Soft-Design Early On: Why Furnishings & Finishes Shouldn’t Be an Afterthought

The best homes are designed from the inside out.

When planning a home renovation, it’s easy to get swept up in the big, structural decisions—walls, cabinetry, plumbing layouts, ceiling heights. These “hard design” elements are foundational and essential. But just as essential? The “soft design” elements, your furnishings, textiles, lighting, and layered details that bring a holistic vision to life with warmth, and everyday function to the space.

Too often, soft design is saved for the end, only tacked on once the dust has settled and the floors are in. But at DMB Design, we believe the most cohesive and beautiful homes are the ones where both hard and soft design are thoughtfully considered from the very beginning.

What Is Soft Design, Exactly?

Soft design includes everything from sofas and side tables to rugs, drapery, artwork, lighting, and accessories. It’s the furniture you’ll live with every day, the fabric that softens your rooms, the counter stools that tie your kitchen together. It’s the polish and personality and it plays a much bigger role in space planning than most people realize.

Why Plan Soft Design Early?

1. It Informs the Layout

If you know you want a large, sectional sofa with a lounge end, we need to plan for that in your living room dimensions. If you’re dreaming of a statement light fixture or custom drapes that pool on the floor, ceiling heights, outlet placements, and window styles must support that vision from day one.

By considering furnishings during the architectural planning phase, we can ensure everything fits not just physically, but visually and functionally.

2. It Prevents Regret (and Redesigns)

Skipping soft design early on often leads to awkward furniture placement, under-scaled rugs, or lighting that feels “off.” Worse, clients end up compromising on the pieces they really want because the layout simply doesn’t accommodate them. Planning ahead eliminates surprises and avoids costly rework later.

3. It Creates a Cohesive Look

Soft and hard design should speak the same language. When tile, cabinetry, hardware, and finishes can be chosen in isolation from furniture and textiles, the result can feel incomplete. But when a home’s finishes and furnishings are designed in tandem, the result is seamless, elevated, and livable. Especially when multiple spaces are called into question, much like the full first floor renovations we are know for, soft-designing each room creates a symbiotic feel from room to room.

4. It Speeds Up the Finishing Phase

When furniture, lighting, rugs, and window treatments are already selected and on order during construction, the finishing phase happens faster and smoother. There’s no long pause after construction wraps while you wait to piece together the rest of the home—because it’s already part of the plan. This method allows for furnishing, artworks, drapes, down to the pillow and lamps to be installed with in days of final contractor punch list items, rather than months. You may not realize it, the the lead times, especially on furniture can be as much as 8-12 weeks and in some cases longer. This is why ordering well in advance of when the space is ready for installation on soft-design goods saves you so much time and provides you with the ability to enjoy your home quickly following a long construction period.

The DMB Approach

We approach every project with the full picture in mind. Whether we’re designing a kitchen, a full home renovation, or a soft-design-only project, we’re always asking: How will this space live once it’s finished? That means planning where the sofa goes before deciding where the windows should be. It means choosing the right rug size before the flooring is installed. And it means treating furnishings, artwork, and accessories as essential to a complete space.

The Takeaway

If you're planning a home renovation, don’t wait to think about the sofa, the sconces, or the chairs around your new island. Soft design is not an afterthought—it’s a cornerstone of great interior design. When you plan it early, your home not only looks complete—it feels that way, too.

Let’s design a home that works as beautifully as it looks—from the floorboards to the final throw pillow.