This happens to almost everyone when shopping for their homes. You see an accessory that looks perfect and then immediately you think and conclude: “oh! This will look perfect near my Smart TV”.
What most of us don’t understand is that interior design requires very keen eye and experience. You may be out shopping and then see something nice; that doesn’t necessarily mean it will look perfect in your home. As a renowned interior designer in Lagos Nigeria, from my experience, I understand colors, lightings, room sizes, scales, and placement affect how an item will look in a room. I can tell whether such will make or kill a room design. Except you have some skills, you will be shopping for accessories that don’t fit. So, I will be sharing some common mistakes that almost everyone makes when designing their home interiors and how to avoid them.
Scale in Interior Design:
Scale is the number one mistake that almost everyone makes when it comes to interior design. It takes a talented eye to decorate a room with impeccable scale. Some people put too many small things in a room, thereby cluttering the room and not giving the eye a place to land. While others put too many large or bulky items in one room, making it look stuffed and small. The secret to proper scale is a mixture of different shapes, heights, and sizes. You never want everything in a room to be at the same level or the same size and you can accomplish this with different heights/sizes in your furnishings, art placement, and window treatments. That’s why when I teach students at Simplinteriors School of interior design & Entrepreneurship, I always explain scale and proportion in design saying “when you enter into a room, it should be like a cityscape; a combination of different heights.
Arrangement of Accessories and Collections
Somehow it starts with one little ceramic bird and now you have a collection of birds in various shapes, sizes, and colours that you have amassed over the years. the mistake that most of us make is scattering pieces of the collection throughout our home. One little bird may be on the console table, while another little bird somehow flew over to perch on the coffee table. No matter what the accessory is, it is best to display them in arrangements and groupings. There are some steadfast rules to arranging items into a group like a top interior designer.
Hanging Art
You can turn any wall of your home into your art gallery. Everyone should display some form of art in their home—whether it is a rare oil painting or a cherished drawing from your child’s pre-school days. The roadblock that mostly encounter is how to properly hang art. The best way to ensure there are no mistakes, and nasty nail holes to fill is to trace and cut out the frame’s outline on paper. Simply tape the paper cut-outs onto your wall, trying numerous placement options until you have the desired outcome. Have fun with your arrangements, playing with size, color, and texture.
Painting first
A common mistake that most of us are guilty of is painting first. Put that paintbrush down! You need to pick out the room’s fabrics and main textiles, such as rugs and curtains. Why is this? Because it is simply much easier to find fabrics that we love and then pick out paint to match, while it is much harder to find a fabric that we love, that also just so happens to match the paint we have already put on our walls. So, with a budget and room size in mind, go for a shopping excursion. Look through samples of fabrics, rugs, pillows, etc.… Find what you love and then once you are happy with your design choices, pick out a paint shade or shades from the chosen textiles. Now you can pick up the paintbrush.
Add Character
While it is really fun to look through showrooms that are full of brand-new modern furnishings, don’t get carried away and buy everything at one time and in one place. Doing this is a common interior design mistake—buying everything matchy-matchy, resulting in a home that lacks character. Character is built within your interior design by adding that odd chair you found at the flea market or the amazing painting that a street vendor was selling, says a top interior designer in Nigeria, ME! Try a small shopping excursion on the weekend and slowly over time you will find things you love and build the character of your home.
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