The Clever Fruit-Inspired Rule That Stops Clutter Before It Enters Your Home

Do you ever wander into a decor or home goods store or shop online and get overwhelmed by the choices? After all, there are hundreds if not thousands of options to choose from, and everything ranges in size, shape, color, and style, making it tricky to pick. While you may want to add everything to your cart, too many items spread out across your home could lead to clutter and an excess of decor that ends up with no place to go. So how do you avoid buying too much while also decorating your tables, shelves, and other rooms with items that create a stylish aesthetic? Well, the key is in your fruit basket or local produce aisle — grab a cantaloupe, because one trend says this can give you the only measurement you need to determine the ideal size of decor for any space. As long as the pieces you buy are bigger than this melon, you can invest in them and avoid clutter!

The idea is to select fewer items that are larger in size rather than loading up on lots of tiny tchotchkes, which often make the space look cluttered. While you may not want to carry an actual cantaloupe around the stores, you can use its relative size to determine what sizes of decor pieces you want to search for. Instead of packing a melon, you could take the measurements of this fruit to keep with you instead. When you collect too many small pieces, it can create too much excess decor throughout your home, something you want to avoid. Even Joanna Gaines warns against this decorating faux pax that makes a home feel cluttered.

Experts and consumers alike agree that larger decor can really help balance and elevate any surface. You can also use your head or a similar-sized object as a scale like the melon. But regardless of the object you use, you might be asking why larger-sized decor items make for better purchases than small pieces. Whenever you're in a room full of tinier knickknacks, planters, and various objects, they can all combine to create a more cluttered layout as mentioned above. Many design experts will tell you to balance small pieces with medium and larger items if you're going to use them, and while you can certainly keep tiny decor in your rooms, you don't want these to be the main pieces you fill a space with. 

It might also be more financially and organizationally useful to invest in pieces that are larger than a cantaloupe, because each one requires you to think about what you're purchasing. Small items are easy to grab and put anywhere, but larger pieces need more consideration due to the size and expense. This is also why the cantaloupe rule works so well — when you're paying for or holding something more substantial, you may be thinking of where it can go instead of buying it and finding you have no place for it. It's also important to have negative space within your home, and bigger decor allows you to leave this so there's breathing room between each item. It can help to follow this home decor trick to add style, and it might also save you a lot of effort spent when you have to declutter your home, too.