8 Home Decor Mistakes to Avoid

Don’t forget to dress up your windows, as quality curtains can make a room shine.

You found the perfect place and can’t wait to set it up in a way that reflects your personal style. You know where to begin decorating, but do you know where to stop? Less is more when it comes to decorating your new apartment, so avoid the following decor mistakes for a place everyone will want to come visit.

Too many bathroom accessories
It was never stylish to have a fuzzy toilet lid cover, toilet mat and bath mat in your bathroom. The former two have no purpose, so stick with what works – a simple, comfortable, rectangular-shaped bath mat in all bathrooms that you and your guests will love to dry their feet on.

Photos of only yourself
Guests and visitors might be freaked out when they are surrounded by so much… you … in your own home. They want to see (and you should too) memories of friends and family, not just candids of yourself looking great. This also applies for wall-sized portraits, paintings or drawings of yourself. If they’re of your children, that’s fine.

Rooms that are too themey
At beach houses, tropical prints seem to invade every room, but don’t let that happen in your own home with any print or theme. Keep the prints to matching comforters, curtains and shams, but alternate with solid color pillowcases and similarly colored throw pillows. Choose a paint color in a complimentary, but not totally matching, shade.

Bulky furniture
Ideally, each room should have a purposeful flow, with mixtures of textures, a combination of light and dark colors and only one big piece of furniture per room. If you have a small living room, don’t decorate with a dark-colored sofa, an oversized television armoire and a chunky coffee table. Instead, lighten up with a glass-topped table or smaller television stand, and measure the room before you purchase anything new to make sure it will fit.

Uncomfortable furniture
Furniture is expensive, so make every piece count. Don’t purchase straight-backed, stiff dining room chairs or a loveseat with little padding just because it was cheaper. Surround yourself with soft, purposeful furniture that makes everyone feel welcome.

Collectible overload
There’s a big difference between a collector and a hoarder. Collectors select one item to collect and display it in one place; hoarders collect everything and display it everywhere. If you love miniature horse figurines and must display them, confine them to one glass-front cabinet, and realize when you’ve outgrown some collections – such as stuffed animals – and store them in bins in the attic or give them away. If you can’t bear to do that, regularly rotate your knick-knacks out with others.

Floating rugs
One of the basic rules of decorating with rugs is that the rug should be anchored by a piece of furniture. The bigger the room, the bigger the floor rug needs to be, so don’t put a runner in the largest room of the house. The ideal rug-to-room look is to put furniture feet on the edge of the rug.

Forgetting the windows
Quality window treatments can make a room, so do more with the windows than just relying on the plastic blinds that come with each apartment. Hang curtains two inches above the window to visually increase the room’s height, and here, quality really does count. If you have solid-color bedding, curtains in a complementary print work well.

Photo Credit: iStockphoto/robophobic