Welcome to Return on Design, the podcast where beauty meets strategy and interiors become assets that perform. I’m your host, Rachel Niederhofer, designer, investor and builder of high impact spaces that deliver real results. Alongside my husband, I run both a design firm and a real estate investment company, where I live at the intersection of creativity and ROI every day. Each week, I’ll be unpacking what most people overlook: how strategic design decisions can grow your investment, elevate your lifestyle and unlock the full potential of your property.
Luxury has less to do with how much you spend and more to do with how strategically you design. The luxury designer look without the price tag is entirely possible, and it comes from a handful of decisions about pattern, scale, and finish that most people never think to question.
Expensive materials on their own don’t produce an expensive result. The same budget tile, laid with intention and paired with the right details, can read as a far more elevated space than a pricier material applied without any strategy behind it.
How do you get a high priced designer feel without a five figure or six figure budget? Not everyone can spend their way to a luxury result, and the good news is nobody has to. Luxury has more to do with quality and strategic execution than it does with the bottom line dollar amount.
Expensive materials do not guarantee that expensive look.
Return on Design, Episode 13
Material finishes and applications are what actually shift perceived value in a project, which is what raises the result and protects the return.
A standard subway tile, laid in different patterns, produces completely different results from the exact same material. Herringbone, vertical stacking, horizontal lines, a classic brick pattern: each one changes the feel of a space without changing the tile itself. Some patterns do raise labor cost, which is why an accent herringbone above a range, instead of a full herringbone backsplash, gets the elevated look without the full labor bill. That is the luxury designer look without the price tag in practice: the material stays the same, only the decision around it changes.
Mixing budget and luxury materials works the same way. A basic, affordable subway tile on most of a shower, paired with an inlaid strip of marble around the plumbing fixtures or on the floor, gives the room a luxury signature without the cost of covering the whole space in marble. If marble isn’t in the budget at all, a ceramic penny round carries the same idea at a lower price point.
A stunning tile can be ruined by the wrong grout color. The farmhouse trend of pairing white subway tile with black grout has already dated. Matching the grout to the tile instead creates a more cohesive, elevated result, and it reads as higher ceilings and a grander space than the same tile with a contrasting grout line.
The tile selection matters less than most people assume. The same tile with a different grout color can look like two entirely different projects, which makes grout one of the least expensive ways to shift a space upmarket.
A door header around a standard seven foot door frame can make it read as an eight foot door. Crown molding is a classic investment that holds its value through shifting design trends. Window and doorway headers over an opening, even painted the same color as the surrounding wall, add enough architectural detail to look sophisticated without needing a second finish.
Scale decides whether millwork reads as elevated or cheap. A room with ten foot ceilings needs baseboards closer to eight inches to look proportional. A tiny one or two inch baseboard throws the whole scale off no matter how nice the rest of the room is. Clean execution matters just as much: a baseboard with visible gaps at the corners undercuts the whole effect, no matter how well the pattern or material choice was planned.
When a budget is limited, the question isn’t what to cut everywhere. It’s where to focus. Start with whatever feels the most dated or incomplete, then identify the actual focal point of the room, a fireplace, a kitchen island, whatever naturally draws the eye, and put the available budget there instead of spreading it thin across a space that is already working. This is the same logic behind Return on Design: put the money where it actually gets seen.
Fixtures follow the same logic. A twelve hundred dollar faucet and a two hundred dollar faucet can share the same finish, and the finish is what reads as luxury, not the brand name on the box. Mirror sizing works on proportion too: a mirror has to scale to both the width of the vanity below it and the wall above it, not just whatever size looked good in a photo. Too large looks wrong, and too small reads as cheap and unfinished.
Overdoing it costs just as much as underdoing it. A single exterior with brick, stone, traditional shingles, and metal roof accents all competing for attention spends more than a restrained, cohesive choice ever would. Classic design holds up because it never tries too hard in the first place. If millwork and trim are new territory, trust the process the same way you would with any other part of a renovation.
And sometimes just changing that pattern the way it’s set can dramatically change the look and from experience, only some certain patterns really kind of change a lot of that labor costs. Like, you know, going from a brick stack to a vertical stack, most tile guys are really not going to charge any differently. But when you get into some of the intricate details, that’s where your pricing can change. So you could be even specific on where to use, maybe small.
Like herringbone is going to cost you more in labor, typically. So maybe do an accent herringbone instead of the whole backsplash herringbone as an example where you can, you know, get that elevated look, maybe above a range. Welcome to Return on Design, the podcast where beauty meets strategy and interiors become assets that perform. I’m your host, Rachel Niederhofer, designer, investor and builder of high impact spaces that deliver real results. Alongside my husband, I run both a design firm and a real estate investment company where I live at the intersection of creativity and ROI every day. Each week, I’ll be unpacking what most people overlook, how strategic design decisions can grow your investment, elevate your lifestyle and unlock the full potential of your property. You’ll get real tools, proven strategies and unfiltered conversations with industry experts who are doing it right. So if you’re ready to invest with purpose and leverage design as a powerful tool, this podcast is for you. How do you get the luxury designer look without that designer price tag? Luxury has more to do with quality and strategic execution that it does just purely bottom line dollar amount.
Yeah, material, material finishes, applications, those are things that can truly adjust that perception or perceived value in your project, really raising that the value price tag in the end and affecting your ROI.
So today, we’re going to be sharing with you different tips, tricks and strategic framework to how to approach your projects, resulting in the designer luxury look, but not necessarily the designer luxury price tag.
So how do you get that high-priced designer feel without a five-figure, six-figure budget? Because not everybody can do that. Right.
Well, a great example is tile, tile and tile application. There’s so many creative ways you can actually apply tile and use colors to change the overall aesthetic or feel. Colors of grout, complementary cabinet or wall colors. But if we’re purely just looking at tile from an application standpoint, you can take, let’s just say, for example, like a three by 12 or four by 12 subway tile, standard subway tile, and you can lay that tile in a variety of different applications to create a completely different look. So if you don’t want to just do a very classic subway, traditional subway, almost similar to like a brick stacking pattern, you know, you can use herringbone or you can lay them all vertically, you can line them up all horizontally. Everything you do in that regard is going to produce a different result. You can also consider using multiple colors. Like if we’re playing on the same subway idea, you can inlay patterns to give an elevated look without actually changing the tile. So you’re just changing the color. So let’s say you’re doing a shower wall and you don’t just want one solid color. You might want to cycle in an accent color within it, maybe every eight to 10 rows, and you can apply that to almost create like a block function or you can color block within, you know, an accent wall or different ideas like that, not to get too far down the rabbit hole.
And sometimes just changing that pattern the way it’s set can dramatically change the look. And from experience, only some certain patterns really kind of change a lot of that labor costs. Like, you know, going from a brick stack to vertical stack, most tile guys are really not going to charge any differently. But when you get into some of the intricate details, that’s where your pricing can change. So you could be even specific on where to use.
Yeah, maybe small like herringbone is going to cost you more in labor, typically. So maybe do an accent herringbone instead of the whole back splash herringbone as an example where you can, you know, get that elevated look, maybe above a range. You can play with your budget a little bit. It’s not just about buying the most expensive tile and assuming that’s going to equate to the most most valuable return. You know, you can approach it with a little creative edge and how you can take that more affordable tile and creatively apply it to elevate the whole look and not necessarily break the bank doing it. Another big factor when it comes to tile is grout. You can take a stunning tile and ruin it with a wrong grout color. It almost was like a very farmhouse trend to take like a white subway as an example and overlay it with a black grout. That’s definitely not on trend now. I mean, a more elevated look would be to match your grout with your tile. It’s going to create the illusion of higher ceilings and more of a grand, just a grand result, excuse me, a grander result. So another thing to consider. I mean, we’ve we’ve seen DIYs where the grout is just all the wrong color and we’ve used the same tile application with a different grout. It gets you a completely different look. It’s much more sophisticated, elevated. It feels more on trend and it doesn’t necessarily mean that the tile is the most trending tile. So that’s a good tip for like investors to if you’re coming into a project and, you know, maybe you’re only upgrading a portion of the house. I mean, you can still complement different tiles by just making sure you’re elevating the overall look.
Yeah. And it’s kind of to circle back on some of the cost of the material because the material sides at the cost of the material is important, but you can take a lesser expensive tile and dress it up to be and look a whole lot more expensive and a whole lot more elevated and elegant. Even if you do want to get some of that more expensive tile, like taking a smaller tile and just dressing it up with that niche section that gets framed out that might be a little bit more higher in, but it brings up the level of everything else, right?
Yes, absolutely. Like I’ve done multiple shower projects, but where I will do like a basic subway, which is much more affordable and I might change the orientation of the layout. Like some might be vertical, some might be, you know, double block to create squares or just different applications with the subway. And then I will inlay like a luxury marble. So I might put marble on the floor or etch out just a space of marble, like in the master, maybe around your plumbing fixtures, trim it out, you know, with marble trim. That’s just one idea. But again, you can also do that same thing. Like if your budget doesn’t permit marble, you could do the same thing with maybe a ceramic penny round on the floor or one by ones that have a subtle pattern. And you could then match that color in a different subway and bring that up on the wall to create a different type of accent.
So there’s lighting in an accent piece.
Yeah, the options truly are unlimited. It’s all about how creative you really want to get. But really, it’s it’s making sure you’re thinking about it from the standpoint of, you know, it doesn’t have to just be, oh, we buy $20 a square foot tile to get that $15,000 luxury look in this bathroom. Expensive materials do not guarantee that expensive look. It’s really about quality execution and how you really apply it.
Application. OK, so, you know, we’ve talked about so like the tile, but what are other ways like trim, mill works, different things like that, you know, baseboards.
Crom moldings, millworks or millwork in general is a great way to elevate a look without having to, you know, over splurge. Example being like, like, let’s say you are doing a flip or maybe you’re just doing a, you know, a moderate renovation of some sort. You can add door headers around your doors, trim around your doors. And now your seven foot doors are going to look like eight foot doors, you know, as an example, you’re probably not going to get a full 12 foot on your header or 12 inch on your header. But it’s a way to create a more luxurious finish and it’s economical, you know, material.
And again, you know, you can get into different materials for that. And material use for areas is where you can really save and manage that budget because you have hardwood, you have MDF, you have there’s some that are even plastic.
And I’ve noticed, like, as much as we’ve moved in all the different architecture in different places, like in certain areas of the country, millwork is much more valued than in other areas. Typically, I’ve seen more historical buildings and just older areas, you know, have a little more history and a little more craftsmanship. As we’ve ventured further out west, I have seen less and less of that. It’s not as regular.
There’s not as much of the big ornate ones.
Yeah, I mean, the ornate has a lot of like the European influence, but even like the colonial builds have, you know, windows, almost all windows are going to have wood casing around them versus if you go to New Mexico and you have like a lot of Indian influence in Adobe, you know, you’re not going to see that same architectural feature. But I digress point being, you can elevate a space using molding, like crown molding is sort of in and out. It fades depending on design trends. I think it’s a nice classic traditional investment that’s going to hold its value over time. Baseboards also scale of your baseboards is important. 12 foot walls or 12 foot ceilings, even 10 foot and little, you know, squatty, one
Inch, two inch baseboard. Yeah, it just throws your scale completely off and look cheaper, too.
So if you have a 10 foot ceiling, let’s say, you know, you probably need to be closer to the eight inches on your baseboard to really give it that grander, elevated look. Just as an example, it helps to
Just extend, like bring the height and bring your eyes throughout the entire space.
Yes, it can completely elevate a room without being solely dependent on a budget. And then, of course, you can do wanes coating on the walls. And a lot of that is going to lend to the architecture. You’ll see it in design trends. But from purely just trying to get that luxury look, if it lends to whatever you’re building out, then I would recommend it to. I mean, it’s a minimal investment if done right. And, you know, again, that
Key is done right and making sure, like for your baseboards, for example, trying to make sure that it’s it looks seamless across the floor. Like you don’t want you don’t want to see big waves and gaps that cheapens the look of what you were trying to accomplish.
Or if you can’t cut a 90 degree on the corner of a lake, you’re going to take a beautiful corner and turn it into a disaster with a huge gap. I’m not I wouldn’t say anything really specific that I could think of. I mean, wanes coating wall.
Wanes coating walls, but that’s very door headers
Make the biggest dramatic and not just above a door, but headers above windows, windows, walkways, openings. Like if you have an opening, you know, from one room to the next and it’s just drywall, you could wrap that in mill work and really elevate it, give it a header and it totally dresses it up. It’s going to give a more formal feel and look and people notice that even if the walls are and the mill work are all the same color, people who will value that and perceive it as a value are going to notice that pretty quickly. Like if you don’t want to, let’s say, have a bunch of different colors in a room, just adding that little bit of architectural detail with the mill work and all the same color is going to give enough contrast to the eye to look very sophisticated and elevated.
OK, so we’ve talked about tile. We’ve talked about mill works and trims and things, ways you can use those. And so you’ve done some of that where areas maybe to avoid or how do you determine I’m going to do this, but I’m not going to do this
Like where to allocate, I guess. I mean, if we’re taking it from like a large. Picture, big, big picture of a whole house, let’s say, and maybe you’re rehabbing or redesigning, I would focus on like your biggest problem areas, your biggest, you know, what feels dated or looks dated or even incomplete. I mean, we’ve seen homes that get half redone and half not. So then immediately you’re like, OK, I need to focus on what hasn’t been done at all versus what’s already been done. Yeah, that would be step one. Like, what’s the primary pinpoint? So let’s narrow it down for me and I can speak to.
I guess, like, what are areas that kind of anchor and bring the whole house together that, you know, if this isn’t cohesive, then none of it will be cohesive.
I would say possibly living room, yes, but more like the focal point of this space. So if you’re looking at a whole house, you’re going to spend most of your time in your kitchen and your primary living area. So that would be the dominating decision making space. But if you’re narrowing it down to one room, then what’s the focal point of that room and then you can kind of back into to that. Your focal point is where you could spend more attention to create a little more of a luxury feel, because it’s going to like draw the eye. If you have a feature fireplace, you don’t want to necessarily just assume, oh, the fireplace is already done. I’m going to focus on this opposing wall and do a big millwork accent on this wall. That may not make sense. It might make more sense to just focus on the already dominating focal point of the room and give it a little bit of an improvement and it can have a more dramatic feel, if that makes sense.
OK, are there, I guess, pieces that go in to a room, you know, maybe don’t that maybe I don’t need to splurge so much on this versus I do like, say in the bathroom, like, you know, the faucets, the pieces like that, those faucets can range in where from 200 bucks to, you know, I’ve seen some that are 1200 bucks and that doesn’t necessarily equate, does it?
Yeah, I mean, you can definitely get at that designer elevated luxury look without buying all those specific brands. You can focus on, like, finish materials. So if you if you love a really, you know, luxury brand and in a like a brass finish, you can start focusing on, OK, I want to find something that’s comparable in the same finish. It’s going to give you that same luxury look without necessarily the price tag. That would be a good one. Plumbing fixtures, mirrors, lighting fixtures over. Make sure you’re scaling your mirrors correctly. So scale is like very, very important in interior design and also in creating a luxury finish. If you have, let’s say you have a vanity that’s 36 inches wide and a wall that is, let’s say, 60 inches long. You want your mirror above your vanity to be proportionally scaled to the width of the vanity and scaled to the height that you have on the wall from the top of the vanity to the
Bottom of your light fixtures.
Yeah, bottom of the light fixture. Like I usually do between two to three inches on each. It really depends. But just to give you an idea, if you have a 36 inch vanity and you’re putting a 48
Inch wide mirror, it’s not going to look right. Oh, what? A 48 inch wide.
Yeah, that would be too big. But too small is going to look cheap, unfinished. So it is a way you can elevate the look, give it more of a grandeur look. It’s going to bounce more light in the room. It’s going to enhance all the the brightness and that luxury feel. And it’s going to make the room feel bigger. Ceilings are going to feel taller. That’s a simple way to create that luxury. Yeah, I mean, there’s so many things that you can do. Techniques that you can apply that are going to give you that luxury feel.
And it’s the smaller touches a lot of times. But necessarily that small touch, those small details don’t always have to be the most expensive thing to get the same feel and look. And there’s just so many different ways as you get into different rooms in different areas, different parts of the country, even where, you know, those touches look and hit better or may not be as necessary.
But sometimes they can blow your budget, too.
Yeah, if you’re trying to really make it over the top, too many details, too many different materials trying to get that over the top look. Sometimes you spend a whole lot more than you really are ever getting out of it.
I mean, I know recently we were just talking about a front elevation of a house that has too many things going on, too many finishes. You know, they’ve got brick and stone and traditional shingles and metal roof accents. And, you know, it’s just like becomes so much happening that it wasn’t necessary. You could have solidified and maybe done some accents without having to throw everything at the wall at the same time.
Yeah, sometimes it’s easy to see sometimes when it’s almost like trying too hard.
Yeah, like, I want this house to feel very expensive. And so then they think.
So I’m going to throw everything in the kitchen sink at it.
Yeah, doesn’t always wait to that is the point. So key takeaways for today. It’s more important to consider creative options to get that elevated luxury designer look. It’s not purely just about spending the luxury dollar to get the look.
Yeah, and it doesn’t mean that you have to do something big and huge in grants. Sometimes it’s the small touches. There’s the small, those small details that really elevate a space. Yeah.
So classic is classy. And there’s an element to a traditional approach to design that will be tried and true.
If you like what you heard today, want to follow along, keep following along. You know, make sure to hit the like button, subscribe, follow along with us on social and on the website. And we’ll just keep sharing with you. Look forward to seeing you next time. Thanks for listening.
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