I was invited to run design sessions at the Ideal Home Show 2026 at Olympia, London. Over several days I sat down with homeowners at every stage of a project. Some had just exchanged on a new property. Others had been living with a room that was not working for years and could not pinpoint why. Several brought their floor plans with them, ready to work through their layout problems on the spot.
What struck me was not the variety of spaces or budgets, but how consistent the problems were. The same issues came up again and again, in different rooms, at different price points, across completely different house types. Those conversations gave me a clear picture of what homeowners are genuinely struggling with when it comes to renovating. It also gave me, as an interior designer and business owner, a better understanding of how we can support clients at House Designer.
Getting the Renovation Sequence Wrong
This was the most common issue I encountered and the one with the most expensive consequences. People are making decisions in the wrong order and it is costing them money, time and frustration.
The most frequent mistake: choosing paint colours before confirming flooring. The flooring is the largest surface in the room and its warmth or coolness directly affects which paint colours will work on the walls. Choosing paint first and flooring second means one of them will almost certainly end up fighting the other.
The second: ordering furniture before having a scaled layout plan. A sofa that looks right in a showroom can be completely wrong for a specific room once you account for the door swing, the radiator position, the traffic flow and the actual proportions of the space. This is one of the most common reasons rooms feel off without the homeowner being able to explain why.
The third, and the one I will come to in more detail: treating lighting as a finishing decision rather than a first one.
The correct sequence in a renovation matters as much as the individual decisions within it. Our post on where to begin when planning a home redesign covers how to approach this properly, and the interior design process page maps the full sequence from brief to completion.
Why Lighting Is the First Thing to Plan, Not the Last
Several people came to the workshops with floor plans they had brought from home, wanting to work through their layout and room decisions. These were often the most productive conversations because we could look at the space properly rather than discussing it in the abstract.
The conversation that shifted people’s thinking most consistently was about lighting, and specifically about how much is possible when you plan it properly from the start. Getting lighting right before the build begins means you can create layers of light across a room, ambient, task and accent, that make the space work differently at different times of day. It means wall light points in exactly the right positions, dimmer circuits where you want atmosphere, and sockets where you actually need them rather than where the electrician defaulted to. Once the walls are plastered and closed up, the circuits are fixed. Adding a socket in a different position, moving a switch or adding a wall light point that was not planned means chasing out finished plasterwork. It is expensive, disruptive and entirely avoidable when the decisions are made at the right stage.
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Lighting is also the element of interior design with the most influence over how a finished room actually feels. The position of a single downlight in the wrong place can create a shadow across an entire kitchen workspace. The right bulb temperature makes a paint colour sing. Getting this right from the start is one of the highest-return investments in any renovation.
Every renovation project we take on at House Designer includes a lighting and socket plan for exactly this reason. Planning it first, before the electrician starts first fix, means the finished room performs the way it was designed to.
Choosing Paint Colours Without Understanding Light
Colour was the topic that generated the most conversation over the ten days, and the most consistent source of renovation regret.
The most common mistake I heard about was painting a room brilliant white to make it feel brighter and finding it looked flat, cold and slightly clinical. This happens because most whites contain blue or grey undertones that cool or limited natural light will amplify rather than neutralise. The solution is not a different shade of white. It is a white with warm undertones, cream, yellow or soft pink in the base, that counterbalances the room’s light conditions rather than reinforcing them.
The wider issue is that most people choose paint colours in isolation. They pick a shade they like on a chip, order a sample, paint a small patch on the wall, and make a decision based on that. What they are not accounting for is how the flooring tone, the furniture they are keeping, and the quality of light at different times of day will interact with the colour once the room is complete.
Colour confidence in a renovation is not about trend awareness. It comes down to understanding the undertone of the colour, the specific light conditions of the room, and how the existing elements in the space will sit alongside it. Our post on how colour psychology shapes home design covers the principles that underpin every colour decision we make.
Space Planning: The Problem Nobody Talks About
A number of people came to the workshops with a specific layout problem they had been living with for months. A living room where the sofa felt wrong regardless of where they put it. A bedroom where the door clashed with the wardrobe and there did not seem to be a solution. An open plan space that had never worked as a place to eat, cook and relax at the same time.
In almost every case the problem was solvable, but it required looking at the space as a scaled plan rather than rearranging furniture by feel. The difference between a room that works and one that does not is very often twenty centimetres in one direction, or a piece of furniture that is marginally too large for the wall it sits against.
This is what professional space planning actually does. It removes the guesswork from furniture decisions before anything is bought and identifies problems before they become expensive. Our 3D floor plan service gives clients a photorealistic view of their room before a single piece of furniture is ordered, which is exactly the kind of clarity most renovation projects are missing.
The Belief That Professional Design Is Not for Them
The most consistent assumption I encountered across the ten days was that professional interior design was not something available to them. Too expensive, too complicated, or designed for a different type of client with a different type of home.
This is understandable given how the design industry has historically presented itself. But it does not reflect the reality of what we offer or how we work.
Professional design support does not need to mean a full-service engagement with a large minimum spend. At House Designer, It can mean a single room, a clear brief, a scaled layout plan, a 3D visuals of the finished space, a shopping list with trade discounts and a dedicated designer available to answer questions throughout the build. That is a practical, accessible service that makes a real difference to how a renovation turns out, regardless of the overall budget.
The conversations at the show reinforced something I come back to often: the value of good design advice is not proportional to the size of the project. The right sequence of decisions, a clear colour direction and confidence in the layout are worth the same whether you are redesigning one room or working through an entire house.
If you are planning a renovation and want to understand what professional support could look like for your project, our how it works page covers the process and our packages page covers the options. If you would rather talk it through first, book a free consultation and we can start from wherever you are in the process.