Interior Designers Reveal the 3 Common Design Flaws That Make Your Furniture Look Cheap
Designers break down the red flags that signal it’s time to run for the hills
Few people set out to buy cheap-looking furniture. Like beauty treatments or clothing, it runs counter to the entire point. We buy things to look better, not worse. Sometimes a ‘good deal’ gets the best of us, but as anyone who’s ever tried to save money on highlights knows, that bargain usually comes with a second appointment and a much higher bill. Buy it nice, or buy it twice.
Perhaps most criminal of all is when you did splurge on a certain furniture trend and the piece still reads budget. That’s double jail. While your great uncle may not clock it at Thanksgiving, anyone you’re actually trying to impress will. There are certain telltale details that not-so-silently scream machine-made, polyester-adjacent, corner-cut furniture from across the room – even when the price tag suggests otherwise.
Ahead, the three fatal flaws that make furniture look cheap – plus what designers recommend instead – so your pieces read every bit as elegant as you intended.
1. Bad Legs
This furniture’s got great legs. The chair slants feel sturdy, and the ladder is off-kilter in all the right ways. When foundations look this good, you can expect greatness to continue upward.
We’ve all been seduced by a plush velvet seat or a mid-century–style coffee table that somehow costs less than three days’ worth of groceries. From the top, it’s convincing. But the legs? They tell on it every time.
‘As a female designer, I almost cringe saying this out loud, but when it comes to checking out furniture, I’m looking right at the legs,’ laughs Lindsay Thornton, interior designer and founder of Cornerstone Design Build. ‘Much like needing the right shoes to finish an outfit, a sofa, table, or chair can be made with beautiful materials, but if the legs look like they came straight from a mass-produced factory, the whole piece falls outside my consideration set,’ she says. ‘Maybe it’s subconscious, but if the legs look cheap, I am sure as not going to sit on that chair!’
Rather than getting distracted by shiny finishes, trendy colors, or tactile fabrics, train your eye downward. Furniture without strong legs rarely excels elsewhere. ‘I look for solid, well-considered legs that make sense within the overall design,’ Lindsay notes. And if solid wood legs push the price out of reach, there’s a hack. ‘Alternatively, opt for a sofa or chair where the fabric goes straight to the ground, removing any guesswork,’ she advises.
Because when the foundation’s wrong, the whole thing collapses – aesthetically, at least.
One way to sidestep the leg problem altogether is to simply cover them. We’re not suggesting this Shea McGee–designed vanity chair has anything to hide – quite the opposite – but when there’s any ambiguity, a skirted slipcover like this solves it instantly.
Most novelty dining room chair designs skip leg day. But Joon Loloi consistently puts in those extra reps, pairing sculptural moments – like this organically curved backrest – with equally substantial angled legs. No spindly metal posts here, just the same real wood grounding everything else.
The whimsical wrought-iron styles having a moment right now (regrettably, even at ottoman scale) can easily run you a thousand dollars. This Shea McGee–designed ottoman, however, pulls off a near-identical effect with dark metal, and trust us: those sinuous legs will keep your secret safe and sound.
2. Generic Hardware
When a cabinet pull looks like it was shoehorned in – and worse, when that hardware is a dull brushed gray-silver oval – the whole piece reads cheap. Swapping it for something more intentional, and tying that choice back to other details in the furniture (as seen here with the black drawer borders), makes it feel more bespoke.
Say you pass the leg test. The structure’s solid, the proportions are right, and the piece promises longevity. The bones are there. Then you notice the hardware – and suddenly, you get the ick. Every redeeming quality starts to lose its luster.
‘For case goods, low-end pieces will often have stainless steel or matte black pulls or knobs, since these are the cheapest metal finishes to produce,’ explains Adriena Daunt, principal designer at Montana-based firm Daunt Designs. ‘Designers typically consider handles and pulls to be the jewelry of the piece, so higher-end case goods will sport hardware with interesting shapes, placement and finishes such as unlacquered brass or leather.’
That said, price alone is not a guarantee of good hardware taste. You can absolutely spend real money on a piece that still defaults to painfully generic finishes, which is why it pays to look closely at the smallest details. ‘I recommend looking carefully at the quality of the hardware (pulls, knobs, hinges) and not being afraid to mix metals in the same space.’
Sometimes you’ll get lucky and find furniture in your budget that already gets it right. But if you don’t, hardware is one of the easiest upgrades in the book. Swapping it out instantly elevates the piece and often makes it feel more bespoke than whatever it arrived with in the first place.
You can usually sniff out a factory-made piece when every detail looks a little too… perfect. Irregularity reads expensive because it implies a human hand, which is exactly why organically inspired hardware like this knob from Crate & Barrel is so convincing.
You simply don’t see cabinet pulls like this every day. A big-box buy (which we love, selectively) could never. Give your bedroom wardrobe an art-forward upgrade with a squiggly handle that makes a $200 piece embody $2,000 energy.
Tassels are an old-timey, hotel-coded touch that’s almost impossible to make look cheap. Render them in brass, like this Lark Knob set from Anthropologie, and those odds jump to a near-perfect 100%. Just imagine what they’d do to your dresser.
3. Trying Too Hard
There’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Often, the most expensive-looking furniture simply masters the basics.
You learned this early. Trying too hard to be cool is usually the fastest way to miss the mark. Furniture is no different.
‘Anything trying too hard to look expensive usually does the opposite,’ notes Lauren Lerner, founder and principal designer of Living with Lolo. ‘Think high-gloss veneers, synthetic stone, and overly polished finishes. They might seem like shortcuts, but they don’t age well, and they don’t feel real.’
If you need a mental picture, recall your last trip to Las Vegas. ‘When materials feel insubstantial or over-styled, the eye reads them as disposable,’ agrees Karen McCooey, founder and designer of Karen McCooey Studios. Instead, she advises to ‘favor honest materials and restrained finishes,’ like ‘matte or softly patinated metals, real wood with visible grain, tailored upholstery, and textures that age gracefully rather than announce themselves.’
‘Quiet luxury’ may have lost most of its meaning, but the now super-saturated sentiment became popular for a reason. Furniture that doesn’t try to impress usually ends up doing exactly that.
The fastest way to drain warmth from a piece is to sand away the very thing that makes it feel alive. Joanna Gaines, as ever, understands the assignment. This full-wood cupboard from her Target line leans into natural grain rather than disguising it, creating storage that looks several times more expensive than it is.
A chenille-upholstered bench like this works just about anywhere the house needs a pause moment, from the entryway to the foot of the bed to the dining room. The bolster pillows aren’t reinventing the wheel, but they’re executed immaculately, which more often than not beats a cheap swing at novelty.
Flirting with faux burlwood or faux marble? Proceed with caution. If the real thing isn’t in the budget and vintage isn’t an option, put your money where it actually counts: wood. Fluting, in particular, is a fantastic workaround, adding depth, shadow, and tactile interest.
Your furniture might no longer read cheap, but tastelessness has a way of catching up to us all. Don’t get stuck with the living-room equivalent of a Labubu – these are the once-revered, now 'cringey' design trends it’s time to retire in 2026.
