Whether fo' real or faux real, cowhide and cowhide-style rugs might just be what your interior needs.

I once heard a designer (whose name I cannot remember) say something that stuck with me. The exact phrasing escapes me, but the gist was that you should be investing your money in the items that you touch daily. The closer to your skin, the more you should consider spending. It makes total sense, as these are the things in your home you likely use more than anything. And sheets are one of those items.

With a slogan like "Beautiful design. Customized by you. Accessibly priced." the values of Interior Define are music to our design-loving ears.

Anyone who lives, breathes, dreams design will understand the following: sometimes, you become fixated on something design-y, and then —like learning a new word that you start to hear everywhere — you start to see that design-y thing everywhere (much to your delight, but also much to your chagrin because you WANT.IT.) Well, that is me currently with colored glass and mirrors.

For just under a year (as of last June, to be exact), I’ve had a serious crush on the Brooklyn home of Jae and Devin. The architecture alone of their brownstone, with those amazing moldings, ceilings and floors would make any design lover completely and totally jealous obsessed. Their lust-worthy abode is more than just really great bones, however, and I’m going to break down why their combo living room and dining room just plain works.

Welcome to the maiden voyage of a new column we’re launching called Why It Works. Here at Apartment Therapy, we publish hundreds upon hundreds of amazing, lived in, real-life homes every year. And though they all are special in their own right, every now and then there comes along a super smart room within one of those homes. In Why It Works, we’re celebrating that notion, and breaking down all the elements that have come together to create a truly spectacular space.

If you've ever wondered about whether the online furniture retailer's sofas were comfortable, we went behind the scenes to find out (and here's what we thought!).

I’ve been on a quest for the perfect pillow for years. My mattress game is on point, but the same cannot be said about my pillows. I’ve tried memory foam, contoured memory foam, down varieties (not for me…too much fluffing), down-alternative, gel-fiber, polyester fluff—you name it, I’ve slept on it.

Vijay Nathan—Product Manager for Apartment Therapy Media—and his wife Anita moved into their rental loft in Philadelphia last year, bringing along with them furniture pieces from previous homes that no longer felt quite right. Some things they loved, others they knew were now placeholders and in need of replacement. “We came to our marriage with furniture that had served us well when we lived apart, though most of it lacked personality and longevity,” says Vijay.

With well over 48 sofas (not counting custom pieces, sectionals and all size options) in their catalog of products, Room & Board has a dizzying assortment of furniture. When we visited their Manhattan showroom in Chelsea, we were honestly taken aback by the vastness of the store, not even knowing where to start our tests. So we can understand how anyone considering a R&B sofa might have a similar plight. How do you narrow down what you’re looking for?

Many of us have been there: You’re on the hunt for a new sofa but you’re tired of the options at your local stores, so you go online to wrangle some fresh ideas. Plenty make your “maybe” list and grace your dedicated Pinterest board, but you just can’t bite the bullet without sitting on the sofa yourself. We get it…that’s a tricky position to be in.

Have you been eyeing a sofa at Crate & Barrel but can’t make it into one of their locations to test it out for yourself? Or maybe you have a few contenders on your list, but need help narrowing them down? That’s where the Apartment Therapy Sofa Squad comes in. We had eight of our editors hit up C&B (as well as four other stores) to couch surf through all 20 models on the floor of the retailer’s SoHo location, taking note of vital sofa-buying criteria: How deep is it?

This month, we are kicking off a new series: The Apartment Therapy Sofa Squad. Internally known simply as “Sofa Squad”, our editorial team converged on New York City to couch surf our way through a hefty helping of retailers. We sat. We lounged. We plopped. We cocooned. We nestled. We faux napped (some may have actually napped.) All in the name of Sofa Squad. SS’s mission is to do the sitting and rating for you.

Project by: Farr North Interiors Location: Boston, Massachusetts A previous renovation in 2010 gave a perfectly lovely cosmetic upgrade to a once-dated 710-square-foot condo in Boston. Though the modernization created a significant aesthetic improvement, layout and flow issues remained in the 2-bedroom, 1-bathroom apartment originally built in the 1800s. To reconfigure the home, the homeowners brought in Kerry Farr of Farr North Interiors to tackle the small space challenges.

Buying furniture can be intimidating, even if you know what you’re looking for in terms of style (if you don’t, that’s an entirely different mountain to climb.) For instance, how do you really know what you’re spending your valuable dollars on will last? What materials are best for wear-and-tear? What questions should you be asking a sales person before committing to a purchase? We turned to the pros (i.e.

Project by: Julie China of Idea Space Architecture + Design Location: Maplewood, New Jersey The wood paneling, formica countertops and dated finishes of this New Jersey kitchen are nothing uncommon to older homes, but they were no longer working for a family of four. Designer Julie China of Idea Space Architecture + Design came on board to open up the space and give it a welcomed refresh.

The world of paint can feel endless. So many blues, grays, whites…how do you settle on one for your wall? I’m a firm believer that nothing will ever replace buying samples and testing a paint color out before diving into gallons of a certain shade, but to get a rough idea of a paint color family or hue without having to head to the hardware store, give one of these six apps a try!

Some decor styles are easy to pin point, as they follow certain rules. But for the eclectic collector, there are no pre-set design mandates. This artfully cluttered, anything goes aesthetic is all about throwing caution to the wind and filling your home with things you love that you’ve picked up along your journeys, whether from Monaco, Morocco or Minneapolis. To some, pattern mixing is an art form that is learn through trial and error.

The world of prints and patterns is wide. For instance, what you think is simply “plaid” is far more intricate. All tartans are plaids, but not all plaids are tartans, in fact. There are madras plaids, houndstooth plaids, windowpane plaids, and many, many more. So we beg the question: Do you know one from the other? With fall—the high season of plaid—just around the bend, it might be a good time to polish up on your terminology. As always, we’re here to help!

Are you the artful bohemian or a new traditionalist? Take this quiz to find out and don’t forget to share your results in the comments! Antsy for your results? Hang tight…they’re coming! Re-edited from a post that originally appeared 09.06.2017.

The idea of 3D-printed products for the home is admittedly a little out there, even Jetsons-esque. The gadgets and gizmos a plenty on sale throughout the internet may run the gamut from completely bizarre to actually interesting (and normal), but no matter where they fall on the spectrum, something that came from a printer (that’s not a sheet of paper with words on it) is certainly a conversation starter. We rounded up a handful of things you might actually want to buy for your own home.

A. Two sofas facing each other OR B. A sofa and love seat arranged in the traditional L-shaped arrangement?