Living Room Design Mistakes (And How to Fix Them!)

hi everyone it's nick welcome welcome back to my channel okay in this video today we are going to be talking about the top 10 interior design mistakes that i see in people's living rooms now i did a video about like 100 years ago on interior design mistakes in general i mean it was probably like six months ago or something but i mean it's 20 21 time is meaningless at this point like who knows when i did that video but i thought in this series what i would do is i would go room by room and address specific mistakes that i see over and over again in different rooms and today we are talking mistakes in the living room okay mistake number one that i see is not focusing enough on making a cohesive living room so what i see people do all the time is they go to stores you know they like things in isolation and they don't really think about how they are going to play against the other things that are already in their home this is something people do all the time they go to the store they go to home sense they go to whatever and they go oh that's cute and they kind of pick it up they throw it in the cart they bring it home and then they go wait why does this place look like a hodgepodge why does this place just doesn't feel like it all belongs together this doesn't really communicate kind of a singular message it doesn't feel like everything works why is it that i like everything individually in the store and it looks good and it just doesn't work when i get it home that is because i think you're not really focusing on creating a cohesive space if you saw my video last week you know all about this so the gist of it is this if you repeat colors and patterns and shape and texture and design style and different elements in your space you create what's called rhythm and it sort of guides you through your living room to make it feel cohesive and make it feel like everything belongs together so i explained everything in depth in that video but basically what you need to do is focus more on how all these different elements are going to play off each other how they're going to work with the fixed elements that you already have so that you're not just kind of throwing things in together and hope it works but instead you have a strategy on bringing everything together because it's united by either color or design style or size or shape or texture all whole bunch of different things that you can do that helps everything sort of work together remember that nothing in your living room works in isolation everything in your space is going to work and play off of each other so whether it's the paint colors that you're choosing the furniture that you're choosing or the different decor pieces that you have they all have to work together to create a unified living room okay mistake number two that i see over and over again is not enough variation in your color palette so this is almost at first going to contradict what i just said about being cohesive but i promise you it does not when you go and you figure out what your color palette is going to be you should be taking into account the different tints tones and shades of the different hues that you are choosing so remember that if you choose blue and you want to work with maybe really light blue you can work with dark blue you can even work with an off-white paint that has a blue undertone because you're basically working with all the different tints tones and shades that all belong to the color blue does that make sense if not go see my color palette video but basically what i see people do in an effort to be cohesive see point one is they will go okay let's pick blue and they will pick a blue couch and then they will have the exact same blue and they will use that in another couch in the side chair in the pillows they will use it in all the different decor pieces and before you know it you've created the blue room there needs to be some variation in tone right you can have blues that are really more heavily tinted maybe they're a much lighter blue or maybe they're a really dark blue there's a lot of different colors that are sort of made up within blue there's different tints and tones and shades within that color and you need to use all of them or at least several of them in order to create a space that is still interesting so what i see is people just pick a color and then they go great i love this color let's use it a thousand times and you just can't do that in order to create a really interesting and nuanced space you need to create different variations of that color or several colors that basically create a really interesting color palette and that brings me to mistake number three that i see and that is that your furniture is too matchy matchy again sort of like point two but this is oftentimes i'm talking more about design style here this is what happens when you just go to a big box store and you just say you know wrap it up and throw it in the truck like i'm done i'm just gonna take whatever is at the store and you're going to bring it home and you're just going to kind of take it home from an ashley furniture and just roll it into your living room and although it may look cohesive it's going to be boring it's not going to look interesting it's just so matchy-matchy that it lacks personality and it doesn't feel like it's yours it feels like an ashley furniture and that's not really a look that you're going for if you kind of want to elevate your space and make it a little bit more interesting and unique and sort of show your personality because i guarantee you you watching this in your own way you are interesting you have something to say you have some style and you want to express yourself through your home that's probably a big reason why you clicked on this video and you watch my channel and so going in and buying matchy matchy furniture is just not going to accomplish that for you so stick to ways that you can create a cohesive space while still making an interesting space which means picking things that are unified but not necessarily super matchy matchy so you know actually right now i think is doing this really well is studio mcgee if you've heard of studio mcgee it's kind of interesting if you look at a lot of their photos i've noticed something that they do over and over again which is interesting that i think they do quite well and that is that they don't do matchy-matchy furniture they usually oftentimes especially in larger spaces is they will have two couches they will usually have one couch that's really sort of straight and plain and then they will have a little bit more of a funky interesting couch next to it so they might be a little bit different in design style but usually unified by say like a really sort of neutral color palette and that's sort of a way that they can kind of create a more interesting space than if they had just done the same couch times two i think they're kind of a really good example right now that is accessible to most people because i think a lot of people really like that style that they do at studio mcgee where you can create something that is interesting and varied without being super cookie cutter but still feel really cohesive like it all belongs together okay fourth up on my list of living room mistakes is your rug is too small there's really only a couple options here okay there is the first option which is probably going to be what the majority of you do and that is putting the front two legs of your sofa and your side chairs on top of the rugs so get out that tape measure and measure out the rug because you're going to be looking for something that isn't going to carpet to all different areas of the wall but is going to be just enough for the front two furniture legs of your chair and your sofa on top of that rug that is option one option two especially if you have a larger space so this is really only for those who have the really big and grand living room is you can do all the furniture legs on top now those rugs are usually expensive but if you probably have a big grand living room you could probably afford it but basically you can put all four legs of all the different side chairs and the couch on top of the rug that is the second option probably the minority of you are probably going to be able to do that you know if you're living in an apartment or a smaller home you probably don't have the space to do a huge rug so most of you are probably going to have a rug that is just enough for those front two legs what is not happening ever is a rug that is so small that the coffee table barely covers it you know what i'm talking about i'm gonna show you some silly photos because they are just that silly it looks really silly to have a really stupid little mini postage stamp of a rug sitting in the center of your room that's a bath mat okay it's practically a bath mat save it for the bathroom do not put it in the center of your living room this is like kind of non-negotiable here there's not a whole lot of wiggle room so just basically go with a rug where you got those front two legs it's gonna look great it's gonna look awesome and your rug is gonna fit perfectly in your living room every time okay number five on my list of living room mistakes is not enough breathing space around your furniture okay so there's really two reasons for this but let's go through the first one is that you want to make sure that everybody comfortably has enough space to get around the furniture pieces in your space if people feel like their chairs are jammed up against the wall that's not comfortable if they feel like they can't squeeze between your sofa and the coffee table that's not comfortable and here's the good news there's a lot of art and science to interior design this squarely to me fits in the category of science which is you're building a living room for the human scale so humans don't really vary in size that much of course in your living room you want to take into account things like accessibility and mobility so really what you want to do is make sure you have adequate space around your different furniture pieces so that everybody can comfortably get around so you really want to take into account that some people don't have the mobility to be able to get around all your different places so not everybody is really able to kind of shimmy in to get into you know your side chair because they kind of have to get around an end table and maybe climb over the coffee table in order to get there like no that's not how you do it the second reason is also it's too cluttered to the eye if your space looks really cluttered or your furniture pieces are too oversized or everything just feels like it's just too much and too heavy it kind of looks cluttered and it makes it not look fresh and inviting and welcoming so you want to create a beautiful peaceful living room actually enjoyable to be in and part of that is not having a whole bunch of clutter everywhere or pieces are oversized and you can't adequately get around okay number six on living room mistakes is not enough variation in your lighting typically what so many people do is they put the one singular light bulb in the center of the room and call it a day and they don't have really any variation in height on their lighting around their living room so do not rely on the one light what you're really looking for is an adequate amount of ambient task and accent lighting around your living room you're able to create a dynamic environment with lots of different lighting sources coming from different areas at different height levels so that creates a space that is interesting and also functional as well because you know you might sometimes need to turn on a light and that one light in the center of the room is not adequate if you're doing maybe a full renovation and you're trying to figure out what to do with your whole living room you know focusing on things like recessed led strips so that you can sort of have this nice soft glow in your space can be really beautiful that's what i have in my living room here and i love love love it but if you're not doing a full renovation and you're just looking to sort of redecorate and add different lighting focus on lighting at different height levels to create a more interesting and dynamic space so you might have a table lamp you might have a floor lamp you might have task lighting on either side of the couch all these things can be really beautiful and it just varies the light it makes your space a lot more functional but also a lot more beautiful because in the end remember that lighting plays a massive role in how we perceive things okay number seven on my list of living room design mistakes is your place is just boring like boring like we don't like ugh it's just you know here's the thing i think people have boring living rooms and by the way i would define a boring living room as something where it's just one note it's really simple and boring but not there's nothing interesting there's nothing dynamic it's just like you went to ikea you bought that plain gray sofa you put a lot coffee table in the middle and you got maybe a rug you know i'm talking about like that college dorm kind of look you're better than this you know you can do something really interesting and creative that really is signature and reflects you and you know what i think rather than just be judgmental towards people that have boring living rooms i'm going to say this i think it's a lot of it is either people don't prioritize style or design which is fine but it's probably not you because you know you clicked on this video so you obviously somewhat care i think it's because people are kind of afraid i think they're really scared to make mistakes because they're worried that you know they're not their place is just going to look weird or they're going to pick the wrong things or they're going to pick things that aren't in style and a bunch of money on something that ultimately isn't going to look very good and you know in the end i just think that a lot of it is going to be taking some risks and trying out things that you really like so look at different inspirational photos look at pinterest look at instagram the things that i show on this channel and really figure out kind of what you like what is sort of your signature style what is your personality what colors do you really like what design styles do you really enjoy if you have a boring living room which we've all been there i think when you're really learning and starting out that's something that can be a real challenge it's just really focusing in on some of these really basic parts of design by creating something really cohesive identifying a color palette that really speaks to you finding the right design style that works for you combine a couple of different design styles to create something that you think really fits for what you're looking for and just get started okay next up on my list of design mistakes is that your tv is too high now i'm not going to go into a huge amount depth of this remember how i said earlier how there's an art and science well this again is going to fit more in the science category your tv should not be so high that it hurts your neck or it strains your neck and orange people to look at it i have seen some tvs that are absolutely comically outrageously high this is one of the problems sometimes with putting above your mantle or putting above your fireplace and it's not a huge room really reconsider putting that television over top if it's too high it looks silly it looks ridiculous it's kind of like the whole like small rug thing you know what i mean like it's just too high it looks weird what you should be focusing on is things that are at eye level or just above eye level like get out that protractor i think we're talking what 10 maybe 15 degrees is what you should be looking at from your eye level from where you're sitting on the couch to looking up at your television if you're like this looking up at your television it's too high case closed okay tip number nine on mistakes that you're making in your living room is pushing all of your furniture up against the wall i've never talked about this on my channel but i think what is really important for people to understand here is the purpose of a living room why do we have a living room it is largely a space for you to be able to comfortably have conversation with people whether that's your family or if you're not sick of them by now after quarantine or friends when you maybe have friends again you know and this is a room where you can really kind of share with people's company and sort of have great conversation and that is not really conducive when all your furniture is like pushed up against the wall and miles away now i think it's really important to know that i'm not saying don't put any furniture up against the wall like you know my couch here is up against this wall absolutely can make sense especially in a smaller place if you're an apartment that might be just what you need to do and that can be totally fine and again i think the logic here is that i think people are scared of putting a furniture piece in the center of the room because they feel like people are going to stumble on over it or it's just not going to work because it's going to be just floating in the middle of nowhere so if you just focus in on creating that conversation area you're going to be fine but don't feel that you're going to have to push everything up against the wall that is a mistake okay so number 10 on my list this is something that i see all the time and that is people keeping things that they don't like i get this all the time people message me and they say hey i have this rug i have this couch or this chair i have this art and i don't like it how do i make it work you know what it doesn't speak to me anymore it's my old style it's something that i had in my own apartment and it made sense for that apartment it doesn't make sense in this one or you know it fit in that apartment and it doesn't make sense because it doesn't fit in this apartment anymore because i moved whatever your reasoning it doesn't really matter because if you don't like it it's not gonna work like i'm here to tell you that i'm here to give you permission i'm like marie kondo like pick it up and say thank you pillows that i've had in my last apartment that made sense thank you for all the comfort that you gave me now it is time for you to go off onto facebook marketplace for somebody else to enjoy because it's just not going to work it's not going to work i'm here to tell you that i have tried i have tried to go no just give me time i'll warm up to it no you won't warm up to it if you don't like it if it's no longer your style if it doesn't fit with what you're doing if it doesn't fit physically in the space because it's too big or it's too small whatever then it's time to pass that on to somebody else now i'm not promoting a culture of like constant consumerism where you just buy everything and then you know you sell it or you throw it out in the garbage or whatever obviously that is not sustainable you want to be very conscious with the stuff that you are purchasing and bringing into your home i'm a big advocate for that on this channel but i am saying that if you don't like something and it's past its time or you know somebody else can enjoy it and if that someone is not you then i'm telling you there is nothing that is going to save it 10 pieces that are amazing and beautiful that you love are not going to all of a sudden kind of make that extra one piece look any better if you don't like it and it doesn't work it's time for you to let it go and let it move on to somebody else that's it for me for today's video so i'm going to link here to the playlist of these mistakes videos i already have the one the interior design mistakes video i made forever ago and now this one and i will keep adding to this as time goes on so i'll see you all in the next video thanks bye

Channel: Nick Lewis

Views: 670,334

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Id: vozrDybVCrU

Length: 16min 11sec (971 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 10 2021