Everyone wants to live in a home that’s beautiful, comfortable, and functional. Of course, a well-designed space doesn’t happen by chance!
With so many decorating shows, sites, magazines, and more available at our fingertips, it’s easier than ever to take decorating into your own hands and create living spaces like a professional. While this is true, even the most well-intentioned home decorator can go awry without the proper professional guidance from time to time.
If you’ve experienced a decorating pitfall on your journey to the home of your dreams, you’re not alone. The Star Furniture design team has seen its fair share of home decor missteps over the years. Decorating mistakes can be learning experiences for homeowners. That said, how much better to learn from the pros and avoid costly missteps in the first place? Star Furniture is here to help. Check out the 7 biggest decorating mistakes design pros see every day and what you can do to avoid them.
Mistake 1: Ignoring Scale and Proportion
Too often, people bring a piece of furniture home without ever considering its size compared to the room where they intend to put it. As a result, it’s common for furnishings to be too large or too small for the space. No matter how stylish or practical a piece of furniture may be, if it’s disproportionate to its surroundings, it will assuredly disrupt the harmony of the entire room. Furniture that’s too big for a room will make it appear small and closed in while furniture that’s too small for a room can get lost and feel awkward.
With this in mind, it’s well worth your time to measure the room that you’re decorating before introducing any new furnishings as well as each piece that you bring home. This simple step will ensure that you don’t waste time, money, and effort investing in furniture that isn’t the best option for your home. To prevent the unfortunate situation of bringing home a sofa that’s too big for your living room or a dining room table that’s too small, keep these helpful tips in mind from the design pros at Star Furniture:
- After you measure the length and width of a room, be sure to also measure any architectural feature that could affect your home decorating plans, such as a built-in bookcase.
- The room where you plan to put the furniture isn’t the only space the piece should fit in easily. You should also measure the doorways, halls, and staircases that the item has to travel through to get to its final location.
- Document your measurements in a convenient spot, such as your phone, so that they’re easily available when you need to find them.
Mistake 2: Overmatching Everything
When you’re decorating a room in your home on your own, it can be tempting to go to a furniture store and buy an entire living room or bedroom set right off the showroom floor. The thought behind this approach is that there’s no question about whether or not a group of furnishings go together; they’re all made from the same materials and conceived as a unified group.
It’s true that matching everything in a space is an easy way to put together a space, but while you might take the risk and guesswork out of home design, you also lose the personality and warmth. An overmatched room doesn’t merely look outdated, it can also look flat and uninspired. If you’d like your living spaces to look like they were curated by a professional designer (and who doesn’t?), it’s much more effective to play with texture, color, and patterns to achieve a look that is dynamic and unique.
Mixing patterns and prints doesn’t always come naturally for everyone and that’s okay. The Star Furniture design team has some tried and true tips to help you put together rooms that are cohesive, balanced, and, most importantly, interesting:
- A little goes a long way. Choose one piece in the room to bring in a bold pattern or vibrant accent color, such as an armchair in your living room or an ottoman at the foot of your bed.
- When using more than one pattern in a space, you can’t go wrong with classic combinations, such as stripes and polka dots.
- Anchor the space by using one item as your color inspiration for the whole room, such as a painting. Then, incorporate two or three colors from the piece throughout the room through accessories, such as throw pillows.
Mistake 3: Neglecting Lighting
There’s nothing more lackluster than a well-decorated room that is dark or not properly illuminated. Unfortunately, this is one decorating blunder that the Star Furniture designers encounter frequently. Either a room is lit up by one inadequate overhead light fixture or an assortment of lamps that serve no specific purpose. This causes otherwise beautiful homes to look small, dark, and dated.
The lighting in your home will play a major role in its appearance and ambiance. Because of this, lighting fixtures should be incorporated strategically, not haphazardly. If you know the lighting in your home could use a facelift but aren’t sure where to begin, the trusted design team at Star Furniture has you covered. Keep these practical tips in mind to utilize the lighting in your home like a pro:
- Don’t just buy a lamp because you think it looks nice. Instead, choose specific light fixtures for particular activities. For instance, you’ll probably need a desk lamp in your home office to make reading papers a breeze. Likewise, a floor lamp next to your bed would certainly prove to be useful and convenient.
- Don’t rely on one light source to illuminate an entire room. Using a variety of layered light fixtures can help you achieve the warm, balanced look that makes magazine advertisements so attractive. To layer the lighting in a room, be sure to have a bright overhead light, a couple of task lights, and finish it off with tasteful accent lights.
- Make the most of every bit of light that’s available in your home by hanging mirrors across from windows and light fixtures. This will maximize both natural and artificial light, making your home feel spacious and open.
- Natural light is your friend. Let as much sunshine into your home as possible by keeping your windows free of bulky furniture or curtains.
Mistake 4: Forgetting Functionality
Your home should be a place where your life can be comfortably lived. If your home is decorated in such a way that it’s always ready for a photoshoot but you’re too scared to mess something up to relax or entertain in it, something has to give. After all, what good is a house that you can’t truly live in?
For this reason, be sure to prioritize functionality when thinking about how you’d like to decorate a room in your home. Luckily, it’s possible to balance aesthetic appeal with practical needs. Beautiful homes can also be livable. To help make every area of your home as functional as they are attractive, here are some tips from the interior designers at Star Furniture:
- Bring in furniture with hidden storage whenever possible. This will allow you to keep everyday essentials easily accessible while being neatly tucked away when they’re being used, such as throw blankets.
- Be sure there are the appropriate places to keep your belongings organized in every room, such as a rack for shoes by the front door, hooks for keys and pet supplies in the mud room, and bins in your bedroom and bathroom to throw dirty laundry.
- Don’t waste an inch of space. If you’ve always wanted a home office but don’t have an extra room to create one, transform the empty corner of your living room (or other large room) into a productive workspace with a small desk, cozy chair, and stylish table lamp.
Mistake 5: Playing It Too Safe with Color
Decorating with color can be a daunting task. Even folks who appreciate bold, playful colors can be overwhelmed by the thought of trying to decide which colors to pair together and how. Unfortunately, this can lead homeowners to play it too safe with color, leaving their living spaces feeling bland and stark. You don’t have to take a shot in the dark and hope you get lucky to decorate with color in a way that’s compelling and fresh. On the contrary, it’s possible for everyday homeowners to use color with confidence in every area of their home. The Star Furniture experts are here to show you how:
- Choose the right color for the space. While your favorite color might be lime green, that’s probably not the best color choice for your bedroom where you go to rest and relax. With this in mind, consider how a color makes you feel before bringing it into certain rooms in your home.
- Don’t go overboard with color. Stick with one or two accent colors to highlight in a room, being sure to pair them with a space that’s predominantly neutral so that it doesn’t look too busy.
- Invest in neutral furnishings, such as your sofa and bed, then brighten things up with colorful accessories. These could include pillows, area rugs, curtains, and lamps. This will allow you to easily change things up as you like.
- Bring a room to life without going overboard with color by creating an accent wall. Highlighting one wall of a room with a unique paint color or wallpaper is a simple technique that can make a big statement in your dining room, living room, or even your bedroom.
Mistake 6: Hanging Art Incorrectly
There’s a reason that art looks stunning in rooms coordinated by professional designers. It’s not just that they choose pieces that perfectly complement the surrounding decor (although that’s certainly part of it). The secret is understanding how to properly hang wall art so that it elevates the space.
The wall hangings you incorporate into your home should be as intentional as any other furnishing or accessory. Finding a photograph or painting endearing is not reason enough to display it front and center in your living room. On the contrary, there are guidelines for displaying wall art that can help you take your home’s overall style to the next level. Check out these tips from the trusted Star Furniture team to hang the art in your home properly:
- Choose pieces that are the appropriate scale for the wall. Art that is too small will inevitably get lost on a large wall while art that is too large for a wall will overwhelm the space.
- Avoid hanging pictures too high or too low. The goal is to have the center of the piece be about eye level. Of course, this won’t be exact since everyone’s eye level is different. A good rule of thumb is to hang pictures 57 inches from the ground.
- If grouping multiple pieces together on a wall to form a collage, be sure to leave two to three inches between each piece as well as between the pieces and any surrounding features, such as doorways or furniture.
- As with many other aspects of home decorating, remember that less is more when it comes to hanging art on your walls. Let a few of your favorite pieces make a statement in your home rather than striving to fill every inch of available wall space with a frame.
Mistake 7: Clutter and Lack of Focus
The quickest way to take away from the visual appeal of any room in your home, big or small, is to clutter it up with unnecessary pieces. Whether it’s a stack of books on your nightstand, a pile of clothes draped over your armchair, or random knick-knacks strewn about your living room, clutter can single handedly sabotage even the most style-forward living spaces. Oftentimes, homeowners don’t even realize how cluttered certain areas of their homes have become because they’ve grown so accustomed to disorganization.
Once you recognize that your house is cluttered, the hardest part is behind you. You can then move forward in letting go of the items that are holding your home back from reaching its full potential both aesthetically and functionally. Of course, decluttering isn’t always easy, especially if you have a lot of things to get rid of. For this reason, the Star Furniture design team has some helpful tips to ensure your decluttering journey goes as smoothly as possible:
- Ask a friend to help you declutter your home. They will be able to hold you accountable while offering objective advice about what’s worth keeping and what you should let go of.
- Strive to keep the surfaces in your home as clear and open as possible, such as the top of your dress, the side tables in your living room, or the console table in your entryway. This will help your rooms feel bigger while leaving plenty of space for people to set things down when they need to.
- Utilize storage solutions as much as possible to prevent the clutter from coming back. Before you bring new items home, ask yourself where you’re going to store them or what you’re willing to get rid of to make room for them.
Decorate Your Home Like a Professional with Star Furniture
From ignoring the scale of a room and overmatching everything to not lighting rooms properly and hanging wall art incorrectly, the design team at Star Furniture has seen every home decorating mistake under the sun. Luckily, this means that we’re well-equipped to help you overcome them if you encounter one for yourself. If you’re trying to put together rooms that look like they were professionally curated but are somehow falling flat, we’re here to help. Stop by our showroom today to learn more about how you can gain a balanced, informed perspective by working with a Star Furniture designer.