Fun Houzz: 14 Signs You’re an Interiors Geek

There are people who like to have a nice home, and then there are the total interiors geeks among us — those who go that little bit further. Perhaps you can’t resist adding to your dream-house ideabook on a daily basis, or you have to be the first to show off a new paint or style trend. Perhaps you’re addicted to real estate photos, finding pleasure in imagining how you would improve the rooms in the photos. Or do you always have a home project on the go, simply because — well — there’s always room for improvement, isn’t there? Read on to discover how many of these classic interiors-obsessiveness signs you recognize — and share your own below.

1. You can make do — beautifully. Even if you’re saving up for your dream furnishings — or still unpacking them — you have enough style to always make a place feel like home on a shoestring.


2. You can spot a favorite paint shade at 50 paces. A quiet cuppa while leafing through a paint catalog is blissful downtime for interiors obsessives. We don’t even need to have a wall in mind; it’s just nice, you know, to explore our options, isn’t it? And besides, there’s sure to be a wall in need of a new look soon.

Wall paint: Breakfast Room Green, Farrow & Ball


3. You have lots of decorative pillows on your bed. Some members of your household may think this extra bed padding is pointless — especially when you insist it must be removed before sleeping and then neatly rearranged again in the morning. But why argue with some of the most luxurious, and equally well-cushioned, hotel bedrooms around the world?


4. You’ve color-coded your books. People who don’t obsess about creating a stylish and inviting home are likely to arrange their bookshelves by type or size, or alphabetically by author. You, on the other hand, can’t get past how much better your books look lined up by color in an invigorating rainbow display.

Never mind that it took you a full day to get the color order just right, or that it could take just as long to find the book you’re after. On the plus side, this way you’ll probably rediscover gems you’ve been meaning to read for ages.


5. You’ve been known to hide receipts. Some might feel a pang of guilt at splurging on a pair of designer shoes or a lavish piece of tech, and knock a chunk off the price when telling their nearest and dearest about their new purchase. But the interiors geeks among us are more likely to fib about how much that feature wall cost to paper — especially if covered in this particularly lovely Fornasetti Nuvole cloud wallpaper.


6. You’ve disguised your TV. Admittedly, it’s a pretty dedicated soul who’ll go to the lengths of disguising an ugly TV when it’s not in use so as not to detract from well-thought-out decor. But for those of us who haven’t managed this level of interiors geekery, coordinating the walls with a flat-screen is surely one for the to-do list, no?


7. You believe a sunny weekend is for … painting! The weather is beautiful, and the less interiors-obsessed among your friends and family are probably out doing things they consider fun: picnics, country walks, messing about by the water.

You, however, see the warm weather as the perfect opportunity for the paint on your latest DIY project to dry faster, whether it’s sprucing up floorboards, upcycling a cabinet or prettifying the garden shed.


8. A classic chair can get your pulse racing. Admit it — you find the walnut-veneered plywood curves of these midcentury Cherner armchairs a little seductive, don’t you?

And you know that, even in the plainest room, a serious designer piece like one of these — or perhaps a Philippe Starck Ghost chair, a Le Corbusier lounger, an Eames rocker or even an original Thonet Bistro bentwood — would show off your style.


9. You know who designed this house. Design nerds like us also know that Charles and Ray Eames didn’t design only chairs. The Eames House, in Pacific Palisades, California, was designed in the late 1940s by the famous creative couple, in collaboration with fellow design giant Eero Saarinen.

The house was part of a group of more than 20 houses by different designers of the era, commissioned to showcase ideas for affordable accommodation for the masses in the postwar housing boom. The Eameses moved into theirs soon after it was completed and lived there for the rest of their lives.

And there are others: artist Carl Larsson’s 19th-century home in Sweden, with interiors designed by his wife and depicted in so many of his paintings; the art deco party palace at Eltham, on the outskirts of London, redesigned magnificently by the glamorous Courtaulds; and Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1930s family house, Fallingwater, in Pennsylvania. These are the sorts of places some of us, ahem, might even plan vacation itineraries around, no?

See more iconic homes worth a trip


10. Your table settings are works of art. When you’ve put all that thought and effort into decorating a room, why let it down with thrown-together table settings?


11. You understand the power of lighting. Even the best-designed rooms can fall short of reaching their full potential without the right lighting. And you know a well-placed lamp or dimmer switch can turn plain into interesting. (You might even have been known to switch off unflattering overhead lights in other people’s homes and flick on all their lamps when they’re out of the room. Tsk.)

How to get your ambient lighting right


12. Even your children’s artwork has to go with the decor. Come on — that wallpaper deserves respect. And it’s not like you’re refusing to display your darlings’ creative output at all — it’s just about adding a bit of color direction to drawing sessions, isn’t it?


13. Your guest room is better than your own bedroom. What’s the point of making something look beautiful if you’re the only one to see it?

How to be a great host


14. You know that details are everything. In other words, when it comes to your home, you’re a perfectionist; it won’t be perfect until every last detail is finished. And we all know that day will almost certainly never come, don’t we?

What do you think makes an interiors geek? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the Comments below.

URL: Fun Houzz: 14 Signs You’re an Interiors Geek http://www.decor-ideas.org/cases-view-id-26174.html