The 7 Small Space Mistakes You Don't Realize You're Making — & How To Avoid Them

When it comes to small space living, there's a lot of misinformation out there. To be fair, it mostly comes from a place of good intentions — you can take solace in the fact that nobody's trying to sabotage your pint-sized home makeover. But what works for a cozy dorm room may not shine in 400-square-foot NYC apartment, just like what flatters a refurbished basement unit may not be the thing for a rustic Los Angeles bungalow. Small spaces, while they share in common their diminutive size, are often otherwise very different.

But then, there are the things that are, almost universally, just plain bad ideas. Sometimes it's a look that has (for good reason) fallen out of style, or a strategy supposedly meant to maximize the space in a room that, in actuality, ends up being confusing, distracting, or just plain hard to keep clean. Sure, most home decor mistakes are fixable, but why make them in the first place if you can avoid it? That's why we polled four interior design experts on the small space mishaps they see most often, plus how to avoid them.