She's done her house in everything I loath...

[whycantIbestylishtoo]

...and yet my heart sank when I saw it all, because it looks AMAZING.

I shouldn't be surprised really. A close friend of mine has moved house and has redecorated from scratch. It's only a small place, but this is the third house I've known her in, and all of them she decorates beautifully in a way I can only envy.

I like to be modern. I like to be up to date. I like fashionable colours and modern furniture. Matt finishes only. I am loving the trend for brushed brass and dark green. My friend, she doesn't. She likes old things, second-hand furniture, pretty much anything that's out of fashion, her only rule is that the colours of the things within a room have to match on a room-by-room basis.

She's had the ceilings in every room papered in woodchip. Prior to this, they were painted and very cracked in places. The walls in several rooms have been covered in tongue & groove, and in the rooms which haven't been done like that it's raised-pattern paint-able paper. She's had an old-fashioned style coving around the top of every room. All the skirting boards and doors have been changed, again for something very old fashioned which I thought would look horrific in a 40ish year old house. The doors, frames, and skirtings have all been painted in white gloss. The walls, ceilings, and coving painted in brilliant white silk emulsion. And then to this she has brought in all her own style with dark carpets, curtains, soft furnishings and throws, plus the dark wood of most of her furniture.

It sounds hideous written down, and it's everything I would never dream of doing. Yet when I leave her house I feel so depressed that I don't have the courage to like what is not fashionable, the skill to search charity shops and facebook market place for inexpensive 'tat' which I wouldn't look twice at, and the vision to bring it all together. There are no words to describe how beautiful her home now looks. How do some people do it?

Aw, I’m with you op. I have zero talent in the interior decor department and envy those who do! On that basis, i just do what I like and enjoy living in and hope it works.

The way this works is to only decorate your house with and fill it with things that you love, but to keep cohesion through colour schemes. It doesn’t work if you try to emulate it. It can be hard to do that because it means letting go of most interiors trends (unless they align with what you genuinely love) and letting go of what other people will think. If you can do that, it starts to come together and you build it from there. But if what you love are modern clean lines and staying up to date, that’s fine! You can’t fake a love of quirky, old style. Just choose modern, fashionable things for your home that you genuinely love.

I can't pull off modern/trendy OR boho/eclectic so you're winning there OP!

Plus DH treats any attempts to change furniture or redecorate with suspicion and alarm

I'm sorry but i cant get past woodchip on ceiling being described as beautiful. It looks bloody awful. When I moved into my house several rooms had woodchip on the ceiling and it looked so depressing and was a complete nightmare to remove. Also the wallpaper, are you describing that horrible anaglypta stuff that my mum had about 40 years ago? 😀

"Suspicion and alarm" How very true! DH is the same. He has zero sense of colour or style but will get upset at the very idea of getting new things. Not meanness but thinks its a sign of me being indecisive. Also he wants to keep things forever.

You have to start trusting yourself and you could try to stop caring what other people think. We decorate like this and our home is full of "finds" we just do a reverse Marie Kondo and collect what brings us joy, keep things we love. Tbf we are both really arty/crafty so a 1920s projector becomes a lamp etc. Your friend is decorating for her self you are perhaps, decorating to impress others. Just start to explore what you love it is very freeing

Some people just have a knack for home decor and know instinctively how to pull a room together. I’m not one of those people unfortunately and rely on Instagram and Pinterest.

What sticks out in your OP is that you don’t have any actual likes or dislikes - you just like to keep up with the latest trends. There isn’t anything wrong with that but you’ll never develop your personal style if your only inspiration is whatever’s “in”.

I would also like to see a photo of a similar style interior. I'm having trouble imagining it from your description.

You should come to my house @whycantIbestylishtoo
Toy clutter everywhere, top half that we have decorated is bland IKEA, bottom half has ripped awful carpets and half plastered walls. Play dates work well though because I’m not bothered about sand/playdough on our expired carpets.
Style is very low down on my list of priorities!

The woodchip in my parents' home gives me terrors. They've painted over it at least four times over the past 50 years.

That aside I have no talent in home decor but your friend sounds a lot like me. Your home is your castle, and you can decorate it however you want to make you feel safe & comfortable.

Exactly what I was thinking. What a strange choice

I’m guessing the difference between you two is that she has a very cohesive style while you prefer to be up to date, which will always move goalposts as trends change.

Nothing wrong with both options, depending on how often you want to redecorate.

instead of envying her, why don’t you learn from her? She’s your friend why so can’t you say to her: I really love your house and the way you decorated it ….do you think you could try to give me some ideas for mine? She would probably love that, if she’s passionate about decorating.

She lives in a different head to yours. She is probably artistic and creative and expresses herself in her surroundings. It comes naturally. You be you whilst you enjoy her being her. Does she dress in an old fashioned style too? I know someone who is mad about the 1960s and trawls British Heart Fund shops looks for sixties furniture. There is no right answer. It is just people being themselves.

like anything we all generally do (choosing outfits for ourselves, cooking) some people are just naturally very fucking good at it. If you feel frustrated by where you are, I would suggest immersing yourself in learning about it. design is such a brilliant thing to know about and useful for so many different parts of life. Accept that she has natural talent and has probably practised and developed it more than you, and also no doubt will have done a fair bit of reading along the way.

No one can ever persuade me that woodchip and anaglypta are a good idea. We had several layers of both in pretty much every room, with paint on top as well!

I don't think it's the decoration, I think it's her. I'm not saying you're in love with her but it seems that you must really like and respect this woman and that's why suddenly the things you hate don't look so bad when she does them.

This seems to be a problem within yourself, I heard it here, when you said:

Yet when I leave her house I feel so depressed that I don't have the courage to like what is not fashionable, the skill to search charity shops and facebook market place for inexpensive 'tat' which I wouldn't look twice at, and the vision to bring it all together. There are no words to describe how beautiful her home now looks. How do some people do it?

Are you actually jealous of her home or her personality traits that allowed her to make her home her own as you suggest here. If you like fashionable things, that's okay, if you actually prefer all the stuff your friend likes that's okay too. You can be courageous in other ways, your home is probably beautiful too, but in your own way.

I just think this sounds like a self esteem issue. This sounds like how I tried to dress exactly the same as the girls who bullied me at school; no I didn't have the courage and those girls seemed to have everything I didn't. And even when I did dress exactly the same as them -- same skirt, same shoes, same hairstyle, using the same phrases even when I spoke, it still wasn't right, I hated myself so I hated how it all looked on me. Even though it was exactly the same, it didn't look how it looked on those girls and that was the problem.

Love yourself, OP. You are great too.

Her argument would be "why would you take it off? I don't know what's wrong with it". And I know that, because she said she's never seen the issue with it. I mean, I don't like it either, but if I'm honest that's only because I've heard it's not something to like - I can't actually tell you why I don't like it, or even if I truly don't like it, because having seen it in her house, it just looks, well, 'normal'. As if, I'm not sure I'd have noticed it, had she not said, and it's a million miles from the crappy, cracked ceilings which were there before, which stuck out like a sore thumb. Everything just looked so neat and clean now.

Sounds like you focus on fashion, whereas your friend focuses on style.

I think a lot of people make the mistake you do, especially with fashion. They have no style of their own and are overly dependent on what’s “in”, regardless of whether it suits them or their home.

OP what did she do with all the stuff from her old house?

If you mean furniture, most of it came with her. She had no choice but to lose a few pieces along the way as she downsized slightly, and things like light fittings & other pieces that were stuck-down stayed in the old house. She doesn't actually have that much "stuff", and what she has is mostly second-hand and purchased cheaply, so it's not unusual to go round to her house and find that something has been given away and something "new" in its place. That's another thing I envy - the fact that when I have bought new furniture it's had to last a long time due to the price I pay for it. Hers is easy-come, easy-go, and she rarely gets attached to anything...she seems to enjoy things for a while, then pass them on for someone else to love.

And here-in lies another of her "rules" - she won't have any second-hand soft furnishings (chairs, sofas etc) unless she knows where it's come from because she says she hasn't a clue how to clean or replace the coverings (she is not someone who can "upcycle" things, she is someone who can re-purpose things as they are), and she won't buy second-hand electrical appliances, again unless she knows where they are from and can be trusted.

I have a friend who has done her house beautifully, it’s a tiny two up two down and I always feel inspired when I see it. I don’t do anything about it in my current (family) home but I will when I downsize and get my own much smaller property. It will have to be a cheap more second hand version though. My problem is I can’t make up my mind what style/colours and I like too many. My current home has no cohesive look and needs updating but it’s roomy and in a lovely spot so I have that.

Yet when I leave her house I feel so depressed that I don't have the courage to like what is not fashionable

That's what you need to think about. Her woodchip and matching colours are irrelevant.

Not woodchip, but I love old things. My house is all old stuff but I choose Arts and Crafts furniture, William Morris and Voysey fabrics and studio ceramics of that era. I’ve had second hand sofas re-upholstered and love the idea of re-cycling things.

It’s fresh- looking, though, in cool, soft greens, creams and duck-egg for the walls. I’m afraid I couldn’t care less about decor fashion- I probably go against it , if anything!

Old furniture was made of solid wood and to buy the equivalent now would cost a small fortune. Quality matters to me.

I’m sad when people buy a period house and take away every vestige of its character, so we’re all different, OP - and thank goodness!

Can you admire her taste, but at the same time accept that it’s not right for you in your house? In the same way that some people like to dress in a chic way, whilst others more goth. You can appreciate it looks great on them, whilst acknowledging it’s not right for you.

Also, is it a case of her house looks ‘finished’ whilst you feel yours isn’t quite right? She may envy your modern, fashionable look, and wonder how you achieve it, even though she prefers the more traditional look.

I had something similar a few years ago, but instead of leaving this person’s house depressed, I left so inspired and fully charged with my own ideas. I was also full of envy too but in a very positive way.
I really think that one visit opened my eyes and brain to things I never previously noticed.
I now also decorated my new house from scratch and brought this ‘landlord special’ decorated Victorian house to it’s original glory.

So i think you need to shift your attitude a bit, don’t let your friends talent and design ideas sank your heart and instead make your envy a positive feeling that will keep inspiring and motivate you.