7 Interior Details That Reveal Bad Taste

Sometimes just one or two mistakes are enough to turn a stylish interior into a chaotic and tasteless one. Many elements that were once considered trendy now look outdated, while some items have always been associated with cheapness. We explain what to avoid to make your interior look harmonious and modern.

Multi-level Ceilings with Lighting

Complex ceiling designs, especially when combined with multi-colored lighting, are no longer relevant. They overload the space and make it visually lower. Today, interiors value simplicity and airiness, while multi-level ceilings have the opposite effect, weighing down the atmosphere.

What to Replace With: choose a flat matte ceiling that highlights the lightness of the space, and for extra coziness, use recessed lights or neat hidden lighting.

Design: Olga Maganova

Shiny Glazed Suspended Ceilings

Once seen as a sign of luxury, these ceilings now look cheap. The glossy surface reflects light unnaturally and creates the effect of a plastic interior. They also don't blend well with furniture and quickly become annoying.

What to Replace With: opt for a matte suspended ceiling, which looks calm and current. You can also enhance it with minimalist ceiling lights.

Design: Anna Lutskevich

Furniture Sets in One Style

Groups of furniture from a store where the sofa, cabinet, and table are all designed in the same style create an impression of a showroom. The setup looks soulless and lacks character. This approach is long out of fashion and reveals a lack of taste or desire to experiment.

What to Replace With: combine pieces of different styles and textures, selecting them not by catalog but based on personal feelings—for example, a combo of a modern sofa and a vintage side table will make the interior much more interesting.

Design: Olga Bodrova

Over-decorating

Shelves filled with figurines and random souvenirs turn a home into a warehouse. A large number of small items visually consume space and distract from the design, ultimately making the interior lose its coherence, with objects looking chaotic.

What to Replace With: keep only a few meaningful items that are truly valuable and place them in groups within accent areas.

Design: Alesia Vusevich

Colorful Curtains and Bedding with Prints

Large floral patterns or overly bold prints create a sense of overloading, so instead of an impressive effect, you end up with a country inn aesthetic. Such fabrics quickly tire the eyes and make it hard to relax, plus integrating them into a design is quite challenging.

What to Replace With: choose solid-toned textures in calm shades, and if you need a pattern, use small geometric or abstract prints.

Design: Posh Interiors

Excess Gold and Moldings

The pursuit of luxury sometimes leads to the opposite result: an interior becomes a parody of a palace style. Especially ridiculous is gold and gypsum moldings in standard apartments: instead of sophistication, they create a feeling of excess.

What to Replace With: use minimalist metal or wooden details that look expensive but restrained.

Design: Marina Kirillova

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Laminate in Red Wood Tone

Bright red or orange floor tones are outdated and look cheap, poorly match modern furniture, and give a feeling of an office at home.

What to Replace With: go for natural wood tones, as well as gray-beige and warm neutral shades.

Design: Alena Vlasova

Interior taste is not only determined by the cost of furniture or finishes but also by one's ability to feel harmony. Excess details and attempts to fit into a rich aesthetic almost always lead to failure: to make the space look stylish, it's enough with thoughtful planning and attention to detail.