When first-time condo renters move into their unit, decorating their condo’s features suddenly becomes an important question: they’re stuck trying to fit in all the stuff that serve as a reflection of their individuality and end up with tacky condo decorations and designs that are way off the mark.
Overwhelming yourself and your potential guests with forced designs is a big no-no especially when it comes to a condo unit. To guide first-time condo renters away from committing condo design faux pas, they need solid tips in decorating a condo. Here are 18 of the most common condo design mistakes and condo design tips that will solve the problem right away.
1. Forgetting About The Focal Point
Forgetting about the focal point, the eye-catching piece that gives the room an overall sense of order, might leave the whole condo directionless and bland. Give your condo decorations a focal point by injecting a prominent item, like a huge painting, and work the design from there.
2. Making It Hard to Appreciate a Piece of Artwork
Most first-time renters make this mistake by placing their pieces of artwork too high for people of average height to appreciate. Keep in mind that artworks are supposed to be appreciated, so keep them at an eye-level or approximately 5 feet.
3. Letting Curtains Hang Too Low
Letting curtains hang too low does three things: it makes your room look cramped, your window look tiny, and it blocks out natural sunlight. One of the best decorating tips is to play to the principle of scale and proportion. Do this by hanging the curtains as close to the ceiling as possible and avoid letting it reach the floor. Doing this provides space, height, and natural lighting at the same time.
4. Insufficient Natural and Artificial Lighting
Lighting is one of the important elements of a good condo rental design. Without this, your place will look gloomy and lifeless. Bring life into your room by using more than one light fixture you can freely adjust according to your lighting needs and by enhancing natural light through mirrors and non-intrusive curtains.
5. Failing to Put Natural Light Into Account When Choosing Wall Colors
One of the tips most designers give first-time condo renters is to put natural light in consideration when choosing wall colors. . What they don’t understand is that natural light plays a huge factor in bringing out the true merit of a wall’s color and how the colors of your dining room furniture harmonize. That’s why when choosing a wall color, make sure you’re doing it under natural lighting.
6. Forgetting That Paint Comes First Before Furniture
It happens to first-time renters most of the time: they rush into buying condo furniture only to find that the wall paint doesn’t match the furniture. While repainting is a straightforward solution, it’s still too much of a hassle, especially for first-time renters who just want to relax in their new home. Avoid this time-consuming mistake by taking a fabric swatch of your wall paint and then choosing furniture based on the swatch’s matching color palette.
7. The Improper Use of Wallpapers
Sure, wallpapers are great, albeit expensive design additions to any condo unit. However, putting them in areas that are exposed to moisture and high humidity will only leave the wallpapers bubbled and peeled up, making it one of the interior design mistakes to avoid. To avoid burning cash needlessly, avoid applying wallpapers on bathroom walls and other rooms with no proper ventilation.
8. Not Leaving Space Between Walls and Furniture
Backing up all your furniture against the wall is a lazy attempt at decorating your condo. Doing this is also one of the most common home decorating mistakes first-time condo renters make. What you want to do is to huddle crucial pieces of furniture together to create an intimate atmosphere and breathe life into your condo.
9. Settling For Rugs That Are Just Too Small
One of the many advice experts give when designing a space is never choose small rugs for a big room. Make sure that you’re getting the largest rug you can get as possible for it creates an illusion of an expansive room that plays to the principle of space.
10. Neglecting Proportion
Sometimes, first-time condo renters get too playful with their decorations that it dulled their sense of proportion and end up with disproportionate furniture and fixtures. The only way to handle this is to tone down the energy and keep the design simple and fluid.
11. Focusing on Form Over Functionality
It’s easy to get lured into purchasing furniture based only by its looks. However, what most first-time condo renters fail to realize is the difficulty of fitting a random piece of furniture into an overarching design theme or trying to justify its place on the merit of function. Worst of all, the furniture might not even fit through the door. Before buying a piece of furniture, ask yourself 10 times if you truly need it.
12. Forgetting The Appeal of Uniformity
Leaving your furniture arrangement in chaos and your decorative fixtures in disarray are two great ways to ruin the look of your condo. Keep your eyes in aesthetic peace through uniform furniture and fixture arrangement that plays to the principle of balance and flow.
13. Overcrowding The Room
Overcrowding the room with furniture and random accessories doesn’t make your condo unit look better; it will only make guests think that you’re a hoarder. Keep in mind that less is more and that sense of space is critical in achieving a homely feel.
14. Painfully Monotonous Pieces
It’s understandable to try designing your condo the way you saw it on the catalogue, but your condo might not have the height, space, and lighting required to pull off the look you’ve been trying to achieve, which leaves your condo looking boring and one-dimensional. Spruce up the look by adding pieces that provide a pleasant disruption of the dull colors and style. Make it feel natural by injecting a dose of your personality.
15. Sprinkling Collections All Over The Condo Unit
This mistake combines number 12 and number 14. Overt use of collectibles makes your condo unit look monotonous and cluttered. Remember that less is more. Adding your own twist is not necessarily a bad thing, as long as it isn’t overwhelming. Keep the display of your collectibles on the minimum.
16. Ditching Family Photos From The Living Room
The key to organizing your living room is balance. When incorporating family photos use few, professionally-shot pictures. Avoid swarming every possible surface of your condo unit with family photos of varying image quality. As long as the family photos are of great quality and in well-placed areas like a wall, it will work.
17. Keeping Your Pillows Too Formal
Avoid pillow chopping. The pillow chopping style looks too artificial and gives off a rigid aura that guests won’t find comfortable. Just leave it as is and let the pillowcases’ style and patterns do the work for you.
18. Not Grouping Your Accessories
The grouping of accessories can make or break your condo unit’s overall design. That’s why grouping your accessories according to colors, shapes, and patterns is one of the best condo interior design ideas.
Making the most out of designing a condo for rent in the Philippines is understandably difficult. However, with these 18 common decorating mistakes and their quick-fix solutions, you’re now in a better position to get the best design out of your condo without losing your flair. Of course, having a great condo right off the bat is the best way to start. Save yourself from the constant hassle of trying to adjust the specifications of cramped rooms and make designing your condo unit for the first time a breeze.
