Panache Designs

Are you one of those people that has a large collection of pictures of beautiful rooms torn out of magazines? Perhaps you enjoy sites such as Houzz, clicking your favorite rooms into Ideabooks, or maybe you are a Pinterest pinner, creating hundreds of pictures of favorite rooms on your boards. You might even go the extra mile--and create your own beautiful rooms using Olioboard.

If perusing all these wonderful sites leaves you wanting more personality from your own rooms, I am going to help you with some design tips that you can incorporate into your own rooms by avoiding some of the very common DIY decorating mistakes. Your room can be designed with more style and personality by avoiding these common mistakes.

10 VERY COMMON DECORATING MISTAKES--

TO AVOID

1. Ignoring the focal point

2. Poor furniture arrangement

3. Lack of interest

4. Poor traffic patterns

5. All matching tables

6. Lack of architectural interest

7. Room is open to the next room, but looks like a separate appendage

8. Overdone florals, plastic plants & other artificials

9. Ineffective use of accessories

10. Value of room does not match value of home

1. Ignoring the focal point- Every room has a window, some have a fireplace, then there is the ceiling height -- which one of these is your focal point--HIGHLIGHT that feature.

Picture courtesy Better Homes & Gardens BHG.com

Play to the ceiling height with a chandelier and draperies hung from the ceiling height. Picture courtesy of Better Homes & Gardens.

picture courtesy Houzz.com

These windows cannot be ignored! It's all about the view here. The simplicity of this room is very cleverly designed to further draw your eye out thru the window to the magnificent sea view.

DO NOT IGNORE YOUR

ROOM'S FOCAL POINT!

photo courtesy rashoncarraway.com

Isn't this just beautiful! The ceiling is definitely the focal point, but would not be accented enough without the drum chandelier to draw your eye upwards. Keeping the colors neutral really really allows the home's focal to show.
Thanks for the work Mr. Goodwill Hunting (Rashon Carraway) I am definitely a fan of your style now!

2. Poor furniture arrangement- Do not play "ring around the room." BELOW

picture courtesy designlike.com

This is a classic "ring around the room", everything pushed against the walls, creating a too large conversation area. We can forgive this picture, because it was highlighting the beautiful orange tones coming in 2012. Their use of the orange in the carpet and furniture looks very appealing and eye catching.


picture courtesy BHG.com

This is a beautifully arranged room from Better Homes & Gardens. The temptation in a small room like this would be to push everything against the wall, but the designer did not fall prey to the fault. Furniture is perfectly positioned to enhance the room size as well as create a cozy conversation space for 6 people.

3. Lack of interest--Boring walls, boring furniture, and boring accessories. With the variety of styles, colors, DIY advice and availability in various price ranges, including "thrifting", there is lots of inspiration to help you in decorating your home.

GIVE YOUR HOME SOME LOVE!

All the above lighting fixtures available thru Curry & Company from local retailers and designers

All of the above art pieces available from Zatista Art Gallery online. Check out Olioboard.com and see some of Zatista's pieces used used in mood boards as the foundation for furnishing the room.

Pillows provide color, texture and interest. They are the least expensive home accessory.

Budge worthy pillows can be found at Etsy shop, Pillows by Janet, this will fall into any decorating budget. Available in many colors, sizes 18 x 18.

4. Poor traffic pattern. Where there is a door, doorway, or a
        you must allow egress. This is best for visual effects and for safety is a
minimum of 36" and wider 42" thru doorways or passing thru to next room

5. All matching tables. The coffee table is connected to the end
       table is connected to the console is connected to the dining table is.....
   If you pick up any decorating magazine, in any style, the most interesting
   rooms will be a mix of textures. Designers for years have known this
   secret, and now thanks to HGTV, you can see how to achieve this same
   mix of textures in your home. The days of Room 101 are long gone.
   The following rooms have interest and appeal, even when using all tone on tone colors.

I lOVE this room featured on South Shore Decorating Blog. Each item by itself, is different, except for the little bit of chinoiserie going on with the art and the teal chair. We are looking at Cottage style, Asian Style, Contemporary style, and Colonial style, but this is a room that is so artfully and tastefully put together, then topped off with color appeal, that it is a winner for any home.

6. Lack of architectural interest. These days, with the
soaring prices, most of us are not fortunate to move into that lovely old antebellum home with 16 foot ceilings and 16" wide moldings. Not to mention we don't have 5 fireplace mantles for lovely vignettes. There are many ways to remedy the lack of architectural interest. If you have no fireplace, you can find a lovely old or new mantles to use for the mantle vignette.

Invest in adding molding to ceiling lines, if you have a high ceiling, make the molding wider to enhance the high ceiling line.
If you have a modest sized room, approximately 10 x 12, adding modest molding for that room should be under $300. The impact will be very worthwhile.

7. Room is open to the next room, but looks like a
separate

appendage No, you do not have to have the exact same colors in your Dining Room as your Living Room. However, there should be a carry thru color and a similar style. The two or three areas that are viewed from a single area have a relationship to each other, they should be in tune with each other, not headed for a separation. You can join them together visually using a color. Look at these pictures, the designer clearly knows and understands the rooms have a relationship.

BHG,com


leeannthornton.blogspot.com.

8. Overdone florals, plastic plants or other artificials.
       I know, I know....Please let me say- "I am a plant and floral person". Well, I should say "I used to
   be a person with lots of plants (real) and florals (artificials)

   Take a look at the following pictures, and shout what you think out loud!

Enough said. Who yelled 80's or 90's? True floral people and true plant people may not be tired of their things, but most of us (me included) have realized that less is more, and plants and florals are just one more dust collector that busy people do not need to deal with. Sometimes just rearranging your own things will help update your rooms. If you have a large sunny space, real plants should be isolated to that area, not spread around. Artificials of floral or plants are definitely dated and they need to be retired.

9. Ineffective Use of Accessories
Accessories in your room are SOOOOO important, there should be an entire Interior Design class devoted to it. Actually, I think there is. There is a lot between 15 pillows stacked up on a sofa and just 1 in each corner. Proper accessories can fill many roles, you can have a neutral living room that comes alive during the holidays by the addition of a few well placed red (or blue or whatever your holiday color is) items.
These pictures will show your just how effective good accessory selection can really make your room memorable.

Below, a very simple kitchen, this room could have been lacking, except for the memorable lighting which serves as task lighting and accessory lighting

Barn Lighting Electric Company

Below, designer could have gone smaller with the mirror, but the proportion of the room would not be served. The large mirror ensures that all accessories have balance with each other.


Spectacular Mirror Placement by Cecile Starin Designs

Below, carefully selected black and white pillows complement and coordinate with the wall art. Can't you just picture a couple of red pillows in place of the black and white ones, giving you a festive look for the holidays. When using pillows as accessories, the rule is to use in uneven numbers. When using your room for entertaining, be ready for those persons to "part the pillows" before they sit down. Strive for a good balance between a great look, and places to sit when entertaining.

Wow O Wow, the lighting! From Lux Source, the room is beautiful without and very spectacular and memorable with the lighting, which is a very sculptural look.

10. The Value of the Room Does Not Match the Value of the Home
We all love a bargain, no doubt, but....... If you are in a million dollar home, you should not be furnishing your entire room from Home Goods, which actually one of my favorite stores. The way to use this very popular establishment is with a piece or two, or maybe just a collection of colored glass vases. They have an outstanding collection of throw pillows, and some great buys in art. Just be aware that a chair that is in the $300 range will sit like and look like a $300 chair, use them in a lessor used room that the Family Room. For a more upscale look, mix and match your bargains with "good bones" in furniture and art. With the continued filling of our retain storefronts and online shopping experiences, of inexpensive furniture and accessories, we are losing out on the "good bones" of a room. Use these pieces mingled with some solid wood tables or 8 way hand tied bespoke upholstery and you will be happier with the room for a longer period of time. If your home is more expensive than the average, some of your art should begin to be limited edition or original pieces.

By the way, did you know there is actually a rule about how much you should spend to make the inside of your home match the outside? The general rule is that your furniture, art, accessories and everything inside your home should eventually equal 15 to 20% of the value of your home.