People Share What Modern Home Trends They Find Annoying, And Here Are 40 Of The Worst Ones
If you're decorating a new house and don't know where to start, you might spend hours browsing Pinterest mood boards. Looking for new ideas and trying to figure out your style and what's considered in this year can be exhausting. But remember one thing—home design trends come and go. While some of them turn out quite nice, others might be expensive and inefficient.
Reddit user u/wazzel2u raised this question in r/AskReddit: “What is a terrible trend found in new home design?”, and more than 5K people replied. Whether it's lack of storage space, hollow interior doors or open concept bathrooms, the comment section under their post is full of some of the worst design solutions that you should leave behind.
Bored Panda collected some of the most messed-up decor tendencies shared in this Reddit thread. If you have some insights on the topic, don't be shy and share them below!
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The lack of secret bookshelf doors. I mean, who designs their custom home and does not include a bookshelf secret door? People design houses for a reason, and that reason should be secret doors
According to design guru Nate Berkus, following the trends too closely is actually one of the biggest mistakes homeowners can make. “I think that people are very easily taken with the latest look, the latest feeling,” he said.
The interior designer explained that we get easily tired by these types of trends: "It’s kind of like that black-and-white concrete tile that everybody had. Three, four years ago, it was the thing to use in your powder room floor and on your kitchen backsplash, but do you really want it anymore now that you’ve seen it over and over and over?” he asked. Berkus would rather choose really classic, beautiful materials that stand the test of time.
So instead of copying the latest decor tendencies, Berkus suggests choosing materials that have been around since the 1920s because they are always a safe choice: "Stone or stone-solid surfacing, concrete, stone, or wood floors, classic ceramic tiles, terra-cotta, butcher block—all of that stuff has been around forever, and there’s new innovation within those looks.“
Open concept bathrooms.
I don’t need to see you taking a dump from my bed.
Apartment Therapy says that a good rule of thumb would be to go a little more traditional with major furnishings and to add new trends with textiles and other small items. This way, you can modernize your home without changing the expensive cornerstone pieces and easily swap out the little details in the future.
They advise on a few timeless trends that could save you some money if you're planning to redecorate at some point. One of them would be choosing white subway tiles in the kitchen: "White is always a bright, clean backdrop for styling objects and art against." As people say, white never goes out of style, so it is a safe bet since you don't have to limit yourself when looking for other details.
Removing stair banisters for a crisp look. Like your drunk friend Brooks is going to fall of the side and die one day. There are building codes for reasons
Or a kid running will do w header or you in socks on wooden floors. This is totally a death trap
Live laugh love.
OMG I hate those things that say Live Love Laugh. I hate it more when people tattoo those words on their bodies.
In their opinion, neutral tones are always a better option than going with the color of the year (unless, of course, it's neutral). “Neutral tones are timeless and work in any context,” explains designer Becky Shea. “When you go too bold and loud, in the long term, it’s not sustainable.” The same could be applied to furniture and textiles. Choosing natural materials is stylistically versatile, full of texture and warmth, not to mention that it's sustainable and practical.
Total lack of solar panels/windmills. I think its criminal that new builds don't have any form of energy generator built in.
Agree...I live in the desert and still can't understand why they don't build houses that take the climate into account; 110-115 degrees for most of the summer and 300 sunny days/year and still they build without solar, they install windows that are flush with walls facing the sun without large window overhangs or awnings to keep the summer heat out, better insulation etc. First thing we did when we built our house last year was add solar to everything we could, awnings on the windows, situate the house on the lot to minimize interior sun exposure and install a home battery.
Carpeted bathrooms. I’ve seen way too many of them
Then there are the small details. “Live laugh love“ type of decorations or ordering everything in marble might seem great at the time but after some time it can become tasteless. And what about removing stair banisters? Well, it definitely achieves the minimalistic look that's been trendy for the past few decades but in real life, it's not only useless but also dangerous.
Might be an unpopular opinion but i don't need my home to be smart...I just need things to happen when they are supposed to happen and not completely shut off when some douche thought it was a good idea to play who can touch the powerline
Hollow interior doors that don't keep sound out from within the house and hallways - especially hollow bedroom doors when you're trying to sleep.
The cold and sterile look. White, black (high polish please so you see every single fingerprint)... why?
Amen! Where is the warmth? Every room design looks like an un-lived in furnished apartment for rent. Here's my ideal room for example.... greenwich-...a1fb71.jpg
Lastly, the most important thing to remember is that you are creating a home for yourself. Your place should reflect you as a person, it does not have to be perfect or insta-worthy. It's all about coziness and familiarity, not aesthetics.
No broom closets. Where the hell do people put their mops and vacuum cleaners? Or do the people who buy those McMansions just not do any of their own cleaning?
I bought a wardrobe for that as in EU is not that common to have broom closets.
I really don’t like the fireplace design where you are intended to put your TV over it. A TV is way too high when over the fireplace.
for a good body posture, a TV screen should always be placed so that is straight in front of your head, not higher not lower.
I don't know if it's new new, but it drives me crazy when people replace cabinetry with open shelves.
Don't people understand dust? Bugs ring a bell? Pet hair? Speaking of pets, how do you keep your cats from messing around with that setup?
I have open shelves and I have cats, who cannot care less of books and DVDs , I dust, no problem.
Open concept everything. There is value in being able to separate some rooms of the house. I very much prefer to have a kitchen that is not completely exposed to the area where I am going to be entertaining company.
That way, I can cook dinner and not worry about having to clean up everything in the kitchen so its spotless because the kitchen is basically in the main living room of the house.
This and also the trend of having big a** f**king windows in the front so everyone in the street can see your whole ground floor. Makes your first floor into a f**king fishbowl that I would never be comfortable in. I like to be able to walk around my house without worrying the people across the street can track my every move.
The grotesque housing developments of the same like 4 models and 3 colors with no trees. Not to mention the houses are built like s**t. The terribly inefficient road layout with a million cul de sacs.
I live in a small town in Australia, and suburbs like this are being built up in the rural areas. I find the new pop up suburbs, where every house looks identical and the blocks stand alone in the middle of cleared wasteland, much creepier than old houses.
Bedrooms that are only juuuuust big enough for a double or queen bed and a nightstand.
Many bedrooms are like this in the UK and have been for decades. As long as you can comfortably walk round three sides of the bed and get a wardrobe and chest of drawers in there that is enough. My master bedroom is just big enough for a king size bed, but the second bedroom is only really big enough for a single, though a double would squeeze in, you wouldn't be able to walk round it. My parent's have odd shaped bedrooms, which are just wide enough to get a bed in, but have a huge amount of space either side of the bed. It is basically a trade off between how big you make the bedrooms versus the size of the other rooms. If you only have a small apartment, you want more living space than you do sleeping space.
I may die on this hill alone, but I HATE open concept kitchens. Not the ones with a nice bar separating the space, not the ones with a window. I'm talking wide open, no barrier to determine where the kitchen ends. It's hideous.
I hate kitchens that aren't separate, my house is open concept and the normal counter clutter make the living space look messy and the cooking smells permeate the room. It's a pain in the ass.
Those dumb fake balconies
I have one of those - looks pointless but means I can open the doors in summer. I have no outdoor space/garden so it’s better than having just windows.
Small laundry rooms, small pantries, no linen closets, but here’s a 20x20 media room to watch TV. My next house will either be laid out by me or made in the 70s/80s when they designed homes to be lived in.
It seems to me that watching TV in a linen closet would be very uncomfortable.
No door between the master bedroom and master bathroom. It’s so annoying.
The last 3 houses I’ve lived in have had this issue. I like to be able to close the door when I take a bath or shower.
I don't like the idea of not having a door because of smelly poops.
Lack of storage space. Just bought a new home and didn’t realize how little space there was. We have one storage closet upstairs. That’s it.
in EU it's really not common to have built-in closets. we simply buy furniture for that.
In some newer neighborhoods, the houses all look the exact same.
I hate the design of homes that have a massive garage in the front; “welcome to my garage, the home is in the back.”
Homes built on the cheap with so many corners cut in their construction that they end up being horrible places to live in, plagued by mold, damp, noise and plumbing issues and more.
Even newly built high rise million dollar apartments in New York aren't immune to this. Enjoy the feeling of swaying in high winds, elevators constantly breaking down and water seeping through the walls from burst pipes.
Tiny back yards and HOAs
HOA's are the worst. If I put out the money for my own house, I don't want to be told what color I can't paint it.
Why is everything so damn bland? Why is white and grey the popular colors? Whatever happened to color? Why can't we have living rooms wallpapered with big bright flowers, long suede couches in deep fuchsia? And, mile-high blue carpets that you sink into when you walk? Whatever happened to walnut paneling and colored subway tile in the bathroom? Whatever happened to delicate stenciled flowers on the inside of the bowl of the bathroom sink?
When did we lose our personalities? I just want a house that looks like a manic-depressive toddler version of myself was set lose in a JoAnn's with a limitless credit card.
There’s a builder in our area who tears down perfectly good, full-of-character pre-WWII homes and then packs in these grotesque Craftsman-style-hulk-mode houses that take up every available square foot of the lot. They look absolutely ridiculous. The proportions are wrong, they blight the neighborhood. Bleh.
That is criminal, IMO. UGH. And against the Craftsman aesthetic to go Hulk-Mode. The originals were about not being mass-produced nightmares!
Floor-to-ceiling, clear glass showers. They look great when they are spotlessly clean, which means it looks terrible most of the time in most homes.
Wasted space. This includes enormous bedrooms with sitting areas, homes with equal number of bed and bathrooms, extravagant foyers that eat half the front of a house, formal living and/dining rooms that never get used. Etc
S**tty bathtubs. I grew up in a 100 year old house. It had a nice bathtub with a sloping back so you could comfortably lounge in the bath. Modern tubs are pretty nearly straight up on the back so there's no comfortable way to soak, smoke a joint, and read a book.
I lived in San Francisco for most of my life, and nearly every apartment I lived in (once I made enough money to not need roommates) had a beautiful old clawfoot tube...it was my personal requirement. I lived in one place in the Tenderloin that had a first-generation set-in tub that was too long for me, but still nice and deep for bathing.
Every inch of acreage is used. Houses are really close together, streets are narrow. It’s crowded
Go to a high end gated community development ($800k - 2M price points in my area) front of the homes is beautiful stone, brick, etc but on the back every house has cheap ugly vinyl siding all the same color as far as the eye can see. I never understood this since you actually spend time in the back yard not the front.
The cookie cutter houses with no personality and no room, where the windows look directly into your neighbor’s bedroom. Ugh!
Little Boxes on the hillside. Little Boxes... Goos song. I first heard it the TV Show Weeds.
No attention to lighting temperature (kelvins) or even worse, mismatched light temperatures.
Most cheap LED bulbs are way too "cold" looking and lack the natural warmth of old incandescent lighting.
Aim for 2700kelvin or lower for that warm cozy atmosphere.
The obsession with space. So many people won't even consider anything under 2,000sqft. People don't even think about what it would cost to heat and cool. They just gotta have a McMansion.
As an electrician; putting 600 potlights in every room of the house. Sure it makes me money but it looks ridiculous having so many lights every 4 feet of every room.
Not as bad as the houses with too few lights altogether. I've been in some where you feel like you need a headlamp to get around!
Kitchens that they cram into a narrow rectangle. A lot of apartments and town houses come with these. They are so narrow that if you open the fridge door, nobody can walk past you.
A kitchen should be open, not walled in all sides and shaped like a narrow rectangle. It drives me crazy when I see these.
Apartments and town houses have, in most cases, a very limited amount of space, and you don't really need a huge kitchen. And there's no rule that says a kitchen should be open, some like it and don't don't. I love the fact that I can just close the door in my kitchen and cook in peace or hide the mess. 🙃
I've seen several homes with appliances integrated into the construction of the kitchen itself. Not just in an alcove but actually built into the wall. Sure, it's convenient that there's a f**king cappuccino machine built into the wall next to the cabinet over the center island countertop. But what happens when (not if, when) it needs maintenance? Do I have to call a goddamn carpenter as well as a cappuccino machine repairman? Do I have to consider if this is a f**king load bearing wall that contains my broken appliance? And something that's just a convenience like that is one thing, but they do it with stuff like fridges too.
Fake shutters. They dont even look like they would cover the windows on most houses and they just look like garbage. If you love shutters so much, install real ones.
Any of these posts complaining about small xyz... well duh, yeah it wpyld be nice to have a big kitchen and a big garden, but land is expensive and most of us aren't rich!
Right? I mean most of us barely can afford buying a house or paying rent. Sorry gor having small houses...
Load More Replies...I hate pure, unpainted concrete surfaces in homes. It's a good design element in industrial environments but not in homes. And it's a nightmare to keep them clean. concrete-6...60522f.jpg
I love polished concrete! If you live in a hot climate, cool floors like this are wonderful!
Load More Replies...One that annoys me and isn't in the list: putting stove tops or sinks in the middle of the kitchen island. This is not so bad if you have a truly massive one, but if you have a more typical 2m wide island, plunking something that's ~75cm in the middle of it turns what would've been a really useful prep area into two tiny ones that are also difficult to use at all if there is someone using the stove or sink that's right there. I've seen some pretty large kitchens that didn't have a single prep surface bigger than 1m because the designer thinks it looks more balanced that way and isn't thinking at all about the actual work of cooking.
And kids' hands so close to the island stove, when they're sitting on those bar stools.
Load More Replies...Any of these posts complaining about small xyz... well duh, yeah it wpyld be nice to have a big kitchen and a big garden, but land is expensive and most of us aren't rich!
Right? I mean most of us barely can afford buying a house or paying rent. Sorry gor having small houses...
Load More Replies...I hate pure, unpainted concrete surfaces in homes. It's a good design element in industrial environments but not in homes. And it's a nightmare to keep them clean. concrete-6...60522f.jpg
I love polished concrete! If you live in a hot climate, cool floors like this are wonderful!
Load More Replies...One that annoys me and isn't in the list: putting stove tops or sinks in the middle of the kitchen island. This is not so bad if you have a truly massive one, but if you have a more typical 2m wide island, plunking something that's ~75cm in the middle of it turns what would've been a really useful prep area into two tiny ones that are also difficult to use at all if there is someone using the stove or sink that's right there. I've seen some pretty large kitchens that didn't have a single prep surface bigger than 1m because the designer thinks it looks more balanced that way and isn't thinking at all about the actual work of cooking.
And kids' hands so close to the island stove, when they're sitting on those bar stools.
Load More Replies...