Decorating is so fun, but sometimes it’s easy to go overboard. Too much decorating, or the wrong kind of decorating, can make your house look more like a monster than a model home. I’ve gathered some tips & ticks to help fix decorating mistakes that make your house look messy. If you follow these pieces of advice, your house will look lovely without looking overwhelming. Good Luck!
Refinery 29 recommends keeping your furniture away from the walls. If all of your furniture is up against the walls, the space will look cluttered and messy. It’s much better to evenly space the furniture in your room.
Eat Sleep Decorate suggests hanging pictures in an organized and balanced fashion. If you hang too many pictures everywhere, they can be overwhelming. But if you place a choice few in a pleasing arrangement, they can help beautify a room.
Refinery 29 recommends making sure the scale of your furniture is similar. A mix of scales can make a room look thrown together, rather than tastefully designed. It’s also nice to align things, like in this picture. It’s easier on the eyes.
Domaine Home recommends fluffing your pillows in your living room. When pillows are flat and disheveled, the entire room looks messier. All you have to do is give your pillows a quick fluff, and the whole room looks fresher and cleaner.
A disorganized pantry makes for a disorganized and messy house. Chez Larsson posted a pantry redo that puts every pantry thing in its place. Instead of looking like a tornado (like my kitchen), this kitchen pantry enhances the entire home!
Aimee Weaver recommends organizing and decorating the entry way to your home. Since that is the part of the house that first greets visitors, it’s imperative that it makes a good impression. If it looks messy, the whole house will look messy!
The Budget Decorator recommends tagging your storage pieces so that things are easy to find. There’s nothing worse than buckets and baskets filled with all the wrong things! What you really need is to add cute little tags!
Poofy Cheeks posted a tutorial for hiding electronic cords that is just brilliant! TV cords make family rooms look so messy, but with a little DIY action, you can make your TV area one of the best in the whole house!
Decorating Your Small Space posted an idea for organizing stuffed animals that would help make your toy room sparkle. Just built a wooden box with bars for the sides and then stuff your bears inside! Cute and definitely clean!
My Paradissi posted photos of a beautiful apartment in Sweden that utilizes shelves to keep things organized and clean. You don’t want a lot of clutter on shelves, that will defeat the purpose. But tasteful and sparse decorations on shelves can make a huge impact in  your home!
Remodilista posted a beautiful home that is very minimalist and oh so beautiful. The key here is to make sure you get rid of clutter. Countertops should be essentially barren. Too many things clustered around, and your kitchen will turn into a mess rather than a beauty.
Some of the tips are really interesting and even easy to implement. For example: not putting the furniture against the walls, keeping the pantry clean and tidy and giving a neat look to your entrance by keeping an organizer. But not everything is easy to implement like tagging things in the storage space. This is bit difficult as no one finds time to label things while putting them in the storage space.
I keep a sharpie, paper and packing tape in my storage room and label as I go.
Great
Setting furniture away from the walls is nearly always the first thing on any decluttering list. For good reason. But many people (like me) can’t afford a place with such expansive rooms
As an alternative for those like me, it helps to be disciplined and place fewer pieces in the room than you might otherwise. This should leave some bare wall areas which can give the impression of larger space.
If you have a small living room & pull the furniture away from walls then ALL the furniture would be in the middle of the room. THIS idea simply doesn’t apply to everyone, because some of us don’t have the luxury of living in a 2500 sqft home.
Thank you for the advice. Your website really helps me in decorating my home.
This is a topic that’s close to my heart… Take care!
Exactly where are your contact details though?
Yeah, so there’s no tutorial on hiding cords – at least none that I could find. All you get no matter what you click on, is the photo with the messy cords. Can you provide the link? Tried clicking on the name of the blog, the photo….nada.
Hi Sandi
| am retired but when I was working, our IT guy bought some rubber piping from the hardware store and threaded all the computer cords, etc. through this piping and he moved the lot to a side of the desk that you could not see and the cords would be safe. Perhaps you could apply this to your cord problem.
Shirley
I like that idea Shirley. Will have to look for that rubber tubing. Thanks for the tip! 🙂
I use the white plastic covers for shower curtain rods to cover my cords. They cost about $4 and I like them because they are slit down the length so you don’t have to thread the cords through
I don’t know any links but at my house we coil up the extra lengths of cords and the cable box and zip tie them together and mount it all where ever we can hide them best like behind our corner wall mounted tv in the family room it’s all zip tied to the wall mount leaving only one small white cord that is visible mounted to the wall that goes to the outlet and in the formal living room it’s all inside the entertainment center you can find all sorts of cord hiding and mounting gadgets at most electronic stores or home improvement places
Thank you.
You can attach the power cord to the back of the piece of furniture and put excess length of cord inside toilet paper rolls.
If you click on Poofy Cheeks right at the beginning Of he paragraph it takes you to a link explaining what he suggests to hide he cords .
In search put “keep cords hidden” it will show you lots of ideas.?
Just run the cord down the back leg of the furniture and secure in place with tape then it disappears.
And with picture arrangements, always keep the top row of paintings flush, as in even. NEVER hang paintings too high~ eye-level, almost exact center between ceiling & floor. Always decorate in odd numbers~ much more pleasing to the eye…whether it’s items on a mantel or beads on a necklace. AND, every room needs a touch of red.
Well this seems to be your preference but not desirable for everyone. Especially the
red color. A home is what each person makes it not what is a set of rules.
Well a touch of red is just a suggestion, but trust me, you’d be surprised by how much it adds. Odd numbers and paintings are pretty much rules of design. Especially odd numbers. Try putting two or four beads on a necklace, then change it to three or five. Unbelievable difference. Studies have shown people stare longer at odd numbers. They are much more aesthtically pleasing. Same with portrait art. General rule of thumb: No teeth. Imagine The Mona Lisa smiling?? Again, studies have shown that people stare longer at portraits with no teeth. They are more intriguing. And hanging a painting too high can absolutely ruin it.
I hate red
Always a touch of black! Classic , statement making, neutral!
Sure, whatever you want! Like I just said to someone who suggested yellow, that’s a great color as well. But you’d be surprised what a touch of red could do, whatever your taste or colors. No matter how small. An interior designer told me that years ago, and I’m always surprised when there’s no red in a room, and a little splash of it adds so much…
Give the red a rest already!!
Im with you Tara. A touch of the roght shade of red rocks!
Right!
One of my favorite TV personality interior designers recommended the same thing. Good choice!
When you say hang pictures at eye-level, whose eye are you talking about. I have family members that are 6’4″. I am 5’5″.
I wouldn’t go by exact height. They should just never be too high, that’s the worst. Too low is bad, but high is awful. I would say a little bit about the center of the ceiling and the floor for a typical painting.
I think every room needs a touch of yellow. It ‘s like a bit of sunshine.
Yellow is great as well! You’d be surprised what a touch of red could do, though, if you give it a shot. Even if it’s just a little knick-knack…
I totally agree, especially the red part;)
Yes, and those pictures are too high!
I am speaking of the pictures hanging on image 5 of 12.
Since this is the first time on your site, I could not have written this before. However, a good idea is worth repeating and not scolded for trying to help. Don’t worry, I won’t bother a second time.
Your top was helpful.
I liked your idea!!! My IT guy suggested the same. The piping works great when using flush with the hard plastic wall cord covers (for mounted TVs) to hide the remaining cords because it is so flexible. (I think the argument was about using colors in a room…). Thanks for speaking up Shirley!!
Can you give the name/maker of the mirror cabinet pictured on bottom photo? Thanks!
Regarding the idea to put all pantry items in see-through containers is double work for me. I still have whatever is left in the box to contend with. I neatly arrange items in boxed, cans, or glass (all original packaging) containers. Eliminating the need to buy other containers and to store the original package. Also, I need to check directions or “sell by” dates – all on original packages.
Any ideas for hiding a lamp cordfor lamp needed next to sofa when outlet is across the room?
I like it all.
When making the “stuffed animal jail”, instead of bars use colorful bungee cords and the stuffed animals can be removed easily to cuddle with or clean.
Great idea! I love the animal “cage” best of all the ideas.
In my family room we have 1 wall ( also has large picture window ) that is a red cranberry color and the other 2 1/2 walls are white. Was this a mistake? Have small powder room right off Fam room what colors should go with? I want greys he wants reds or beige.
One thing that really makes a room cluttered is choosing plants that are too small or grouping them like little villages on the floor…. Ugh.
There are ways of hanging a lot if real art on your walls without looking messy. If you have well executed paintings by a famous artist or even a skilled family member the safest place to store this is on the walls. I get somewhat dismayed by all of these web sites just put junk on the walls to complete a look. There is a difference between decor objects that hang on walls and true art. If you have good paintings the room and decor should be designed around the art. Truly interesting homes have original art on the walls. No real art and it is like being in a cheap boring IKEA display. Show you personality and be tidy at the same time. Art matters
Judy
@Lynn
Lynn, not everyone can afford “real art”. But whether one can afford it or not, people hang things on their wall, and decorate their homes in a way that make THEMSELVES happy and so they should. I’ve seen very beautiful “cheap” paintings and other types of artwork. I’ve also seen very ugly, horrid “art” by famous artists that make me wonder just exactly what was going through their mind at that time or what mind altering drug they may have been on. Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder. If you don’t like something in someones home, either don’t look at it or don’t go there.
I totally agree with your statement Judy…..I hang what means something to me.
Once I asked a question about turning a steel tank into a kiln to fire pottery. It was on a site where you could get advice from other fellow potters. By then end of the day people were making such nasty remarks to each other, I delete don’t my question.
Reading some of the post reminded me of how irritable people can become. If the advice given doesn’t fit your situation, move on. I love red, I love yellow, heck I have original art and prints. I’m short and have odd and even numbers of prints hanging. Some are high and a few low. Sometimes I love other people’s decor far more than mine. Hey, thanks for listening.
Bless you, Kathy! Somehow we have become a nation (world?) of easily irritated, irresponsible people who can’t or won’t tolerate the rights of others to their opinions, colors, artwork, etc. Yes, I love to see what others do even though I may go yuck to myself. It’s their opinion as to what makes them happy (and they might very well go yuck if they walked through my house, but it makes me happy). The upside of viewing others’ work is that I often say ooh, I like that; wonder how it would look in my … . Tolerance of each other and responsibility for one’s self is so important. (I am not saying lay down on the sidewalk and let people walk all over you!)