Decorating your house? Don't make these 7 mistakes!

SHILPI CHAKRAVARTY SHILPI CHAKRAVARTY
A Modern Family Home: The Nook, Hall + Bednarczyk Architects Hall + Bednarczyk Architects Modern Living Room
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Be it deciding on the wall palette, picking out a fabric for the upholstery or selecting the tiles for the bathroom, the job of an interior designer is a challenging one. Many times, clients come across picture perfect interiors in magazines & wish for a similar setting when their own place is being decorated.  But most of the time, the houses end up with interiors far from those found in the magazines. A possible reason behind this could be our tendency to easily get carried away by the latest trends & turn a blind eye to our creativity, requirement & practicality. And that is where professional experts come to our help.

Even though no rule book jots down how you should decorate your home, we here at homify are going to walk you through a list of 7 designing mistakes that are better avoided. Here we go!

Color Color Everywhere!

Matching colors, fabrics & patterns adorning the entire room—everything seems to melt together, making the room appear much lower in dimensions than it actually is. It is always good to mix & match the fabrics, hues, and styles for upholstery, pillows, rugs, & the like- after all, variety is the spice of life!

Balance is the key when you are all set to decorate your home.  Steering clear of garish notes is essential to limit the theme of decor- a restraint has to be followed between the walls & furnishing elements so that the room does not appear an overkill in spite of its bold accents.

Wrong Placement of Furniture

BIIIG problem! If your furniture is resting against the walls, you will have an empty space in the middle of the room. Besides looking odd, this arrangement also makes the room appear smaller. 

A smart way is to leave a gap of a few centimeters between the wall & the furniture, if you prefer an open space- this makes the walls appear to be farther away than they actually are. The image aesthetically proves this point.

It is, however, a better practice to position furniture centrally together, to give an illusion of a larger  space.

Dark Wallpaper

Dark colors can be employed to enhance the visual appeal of a room. However, going for a dark shade of wallpaper in a room that already has dark colored elements makes the room look smaller than its actual size.

A clever way is to restrict darker shades to the wall, and opt for a lighter color scheme for furnishings, furniture & other accessories. This will add an inviting stance to the room alongside making the space airy and open.

All Hands on Deck!

Going on a decorating spree to glam up every nook & cranny is a BAD idea. Filling up every available spot with decor items, souvenirs, and other trinkets leaves you with a jarring mess that looks less of a decorated space & more of a glaring confusion.

The really smart way out is to create seasonal collections, whereby you pick & choose items to display and put away everything else in a closet. This way you get to use all of them turn by turn, changing them regularly rather than creating a chaotic arrangement.

Short Length of Curtains

If the length of your curtains is too much on the lower side so as to make the curtains hang halfway to the floor, the ceiling will appear to be much lower & the room, smaller. Matte curtains hanging from the curtain rail put as close to the ceiling as possible & falling on the floor are a great option—they make the room appear larger, restrained matte texture helps focus the attention onto the room as compared to a glossy texture, and full length of the curtains allows the illusion of a high ceiling. Practicality replete with grace!

Furniture Overdose

Too much of furniture practically hogs all the space, hampering easy movement. Shifting the extra furniture to the other rooms & avoiding placement of the furniture in front of the windows helps create the impression of depth & spaciousness apart from facilitating clear views of the outside in absence of visual barriers.

A recliner could be conveniently placed in the bedroom to have a comfy place for enjoying your favorite reads while lounging with a cup of tea.

Shabby Lighting

A room without proper lighting commensurate with the interior space makes the room appear small, dark & dreary. The right thing to do is to ensure that the lights are selected as per the requirements of the space and are properly spread out across the room- this will make the entire room look bright & well lit, with the extra light reflecting on the walls to light up the dark corners & lifting the aesthetic appeal of the whole space. Look at this wonderful radiant living room!

What would you suggest for fixing these design blunders?

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