I've seen a lot of posts on here in the last handful of months that have similar questions:

What would you do with this space?
How should I decorate this space?
This is my first home, where should I start?

I'm finding myself commenting a lot of the same stuff - so I thought I would put together a guide for getting started in a new space for the newbies who've never decorated or for anyone looking to level up their basics/foundations.

Disclaimer: I'm only kind of an expert. I'm not an interior designer. I work in environment design for video games. I have a master's degree in environment art and as a supervisor I give art critique and feedback every day for a living. I have a deep understanding of art and design strategy and all those amazing fundamentals that often get overlooked (line, form, function, space, shape, silhouette, material, color, shades, etc).

My goal here is to present some underlying principles to consider when designing a space, and then present a general roadmap to success. Strap in. Here we go:

Design 101 - The Fundamentals

Having even a rudimentary understanding of design basics, the very foundations on which ALL design is built can help you build your space cohesively. In art, there tend to be two categories of these - The Elements of Art, and the Principles of Design. Both of them work in tandem to create art, and interior spaces. Some are more important than others, and there are a few that I think are really important for interior design specifically. Here are a few of the most important ones, and a little blerb about why they're important.

COLOR

Pretty self explanatory. Knowing your colors is important. In design, this means knowing the difference between complementary colors (blue vs orange) , and analogous colors (Blue vs green). It also means knowing the UNDERLYING colors - not just warm vs cool (orange vs blue) but the warm and cool versions of a single color (teal vs navy). Keeping your underlying tones the same in a room will help it all feel cohesive.

VALUE

Light vs dark. Light green vs dark green. Using the same hue (color) in a room but with different shades can help add variation but keep it cohesive.

TEXTURE

Mixing up your textures can make for very interesting and complex spaces. If you're buying "another grey thing" maybe try another grey thing that feeeeeels different from the other grey things you bought.

Balance

Symmetry is one form of balance, but you can also pair one large thing opposite three small things and still create balance. Having all your furniture on one side of the room can make it feel lopsided. You won't know why the room feels weird when you're in it, it just will.

UNITY

Having an underlying current to all of your stuff in a room will help it feel cohesive and unified. Maybe that means having all the same metal color, or all the same wood color.. not everything has to be matchy matchy, but keeping an underlying theme will help a room feel like one vision and not a hodge podge.

EMPHASIS (FOCAL POINT)

What's the focus of your space? Wanna show off that singular gorgeous piece of art? Are you here to watch TV? To sleep? To highlight the seating area to invite guests to come in and sit? Who is the "leading lady" of your room, and how can we make sure all the other pieces are back up singers so no one outshines her?

MOVEMENT/ FLOW

In art this can be a visual flow of color or line leading your eye across a canvas. In rooms, I would think of this more about the flow of space. How do you move through a room? How do you get from the door to...wherever you want to go? Are there clear walkways? Can you access entrances and exits clearly or is there stuff blocking you?

PATTERN

This can mean either repetitive patterns in fabric, or repetitive elements in a room (think like a gallery wall of frames, or a row of bar stools).

SCALE/ PROPORTION

One of the more difficult ideas - Are your furnishings of a comparable size with their surroundings - both other furnishings and the room itself. A little tiny mirror on wall with two story windows will look dwarfed and lonely. A giant massive couch that barely fits in a tiny room will make the room feel even smaller. Keeping your stuff in scale with everything around it can make or break a space.

DESIGN STYLES

There are a lot of sites that can adequately explain what the different current design styles look like. Here's why it's important to even kind of know them.

When you're new, you may not know what goes with what. That's okay. By first taking a look at some design styles, you can start to get an idea of what you like and what appeals to you. This can give you an idea of where to start. It can also give you something to google search when you're looking for reference and ideas. Is it okay to go outside of a design style? Absolutely! Hey at the end of the day it's your space, so you fill it however you want. Plenty of incredibly successful spaces incorporate multiple design styles and they all work together. When you're first starting out, hemming it in to one or maybe two can guide you down a path and then later you can branch out.

Here are some great examples to take a look at for some different design styles:

https://www.decoraid.com/blog/interior-design-styles-definition-2019/

https://www.hgtv.com/design/decorating/design-101/design-styles-defined-pictures

https://decorinteriorsus.com/blog/resources/style-glossary/ - This is an outrageously comprehensive list. Many of these are not "in style" anymore (when was the last time you saw a Jacobean living room?) but it does give a very wide view of lots of stuff that's out there.

Using these terms in image searching (pinterest, google etc) can help get you reference. Searching "Grey regency living room" will yield you completely different results from "Grey industrial living room.".

ROADMAP TO SUCCESS

Step 1. Design a room.
Step 2. Live in it
Step 3. ???
Step 4. Profit.

When you start decorating a space, there are a lot of different "starting" points. Maybe your apartment is full of "college" furniture that is whatever you could find, for as cheap as you could get it and now you're ready to start a real "grown up" space. Maybe you've bought your first house after living in a shoebox and have many completely empty vacant rooms that need filling. Maybe you are tired of everything you have and you want to start fresh but this time with a real vision instead of whatever you picked up along the way.

Here are some general steps to decorating a room:

THINK first.

How do you want to feeeeel in this room? What is its purpose? Start here first and foremost. Do you want to feel zen and relaxed like a spa in the bedroom? Do you want a living room that is alive and awake, or quiet and calm? Is your kitchen a busy place full of people, or your quiet country cottage get away for brewing your favorite tea? Set a tone for your room - not every room has to be the same. So many aspects of a room can be derived simply by knowing how you want to feel when you are in this room. (Example: I wanted my bedroom to feel like a retreat, the way I feel at the spa. It is full of earth tones, subdued colors, warm woods, candles, and soft fluffy textures. I also used thick luxurious curtains to block out light and make a tall room less echo-y to make it more cozy. )

Gather research and reference.

Do your research. Look at those design styles above and find something that you like. Start doing some searching. Maybe make a pinterest board.
DO Find images of stuff you like.
DONT find too many images. You'll get bogged down. You can't do everything. If you have 30 images, you have too many. Pare it down to like.. 4. Creating mood boards can help you plan too. Making a plan like this isn't concrete though. You may not be able to find that exact table or that specific rug. Understand the underlying principles of why you like it. Maybe what you're really looking for is a glassy smooth modern end table, not that precise one That opens up a lot of options.
Know your limits for your room. If you have a small shoebox apartment with cream carpet that you can't change, it is never going to look like that soaring open concept industrial space with concrete floors. Sorry - it isn't. Deal with it. Work WITH your space, don't aim for something it can never be.

Plan a basic layout.

Start making a basic layout of your space. You can use an online app, a phone app, or even a pencil and paper. Measure!! Note your windows, your doors, closet space. Start to draw out where you think you want the couch to go, where the tv should go, or bed, or dining table - whatever. Plan out the big anchor pieces of a room. You want that giant L shaped couch? Account for it in your plan so you know how much space you have to work with. Never. Buy. Furniture. Without. Measuring. EVER.

Work big to small, anchor pieces to details.

In a living room your anchor piece is the couch. In the dining room, the table/chairs. In a bedroom, the bed. Settle on that big piece and build from there. Having this one thing settled can help in a couple of ways. It can help set the tone for the rest of the room, and it can make the room functional. Can't sleep in a room without a bed, so start there so the room is available for actual sleeping. Next work your way to medium pieces - bookshelves, coffee tables, end tables, sideboards, desks etc. Finally choose the accents - lamps, knick knacks, plants throw pillows.

Solve problems, one at a time.

It's very hard to score a goal when the goal post or the field keeps moving. Once you anchor yourself in a room, you can start filling it by solving small problems. Instead of "What do I put in this room?" you can think "What tall thing can I put in this corner to fill this empty space?" These smaller problems/challenges/questions are much easier to tackle. Looking at a whole room can be very daunting, particularly if you have zero furniture or direction to work with. Also, you will get much better responses on this subreddit if you ask a specific question. "What should I put in this bookshelf" "How can I display these teacups?" Will always yield better results than "how should I decorate my house?"

Embrace the cocktail party.

I don't love super matchy matchy rooms - for me a room should be like a cocktail party. Everyone invited is interesting in their own way, but I want to make sure everyone has at least someone they can talk to or relate with. Think of all your furniture pieces and all your stuff as "talking" to each other.

A hot pink porcelain bowl may not relate to a black metal table - but the rug they are both near is hot pink, black, and white, so they are tied together by this rug.

TAKE YOUR TIME.

I can't say this enough: Take your time. Even if you're working with a giant budget, a really beloved space can take a long time to come together. Don't rush. Don't try to fill every corner RIGHT THIS SECOND. Look for things thoughtfully. Look for things specifically. Grab something when you see it because it would go perfectly right in that one spot. It took you a lifetime to create your personality, a room has its own personality and its own life time - and it takes time to grow and accumulate stuff.

So ends my giant post. I hope this is helpful to someone out there. I'll try to edit/update the post if people have suggestions. Decorating a space can be so much fun, and it's such a unique experience to everyone. None of these are "rules" they're just methods that yield good results. (Sure you can build a staircase out of paper bags, there's nothing that says you can't - but you'll probably be more successful with wood or metal. ) At the end of the day it's your space, your house, and you gotta live in it. I hope you make it something great. :D