There is no doubt that your home should be filled with things you love, but sometimes, just throwing everything you like at the space is not the right approach to make it feel like a coherent, comfortable and welcoming space, but also, nor is just copying the latest trends you find on Insta or the architectural magazines. No, what you need to do, is work out how to have a home that is filled with the things you love, your personal style and touches, while avoiding the cajon mistakes that make a home look less than put-together and less than the stylish, sophisticated space you have always wanted it to be.
With that in mind, below, we are going to take a look at some common interior design mistakes that you will surely regret if you make.
The Siren Call of Cheap Furniture
Let’s start with a classic blunder: falling for the siren call of cheap furniture. Picture this: you’ve just moved into your new pad, and the excitement to furnish it on a shoestring budget leads you to a place where price tags are low, and expectations are even lower. Fast forward a few months, and that chic-looking chair begins to morph into an instrument of torture, squeaking menacingly at every shift and trapping unsuspecting guests in its flimsy grasp.
The allure of bargain furniture is a tale as old as time, seducing us with instant gratification and the promise of a Pinterest-worthy home without the hefty price tag. Yet, the harsh reality often sets in when these pieces start to show their true colours, unraveling at the seams and leaving us with a mess of particle board and buyer’s remorse. Investing in quality pieces, such as West Elm furniture, may seem like a bank account’s worst nightmare, but it pays off in longevity, comfort, and, let’s face it, fewer embarrassing moments when your furniture decides to spontaneously disassemble itself beneath a guest.
Ignoring the Scale and Proportions
Ever walked into a room where the furniture seemed like it was either on steroids or borrowed from a dollhouse? That’s the result of ignoring the sacred laws of scale and proportion. In the world of interior decor, size does matter. Imagine purchasing a sofa so large it could easily double as a guest room, swallowing up your living space and leaving you wondering if you accidentally stepped into a furniture store. Or perhaps you’ve chosen a rug so tiny, it looks like a postage stamp stranded in the middle of the ocean.
Dressing your rooms with furniture that’s out of scale is akin to wearing clothes that just don’t fit – uncomfortable, awkward, and a glaring reminder that something is amiss. It’s about finding that Goldilocks zone where everything is just right, ensuring your space feels balanced rather than a mismatched jumble of sizes.
Being Held Hostage by Trends
Ah, the double-edged sword of following trends. On one hand, it’s tempting to inject our homes with the latest design fads, transforming them into living embodiments of the current zeitgeist. On the other, slavishly adhering to these trends can leave our spaces feeling dated faster than you can say “millennial pink.” Remember when chevron patterns were everywhere? Walls, cushions, even toasters weren’t safe from those zigzag lines. Fast forward, and the sight of them now induces a collective groan.
When you’re decorating your home you should spend more time thinking about what you can do to create a personal art collection and less time trying to be like the latest showroom trend. Go for objects and furniture that create a unique blend of timeless, modern and personal and you will be winning.
The Perils of Over-Theming
Everyone loves a theme, right? So it can be really tempting to choose a theme and stick to it rigidly when you are decorating your home, This is sure to be a mistake. Sure, it starts innocently enough; a cushion here, a wall decal there, perhaps a lamp shaped like a lighthouse for good measure. But, before you know it, your cosy living room has transformed into the set of a pirate movie, complete with treasure maps and a parrot squawking from the corner, and that will get really old really fast.
Sure, it’s good to be unique with your decor, but there’s being unique and then there’s being the whole wrong kind of quirky. Add a few objects that suggest a theme, sure, but do not make it your home’s whole personality.
Neglecting the Flow of Space
Have you ever visited a home where moving from one room to another felt like navigating an obstacle course designed by a sadistic gym teacher? That’s what happens when the flow of space is neglected. Furniture should facilitate movement, not hinder it. Placing a coffee table here or a shelf there without considering how people move through space can turn your home into a maze of frustration. Imagine leaping over ottomans and sidestepping side tables just to get to the sofa – it’s a workout no one signed up for.
Design your space with traffic patterns in mind, ensuring that there’s a clear path that allows for easy navigation. Your living room shouldn’t require a map and compass to get through.
Underestimating Lighting
Lighting in interior design is like the soundtrack of a movie – it sets the tone and mood. Yet, it’s astonishing how often it’s overlooked, leading to rooms that feel more like interrogation cells than spaces meant for living. Harsh overhead lighting can suck the warmth out of a room faster than a vampire at a blood bank, leaving everything looking sterile and unwelcoming. On the flip side, a room lit only by a single, dim lamp might aim for cosy but land on creepy, like a scene from a horror movie where the next victim is chosen.
The trick is to layer lighting, using a combination of ambient, task, and accent lights to create depth and warmth. Think of lighting as the visual equivalent of a warm hug – it should make you feel comfortable and at ease, not like you’re about to be questioned for a crime you didn’t commit.
Letting Your (Colour) Palette Run Wild
Embarking on a colour scheme for your home can sometimes feel like being a kid in a candy store – so many options and the temptation to try everything. However, just because you can, doesn’t mean you should. A common mistake in the home decor world is letting your home become what looks like some kind of mad psychedelic experience that has gone terribly wrong.
Yes, it is possible to have a clash of colours and for it to look good, but most people simply do not have the right eye for it, and it is much better to choose colours that complement each other, sticking to two or three different shades at most, and allowing one to dominate with the others making up accents. The same is true of patterns for the most part too, unless you are one of those people who really does have a good eye for it, anyway.
Storage Solutions That Solve Nothing
It’s kind of ironic but some of us, on admission to minimise our clutter and create order in our homes can actually end up making more clutter and solving zero problems with our cute new storage solutions.
The allure of having lots of lovely storage solutions is undeniable: baskets, boxes, and bins promising to restore order to our chaotic lives. However, the reality can be that those baskets do not get used or start to overflow, and become a place to collect even more clutter.
The ideal way to deal with storage solutions is to build them into dead space and have them be a natural part of the room, while also only adding storage that will actually be used to practically deal with clutter. Anything else is just more mess.
The Great Wall of Randomness
There’s something deeply personal about the art we choose to display in our homes. It’s a reflection of our tastes, travels, and the stories we wish to tell. However, without a cohesive plan, our walls can quickly transform into a disjointed collage of randomness that leaves onlookers feeling more puzzled than inspired. The Great Wall of Randomness may boast everything from a hastily hung college diploma to a neon beer sign, lacking any form of thematic or aesthetic connection.
To avoid this, think of your walls as curators of your personal gallery. Choose pieces that speak to one another, share a common thread, or at least agree to coexist peacefully. A well-thought-out wall can narrate the story of your life with elegance and coherence, inviting guests to read each chapter without inducing visual whiplash.
As you can see, there are a lot of mistakes it is possible to make when you’re trying to curate a home that you truly love and which will always look great, but look on the bright side; now you know what these mistakes are, you can avoid them and create a truly beautiful home for you and your family, and that will make it all worthwhile, right?
