Over the past 15 years as an interior designer, I've visited numerous households, each seeking design assistance. Additionally, I've received requests for help from friends, family, and through social media groups. Here are the ten most common mistakes I've encountered, along with my solutions to address them.
Design Mistake No. 1:
Identity Crisis Design
If your favorite food is sushi, you probably shouldn’t hire an Italian chef. Not knowing what you want opens you up to everything, and in design, that is not a good thing. Asking for general advice is all good and well, but when you don’t know where you are going, you are going nowhere or worse, everywhere. When you purchase furniture relying on the advice of 5 different designers, professional as they may be, you will be disappointed with the patchy end results.
To achieve true harmony in a designed space, you must follow a specific blueprint of colors, materials, and inspirations. If you want to discover your style, you must try this style test and find out.
Design Mistake No. 2:
Clinging to Clutter
Like a makeup artist needs a clean face to start creating a beautiful make up, When you want to update the design of your room you need to start from a clear space. The common question people always ask is ‘what can I add to the space,’ instead, look at your room with fresh eyes and ask ‘what here needs to go’. Declutter first. After discovering your style with the style test, this mission should be easy. Anything that fails to align with your fresh vision, evokes negative memories, or simply no longer serves a purpose should to be removed. Look especially for those little décor pieces you keep cleaning dust off even though you can’t stand looking at them anymore. Old faded color cushions and bed sheets, anything broken, old, irrelevant pictures, and so on. Here is one of the best tips, anything you can fit in one or both hands that is just ‘there’ adding visual clutter and no design or functional purpose – to the bin. These little ‘dollar shop’ finds add up fast to making your house look cheap. Notice magazine images and really stylish homes have very few décor items, usually in big proportions.
Design Mistake No. 3:
Impulse shopping habit
Each household has different people living in it, with different needs. Learn your own living habits before beginning your shopping. If you have small kids that play in the living room, no amount of décor vases will help you enjoy the beauty of the space more than a designed basket to organize the toys at the end of the day. If you are a couple that doesn’t entertain often, think twice before getting that beautiful 8-seater dining table. Not only will you enjoy your house more, but you will also invest your money wisely in furniture that will serve a design and a functional purpose. And that is my friend - true life quality. If you are not the organized type and need help prioritizing and creating a shopping list, I have you covered. Just click here to download for FREE my interior shopping guide.
Design Mistake No. 4:
Wrong Storage Solution
An old Chinese phrase says: ‘Get the bigger closet, no, it’s not too big’. If you feel like you never have storage space it’s because you keep buying ‘a dresser just for papers’ and then you need ‘a shelf just for the printer’, and ‘a box just for the shoes’, and 5 months later, ‘a low board just for cables’… and the list goes on. You end up having many mismatched little storage units that accumulate dust, fit nothing in them, and make your space look messy and heavy. The solution here is really easy. If I can offer you the biggest advice on how to keep your house organized, it is to always buy the maximum size cabinet, wall to wall, floor to ceiling. Even if you are not sure what to put inside, or currently really don’t need so much storage, you will thank me later! Measure your space properly and just go for it! Don’t be afraid to commit to a pricey purchase or the scale of the item. We buy small things because it’s easier for us to imagine them in our home. To give yourself extra reassurance, select lighter colors such as white, beige, or light gray depending on your style. If you find yourself still struggling with storage, check out our in-depth storage solutions advice here.
Design Mistake No. 5:
Kitchen Ceiling Crisis
Another place you are literally short on storage is your kitchen. But this time, it's not your fault. Here is a little industry secret: most kitchens are sold in 240cm height or 94.4 inches because they are still manufactured to fit a standard kitchen in the 50s. Many heavy machinery and logistic processes are still to this day adjusted for these measurements, and changing them just won't be a financially wise decision for most companies. However, in the last 50 years, our ceilings have risen by a lot. So, whether you have a small or big kitchen, don’t stop the cabinets mid-wall creating a dust shelf and a visual break in the space. The fix here is easy, insist on having kitchen cabinets that reach all the way to the ceiling, speak with your kitchen company, and try to find creative solutions. Nowadays, even IKEA KITCHENS provides wonderful solutions for this problem, so if your kitchen provider can't do it, consider replacing them. More on kitchen design, you can find in my kitchen design course.
Design Mistake No. 6:
Twilights lights
In the first day of creation, God made light, and for a good reason. If the whole world is beautiful, but dark, how will we be able to enjoy its beauty? Most of you have just one or two light exits in your ceiling and I understand that unless you are going into a massive renovation, this will probably remain the case. So here is what you can do, maximize these one or two lights exits by purchasing track lights that will reach a wider spectrum of the room and make it look bigger, prefer to install lights as close to the ceiling as possible and keep the color and model cohesive, especially in open space situations. Another upgrade will be using wall-mounted lights powered by rechargeable batteries, and of course, table and floor lamps that add not only light but also a lot of chic to a space. Consider purchasing "warm white" lighting, which accentuates the warm colors in the house. Use K 2700-3000K lighting for calmer areas like the living room and bedroom, while K 4000 lighting suits spaces such as kitchens and wet rooms.
Design Mistake No. 7:
Décor Disarray
This one will be short and sweet, throw away all your old floral colorful floral, striped horrible faded bedsheets, bathroom towels, and kitchen cloths and never buy them again. These items always look like they have seen better days and if it wasn’t your own house you know you would probably even get a little disgusted. What to buy instead?! Replace them with white ones. There is a very good reason why hotels always use white towels and it’s not just because they look fresh, they really are fresh! White cloths are actually the easiest to maintain, prolong the use you get out of them by using whitening washing powder and bleach out bacteria. Your white towels will look like new for years and match any design style. (If you dye your hair or have other needs that require darker towels just keep one or two for those days).
Design Mistake No. 8:
Art Apathy Attitude
Not long ago, every piece of furniture we owned was made by a craftsman of some kind, the wallpapers were murals, and the cushions handmade. Since then we have come a long way and thanks to the industrialized world we can buy beautiful and affordable furniture. The problem is, so does everybody else. So how do we make our house unique with a reasonable budget? We use art and family pictures. The logic is simple. Imagine visiting an art gallery, each time the artist on display changes, the whole atmosphere in the gallery changes. Walls are the same, but their energy is different. Not only does art and photos add to the luxurious feeling of the house, but each work of art also has a story, a mood, an energy that is unique. Furthermore, it is a great way to add colors, memories, and playfulness to your space. Here as well, I will encourage you to step outside your comfort zone and get a larger scale than what you are used to. Whether you want to DIY it on the weekend or shop from a variety of independent talented artists online, a big piece of art is a luxury you can afford and shouldn’t miss out on. For your family pictures, treat them as if they were art, print on a large scale in black and white, and invest in a beautiful frame. Find art inspiration within our digital art collection here!
Design Mistake No. 9:
Partial Solutions Pains
I see this one all the time, ‘what to do with the hallway’ ‘help me with this wall’.
I get it, I understand, grasping a space in 3D is hard, it a muscle that needs to be developed and master, and therefore usually only professional designers can easily imagine in 3D. HOWEVER, when you ask for advice, or start working on a section of the house, you have to have contexts. Like any other problem-solving task, also in design, we need to understand all the contributing factors. For example: entrance to and from the space, natural / artificial light, other surrounding furniture that should match the section in question. Who uses this space and how? And of course, as you already know, a clear definition of the style. Giving context to your design dilemmas will get you good answers, and therefore, good design.
Design Mistake No. 10:
Color Crisis
Here is an idea, leave your walls white. You don’t need contrast, accent walls are out since 2008, your house is not cold. Are there some amazing examples out there of colorful walls? Yes, is it possible to get right? Absolutely! Take the challenge if you feel up to it, but more often than not, the result looks cheap. White has much more than 50 shades, and to find the right one to fit your house just borrow or create some samples you can physically check in different rooms of your house in natural daylight. You can find within this constriction a lot of creative solutions. My advice will be to add interest to your walls with 3D texture for a much more sophisticated result: textured wallpapers, big art, trims, molding, big curtains, and decorations on shelves.
By addressing these common design missteps, you'll unlock the full potential of your living space, creating a sanctuary that reflects your personality and enhances your quality of life. Let's embark on this journey together, transforming your house into a home you'll cherish for years to come.
If I got you motivated to start, take the first step, and discover your interior design style here.