All About Home Decor

The commonest flaws in do-it-yourself design

Home decor is an intensely personal and idiosyncratic thing. But if style is human, to err is human also. In every room and in every home decor style, the same decorating mistakes tend to occur again and again. Learning all about home decor mistakes will help you avoid these common pitfalls when you renovate your house or apartment.

Measure for measure

In home decor, size matters. Your floor plan may be the room of your dreams, but it's going to be composed of concrete items in a confined space. Take the time to measure a room before you furnish it, or you may find that your new clothes dresser prevents you from fully opening your bedroom door. Scale is also an aesthetic element of home decor, and knowing the size of your furnishings will help you to choose appropriately sized home décor accessories.

Let there be lights

Relying on one or two identical light sources is a chronic home décor mistake. Choose lights that complement a room's primary uses, and pay attention to brightness levels. A sculptured floor lamp may look great in a retail show room, but the 40W bulb it uses will make your bedroom as bright as a back alley. Great home decor utilizes table lamps, floor lamps, overhead lamps, and reading lamps, often in the same room.

Colorblind

Home decor guides often recommend using neutral colors in a primary home space. That's not a bad idea, but neutral is not the same thing as bland or boring. Try to find neutral colors that are playful or warm, or that exude a particular quality that you find appealing. Another common home decor color mistake is using colors that are too light for the size of the room. Larger rooms need darker colors to provide texture and depth.

Getting squirrelly

If you've ever lived near a tree full of squirrels, you know that they like to bury things all over the place. The distribution of home decor accessories in a room can often resemble a squirrel's handiwork: scattered, nonsensical, and busy. Home decor accessories should serve a stylistic purpose. If you have a number of small curio items, locate them in a curio cabinet rather than singly or in pairs all over a room.

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