8 Seriously Smart Home Decor Hacks, According to Reddit

We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again: Reddit is a treasure trove of information on a variety of topics, and decorating is no exception to this rule. When Redditor brienoconan posted the question, “What are some ‘room hacks’ to enhance the interior design of your room while on a budget?,” almost 800 users replied with their thoughts. Sure, that’s a bunch of noise, but that’s where I come in. I read through all of those comments—yes, all of them—so you don’t have to. And these are the best eight room hacks from Reddit. 

By now, you probably know mirrors can throw natural light around a room, making it appear larger. But mirrors can be pricey, as Redditor Hirudin, pointed out. So in this instance, might be smart to choose quantity over quality. “A bunch of smaller, cheaper mirrors arranged neatly can have the same mental effect as a much larger mirror and make a small room feel more spacious,” Hirudin writes. Whether you create a gallery wall out or mirrors or just arrange a few in a grid, you’ve got options. 

It pays to be strategic about how you hang your drapes. “Now, here is a curtain hack—you don’t have to mount the curtains on the exact shape of your windows,” writes Redditor GardenGnostic. “Most people do, and if you do, you lose a bit of window to the curtains, and you can never get light through that space.” Instead, if you mount your curtains a bit outside (and above) your window, as GardenGnostic suggests, then you can make your windows look bigger, and you can get more light into the room when the curtains are open. That’s a decorating win-win in our books. 

“No matter how pretty and ‘together’ your room is, put something black in it,” says GlobbyDoodle. Not only does black ground a space, it also adds visual interest and balance to an otherwise neutral room full of lighter shades. So make sure you design liberally with some pops of the color black for best results.

Look up—and down—for sneaky storage opportunities in your home. “Make use of vertical space: Shelves, racks, areas under tables/beds,” says morningcupoftea. Freeing up floor space will help open up the flow in your place and reduce the appearance of clutter.

Don’t discount scrap pieces of wood—they’re perfectly fine for building things, and you can easily hide flaws with paint or stain. “Off-cuts of wood are super cheap,” writes friskyumbrella. “Put a bit of work in it, and boom, you have your very special custom shelf.”

The right bulb can really change your lighting game. “Costco sells Feit Electric smart bulbs in packs of 4 for $70,” says keatonpotat0es. “They’re a really affordable alternative to Philips’ Hues, and they’re a lot of fun. You can change your bulb colors from your phone to literally anything, and they last much longer than the squiggly bulbs.”

Design isn’t always about following the rulebook, but there are a few tricks for composing rooms that can help beginners. Redditor bdubbs is fond of the 10-30-60 rule, and you should use it, too: “10 percent of your decor should be a color that adds pop, 30 percent should be a base color—think primary colors, and 60 percent should be a neutral color like beige, dark brown, or gray,” says bdubbs. This breakdown will create a balanced composition, even if you deviate from the percentages a bit. 

Baskets and bins are great for corralling stuff, but smaller things are sometimes best on, wait for it, cake trays. “They could stay in the back of the cupboard for 80 percent of the time, or you could put fruit on them,” writes GardenGnostic. “Or if you don’t have fruit, but you like to keep your hot sauce and mustard and stuff on the table, you could put them on some kind of fixture like that too.”