Interior Design Choices I Like in Other People’s Homes but Would Never Have in Mine

There are plenty of interiors I can look at and think are absolutely beautiful while simultaneously knowing I would hate to live in them. Appreciating a design and wanting to recreate it at home are two completely different things, although Pinterest has done a fairly good job of convincing us otherwise. I can save an image, love every detail and still know that three months after installing it myself I’d be wondering what possessed me.

Sometimes knowing your own limits is a fairly useful part of interior design.

It’s not even that I dislike the choices below. Quite a few of them I really love, and some I’ve tried myself before discovering that apparently my eyes and my brain have different opinions about how much pattern, colour or darkness they want to deal with every day.

Others simply involve a level of practicality, organisation or exposure I’m not prepared to commit to. They can stay in my saved folder, where they cause me absolutely no problems.

Sometimes knowing your own limits is a fairly useful part of interior design.

Very Dark Rooms

I love a dark interior when somebody gets it right, enough that I once painted my own living room black. It looked dramatic, the furniture stood out beautifully against it and for a while I was completely convinced.

Within a year it gave me the icks and I wanted the light back. Admiring dark interiors and actually spending every evening in one are quite different things for me.

That time I painted my living room black.

My daughter has now entered her teenage era and wants her bedroom dark grey. I’ve let her, because it’s paint. Who cares? She loves it, I can close the door, and when she inevitably decides she wants something completely different, we can paint over it. I am far more willing to experiment with dark paint than commit to an entire dark kitchen or expensive finishes that are considerably harder to undo.

Colourful Kitchen Cabinetry

I love colourful kitchens, and I’d actually choose colour over white cabinetry quite happily. Deep burgundy, muddy green, muted blue and soft pink can all look incredible, particularly when the colour works with the architecture rather than feeling as though it was selected because it happened to be fashionable that year.

Cool, but probably a bit too minty for me.

I’d probably always choose a slightly muted version though. Give a strong colour a bit of grey, brown or earthiness and I’m much more comfortable committing to it for years.

I am also hardly in a position to lecture anyone about colourful cabinetry, considering I have a pink kitchen in Spain. Somehow that feels different, although I’m not entirely sure I can make a convincing legal case for why. Perhaps it’s the light, the house or simply the fact that Spain lets me get away with things I wouldn’t necessarily choose elsewhere.

My pink kitchen in Spain.

Either way, I love seeing really bold kitchens in other homes, but for my own I’d still want the colour dialled down just enough that it doesn’t become the only thing I see.

Wallpaper on Absolutely Everything

I love wallpaper, so restraint isn’t exactly my natural position here. I also love those full-on English interiors where patterned wallpaper covers every wall, continues across the ceiling and then meets patterned curtains, upholstered furniture and another pattern on the bed for good measure. I’ve tried pushing pattern much further myself because I genuinely love the look. Eventually, though, I find it overstimulating to actually live with.

For me, wallpaper works better when there’s somewhere for the eye to rest. I can happily commit to a strong pattern across an entire room, but once the ceiling, curtains and upholstery all join the conversation, I start wanting somebody to stop talking.

In somebody else’s country house, I can admire the layers endlessly. At home, I’ve learnt that loving pattern doesn’t necessarily mean I want to be surrounded by every pattern I love at the same time.

A Bath in the Bedroom

I understand why this looks fabulous in hotel photographs. A beautiful freestanding bath beside enormous windows, perhaps overlooking a spectacular view, certainly makes a stronger image than putting it behind a bathroom door. In an actual home, though, I find the whole concept slightly ridiculous. Bathrooms exist for a reason, and I’m quite happy for baths to remain in them.

There’s the humidity, splashing, wet towels and the fact that one person might quite like to go to bed while another is having a bath three metres away. Then there’s simply the visual reality of having a large plumbing fixture permanently sitting in your bedroom. I can enjoy it for two nights in a hotel and think it feels wonderfully indulgent. I just don’t need the indulgence badly enough to sleep next to my bathtub every night.

Glass-Fronted Kitchen Cabinets Everywhere

Glass-fronted cabinetry can be beautiful, particularly when it’s used to display ceramics, glassware or things you actually want to see. A couple of glass cabinets can break up a long run of solid doors and make a kitchen feel lighter. An entire kitchen of them, however, effectively turns the contents of every cupboard into part of the decorating scheme. Suddenly stacking bowls badly has aesthetic consequences.

I don’t want to think about whether the pasta bowls look attractive beside the cereal bowls every time I unload the dishwasher. Nor do I particularly want to see packets, mismatched mugs and all the other perfectly normal things hiding behind my kitchen doors.

Give me a few beautiful glass-fronted cupboards and plenty of solid ones beside them. Some possessions deserve to be displayed and others deserve the privacy of a cupboard door.

Like it would ever look like this...

Open Showers With No Screen

An open shower can look fantastic, particularly in a large bathroom where the flooring simply continues through and there’s no glass interrupting anything. It feels spacious, simple and very architectural.

Unfortunately, water has absolutely no interest in your architectural intentions. Unless the shower area is genuinely enormous, it travels considerably further than you expect.

And then there’s the cold. Shower screens don’t just stop water, they keep a surprising amount of warmth around you, something you notice very quickly when they’re gone. Standing under lovely hot water while the rest of your body is being introduced to a cold bathroom draught rather ruins the spa effect. I’ll take the glass, thanks.

Looks great, doesn't work.

Floating Staircases

Floating staircases can be incredibly beautiful, especially when they’re made from solid timber with very little visible structure. In the right house they almost become a piece of sculpture rather than something purely functional.

I can appreciate the engineering and the simplicity and still feel slightly uneasy about actually using one every day. Open risers are one thing, but add open sides and suddenly the journey upstairs feels rather more adventurous than necessary.

Obviously, there are floating staircases designed with perfectly good balustrades and all the necessary safety considerations. It’s the really stripped-back versions I’m talking about, where apparently the visual goal is to pretend gravity isn’t involved. I’m happy to admire those from the ground floor. My staircase can look slightly less impressive and give me something substantial to hold onto.

Highly Sculptural Sofas

Those enormous curved sofas that seem to float in the middle of a room can look incredible. They’re soft, sculptural and often far more interesting than another rectangular sofa pushed against a wall. In a huge living room, particularly one with views in several directions, I completely understand the appeal. Then I sit on some of them and remember that a sofa has another fairly important job.

Very low seats, enormous depths and rounded backs aren’t always particularly comfortable when you actually want to sit rather than recline elegantly for a photograph. I want to be able to curl up on my sofa, watch television, read and get back off it without requiring assistance. If the sculptural sofa happens to be wonderfully comfortable too, brilliant. If not, I’m happy for somebody else to own the art installation.

No Upper Cabinets in the Kitchen

I love kitchens without upper cabinetry. A long uninterrupted wall with a beautiful stone splashback, a simple shelf or perhaps just a piece of art can make a kitchen feel far less like a kitchen. It gives the materials room to breathe and can be especially beautiful in an open-plan space where you’re looking at the kitchen from the living area. I’d happily choose it if the rest of the house gave me enough storage to compensate.

That last part is doing quite a lot of work, though. Unless there’s a serious pantry, plenty of drawers or another wall of full-height cabinetry, I know I’d miss the storage. Kitchens have an annoying habit of accumulating things no matter how minimalist your intentions were when you designed them. I love the look enough to make it work in the right house, but I wouldn’t sacrifice genuinely useful storage just to keep a wall beautifully empty. Plus, lower cabinets make my back hurt.

A Completely Open Ensuite

An open ensuite takes the bath-in-the-bedroom idea and commits even harder. No proper door, sometimes barely a wall, just a seamless transition from sleeping to showering and everything else that happens in a bathroom. In a boutique hotel it can look very slick, particularly when you’re there for a weekend and nobody has left toothpaste all over the sink. At home, I remain a fairly committed supporter of bathroom doors.

There are sounds, smells, steam, different morning routines and all the other unphotogenic realities that interior imagery tends to leave out. Sharing a bedroom doesn’t mean every aspect of daily life needs to become a shared experience. I like connected spaces, but I also like privacy. The door can stay.

Floor-to-Ceiling Curtains in Very Bold Patterns

Huge patterned curtains can be spectacular. A floral, stripe or graphic print running from ceiling to floor can completely change a room and often gives traditional interiors that layered, slightly eccentric quality I love. The difficulty is that fabric samples are deceptive little things. A pattern that looks fantastic across thirty centimetres becomes a considerable visual commitment when repeated across several metres of fabric.

This probably comes back to the same thing I’ve learnt with wallpaper. I like bold pattern, but there’s a point where I stop seeing the individual pattern and just feel surrounded by it. I’d happily use something with colour, texture or a quieter design on a large curtain. The enormous cabbage roses can live very happily in someone else’s house, where I will enthusiastically compliment them.

Perfectly Styled Open Pantries

I love looking at an organised pantry. Rows of glass jars, labelled containers, baskets lined up neatly and absolutely no evidence that food has ever been sold in ugly packaging. It’s extremely satisfying, right up until I imagine maintaining it. Decanting absolutely everything you buy into another container for the rest of your life is a domestic commitment I’m not prepared to make.

There’s also the inevitable awkward amount left over that doesn’t fit into the jar, so now you have the beautiful jar plus half a packet hiding somewhere else. I want my pantry organised enough that I can find things and know what we have. Beyond that, the pasta is welcome to remain in the packet it arrived in. My pantry doesn’t need its own visual identity.

Some Things Are Better in Someone Else’s House

Knowing what you like is only part of decorating a home. Knowing what you can actually live with is probably more useful, and unfortunately you sometimes only learn that after painting your living room black or covering one pattern too many. I’ve become much better at separating the things I love looking at from the things I want around me every day. It doesn’t make me appreciate those interiors any less.

And there’s something quite nice about not needing to own every design idea you admire. I can visit a house with a black living room, wildly patterned curtains, a floating staircase and an open shower and genuinely love all of it.

Then I can go home to the choices that suit me, close the doors on my cupboards and shower somewhere warm. Some design ideas are much more enjoyable when somebody else has to live with them.