Woman Tired of ‘Neutral’ Apartment Gets Dopamine Décor, Internet Loves It

Looking to give your dreary home interior a colorful face-lift? One woman in Canada found the perfect fix for her “minimalist blah” apartment by giving it a “dopamine” boost.

The 38-year-old administrative worker in the Canadian Prairies in the country’s Western region shared images of her apartment’s incredible transformation in a viral post on Reddit. Shared under the username u/mossyzombie2021, it has amassed more than 17,000 upvotes since it was posted on June 27.

A caption shared with the post reads: “After exhausting the neutral look for years I decided to dopamine my one-bedroom apartment!” The images feature shots of the home decorated in various pastel shades of pink and purple, with green, turquoise blue and peach touches across different furnishings.

The poster told Newsweek: “I wanted neon pastels everywhere with cute, almost kawaii [the Japanese cultural phenomenon celebrating all things cute] touches and retro vibes. Midcentury and 1960s styles have always inspired me, so I wanted to add in some of those, too.”

What Is the Dopamine Décor Trend?

The “feel good” design trend that has been taking the internet by storm is all about bright pops of color and anything else that makes you feel happy.

The Reddit poster said: “Basically, everything I love and that makes me happy—that’s what dopamine décor is about.

“Dopamine décor is an emerging trend of bright colors and eclectic style, bringing back trendy remnants of the 1990s/2000s and even the 1960s. The name implies a jolt of dopamine emanating from the space in every direction you look,” she added.

Money spent on home renovation was found to have surged in the past three years, with the median spend increasing by 60 percent between 2020 ($15,000) and 2023 ($24,000). This is according to a survey of 32,615 users, including 17,713 renovating U.S. homeowners, conducted by Houzz, a home design website.

Seventy percent of renovating homeowners were found to have invested in interior room remodeling last year. On average, homeowners took on nearly three interior room upgrades during their renovations, the survey found.

Living-room projects were popular in 2023, with 21 percent having undertaken them. But kitchens remain as the most commonly renovated interior room (29 percent), followed by guest bathrooms (27 percent) and primary bathrooms (25 percent), according to the survey.

From ‘Blah’ to ‘Color and Pizazz’

The previous look of the poster’s apartment was “the typical neutral beige, gray, seagrass minimalist blah you see everywhere nowadays,” she said, “which honestly took the fun out of decorating, in my opinion, because it was so limiting.”

The poster recalled seeing a colorful item in a shop that made her heart skip a beat, and feeling disheartened that she had to leave it behind because “it wouldn’t ‘go’ with my space.”

Her apartment’s transformation, which has been slowly unfolding over the past two months, is “still a work in progress,” the poster said, “as I procure the perfect items and refine the style.”

Adding that she is renting her apartment, so “painting walls and so on is not an option,” the poster said the process is “still new to me, so I’m still learning as I go to work with so much color and pizazz.”

She added: “I feel it’s a true reflection of my personality, unconstrained by society’s pressures and ideals. Decorating your home can be empowering in that way.”

‘Dopamine Boost’

Users on Reddit were blown away by the apartment’s vibrant revamp.

Reddit user cicada_noises posted: “LOVE. LOVE LOVE LOVE. You’ve balanced maximalist color and whimsy without making the space look cluttered or tacky/cheap. It’s obvious that things were picked and placed with intention. It’s really very restrained and the effect is just fantastic. Your apartment gave me a dopamine boost and I don’t even live there.”

False_Barracuda5571 commented: “This post just awakened something in my soul.”

PaprikaMama wrote: “Saving this post so I can look at it again because it sparks joy!”

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