The Shine-maxxing Trend Is Bringing Iridescent Shine and High-Gloss Glamour Back into Homes

As a child of the 1990s, I’ve never met a bedazzle, shine, or twinkle that I don’t love. So when I first noticed iridescent and glossy decor slowly overtaking matte everything in my social media feeds, I immediately paid attention. These head-turning finishes are a perfect evolution of the wave of maximalism that’s been dominating trendy interiors for the last decade. While it’s true that this micro-trend was once limited to fashion and beauty (think of those buzzy, glowy Instagram brands!), the rise of a trend I’m calling “shine-maxxing” is taking cues from popular culture as a macro-movement. Everything from astrology to Y2K nostalgia is driving interior designers to reimagine how they weave iridescence, a result of melding light waves, into their spaces.

And while I’ve seen so many gorgeous rooms where futuristic shine literally encapsulates every single surface and piece of furniture (hello, lacquer!), others are finding beauty in quiet glimmers that are refined and restrained. These small, delicate details will have you do a double-take and fall in love with a space — from bathrooms and kitchens, to bedrooms and living rooms — again and again, for years to come. I interviewed a panel of interior designers about the ways they’re shinemaxxing interiors, both quietly and boisterously.  They also shared how they’re styling new accessories and decor to make sure this sparkle doesn’t fade before the decade is over.

Put simply, interior designers are embracing a movement away from matte finishes and fully leaning into glossy surfaces and features that dazzle all day long, changing with natural and artificial light alike. This can be achieved more traditionally through high-gloss paint or lacquered walls, ceilings, and furniture. Many design pros, though, are embracing mirrored accents and iridescent decor that bounce light around a room, too — even mixing all of these finishes all at once. In 2027, designers are set to freely pair materials like dichroic glass and pearlescent tiles in backsplashes and counters. They’ll also lean on prism-like effects created by iridescent decor to round out spaces that borrow from 1990s retro-futurism (another major interior trend all its own!).

“I love that iridescence is having its moment, as it’s beautifully feminine, it’s flowy, and it shifts throughout the room in a way that brings the space to life,” says Genna Jacobs Freeman, principal designer and co-founder of Atlanta-based luxury interiors firm Space Design Collective. Freeman balances her designs with neuroaesthetics in mind by harnessing iridescent and pearlescent fittings to enhance lighting and meaningfully impact her client’s nervous system. “Iridescent surfaces bounce and refract light; they don’t just reflect it,” she says. “Shimmer is powerful.”

When it comes to shine-maxxing, the sky is truly the limit: The trend has been more apparent in kitchens and in bathrooms, where design pros are weaving iridescent tile into backsplashes, flooring, and countertops. Pearlescent hardware (think: cabinet pulls, light switches, and more!) also adds a pop of glamour by gleaming in natural light from nearby windows. Kanika Khurana, principal designer of Kanika Design in San Mateo, California, recently doused her entire primary bathroom in prism-like tile and hardware. But she tells me that more clients are yearning for the same eye-catching effect in living rooms and bedrooms — even if they’re hard to pick up on at first glance.

“Small-scale accents allow homeowners to experiment with shifting light reflections without overwhelming the entire room’s architecture,” Khurana explains, adding that she’s sourced everything from holographic glass coasters, acrylic organizers, and even cosmic mirrors. “[They] bring a beautiful, luminous quality into main living areas perfectly, and this is exactly why I’ve become fascinated with iridescent finishes: They’re not trend-following decorative elements, but force people to slow down and reperceive the details of a space.”

Showstopping furniture — including coffee tables, bar stools, and oversized mirrors — is being made in light-catching finishes (chrome included!), and it’s finding its way into color- and pattern-drenched rooms. But the beauty of this trend lies in its versatility, where tiny shimmering features are also bouncing light across spaces that are otherwise rooted in quiet neutrals. Weaving iridescence into these smaller accent pieces helps create functional, comfortable rooms that offer more of an emotional connection, says Swati Goorha, principal designer and founder of New Jersey-based Swati Goorha Designs. Goorha deliberately weaves in iridescent decor to enhance an already established palette and draw eyes to surrounding textures in her upholstery and dressings.

“Rather than making iridescence the focal point, the intent was to use [iridescence] as a refined design layer that adds movement and visual richness, all while maintaining a cohesive, timeless interior,” she explains. When used in this approach, Goorha believes anyone can shop for iridescent decor (from accent lamps to drinkware) to layer into rooms that are already lived-in for the same effect — no full makeover needed.

After years of matte finishes gracing the glossy pages of design magazines, more homeowners appear eager to embrace aesthetics that lean more glam than ever — and tile is a lasting way to do just that. Freeman says she’s worked with a client in 2026 that “loved sparkle and shimmer” but wanted something refined enough that wouldn’t break rank with the rest of her biophilic-leaning home. So the designer created a custom kitchen backsplash that taps into a psychological mechanism known as salience, or the way in which humans process different sensory inputs. “Your mind is constantly scanning, trying to figure out where to look; but give it just one focal point, one moment of sparkly deliciousness, outlined by calm, and something interesting happens: The brain settles,” Freeman says.

Tile is a natural way to add that “sparkly deliciousness” into most kitchens and bathrooms in a way that doesn’t read as a trend. It’s a glamorous application that plays well with a myriad of other classic design profiles, and designers are leveraging it in exciting ways. “Honestly, my trick with high-shine finishes is science,” she adds. “Restraint isn’t about withholding glam; it’s about optimizing moments of visual salience and giving the eye a clear place to land.”

At a time when Victorian aesthetics and antiques are indeed coincidentally more popular than ever, a deliberate mishmash of the futuristic elements of iridescent details and more traditional features is emerging. This approach may also ensure that shine-maxxing feels more timeless and lasting beyond 2026: layering these details into rooms that host antiques creates so much depth and prevents a room from looking flat. It’s a quirky take that more daring designers are taking on for clients who don’t want their spaces to be an exact replica of Instagram feeds, explains Yena Jung, creative director and founder of by Yena Interiors, with a studio in Larchmont, New York.

“The part that is so fun about the minimalistic pop of color from something like an iridescent side table is that you get to mix different styles within one room,” she explains. “To mix styles — from vintage and modern to Arts and Crafts, to adding holographic or futuristic moments — can show that you really have a design sense that’s interesting and eclectic.”

Whether you fully lean into full-blown, all-iridescent everything with fully holographic furniture and tile, or you simply want to embrace a quiet luster through lacquered and chrome accents, there isn’t a wrong way to embrace the shine of it all. Designers say that more vendor showrooms are putting glossy, pearlescent pieces front and center, with client mood boards increasingly reflecting the trend as well. “I love lucite and acrylic items, and the way I would suggest for someone to play in this space is to start small,” advises Jung. “Start with something as simple as a colorful acrylic pencil holder on a desk, or an iridescent lamp in the corner of a room.”

Now mass retailers are jumping on the bandwagon with new launches, too. The key to styling them? Ensuring these elements are placed in spaces where they can reflect natural sunlight, both directly and indirectly, throughout the day. “The timeless appeal lies in how these luminous surfaces catch changing daylight to add organic movement without relying on loud patterns,” Khurana says. If you’re looking to dive headfirst into the rainbow-esque world of shinemaxxing, so many delightful styles await you. Below, you’ll find a selection of trendy decor that’ll shine bright all year round (no diamonds needed). Happy shopping!