Spaces and decorating

I was watching an episode of a Finnish home decoration/renovation series last night and they were renovating the home of one of the hosts of the program. His home was a large loft apartment and being an interior decorator or something of the like, he had fairly solid views about what he wanted and what he didn't want. The outcome, while technically ok, was not something that I would've done.

I really like loft apartments thanks to the vast amounts of space they provide. But in my opinion the whole philosophy of a loft apartment is to be industrial and minimalist in some way; in the show last night the end result was very much crowded and looked like something that was forced into the world for the sake of doing something "different" and making a statement. It just didn't work, in my opinion. There were too many tricks and gimmicks to keep the open and spacious nature of the loft intact.

But I guess there might be some issues with decorating large areas. A person I once knew lived in this quite decent sized apartment, but the problem there was the typical Finnish mentality of decorating: put all of the furniture along the walls. There were other issues with not having any continuity or having interesting details, but the main turn-off for me was that by piling everything against the walls, it looked empty and soulless. As if no effort and creativity was used at all. In smaller spaces it's more difficult to place furniture due to the constraints, but in open areas this constraint doesn't exist and things should be a lot more easy. If you want to go for minimalism in open spaces, you should take very bold stances and not fear about placing furniture in the middle of the room.

But I'm nitpicking here and provoking a fight. While I have strong opinions on these subjects, ultimately I guess the core point is that you have to feel at home in your apartment or house. That said, you can decorate things in an interesting way, or then you can be a Finn...