Why I hate the canopy bed.

Ok, hold onto your seats this could be quite a long article as it’s quite hard to know where to begin. You see I don’t just hate canopy beds, I also have very little time for canopy bed sets, bed canopies and all canopy bedding generally. And don’t get me started about homemade or diy four posters! So really my loathing knows no bounds.

Let’s start with the basic problem which is that the canopy bed is a massive throw back to an age we have well and truly outgrown. Just take a look on other article directories to see what kind of fare the canopy bed throws up. Never has so much been written about so little. The canopy bed is romantic, every little girl should have one so she can be a princess, and they remind us of the nobles in their medieval castles in the days of yore, blah, blah, blah.

Exactly who do you think you are if you have gone to the trouble of installing a mighty four poster bed in your home? You are either a show off, someone with no taste, someone with more money than sense or, indeed all three. I can just about accept that it might be fun to spend a night or two in some glamorous high class hotel with a canopy bed where you can, tongue firmly in cheek, forget who you are for a moment and indulge in some deep childhood fantasy. I won’t begrudge anybody that. But to then go home and say to yourself “Hmm wouldn’t it be cool if we had an enormous bed like that in our house so we can sleep in it every night”? No, sorry, that can’t work in my world.

You see buying a great big canopy bed just says gauche decadence. It says no imagination and it says you make interior design decisions based on how much kudos you think it might gain you from your neighbors. Hopefully none if they have any sense. Even worse than this is the rich fool who not only buys the bed but the full canopy bed set with matching bedside tables armoire, dresser, vanity table etc etc. That really shows the complete lack of imagination. I can’t pick out individual pieces of cool furniture that match so I’ll just throw a lot of money at a complete bedroom set so I don’t have to think.

It gets worse...

Perhaps I should give those rich fools a break as they were probably working too hard to have the time to learn any taste and after all there is a breed of canopy bedding enthusiasts who are worse than them… the wannabes. Yes those sad ones who don’t have the money and the big mansion but have been sucked into thinking that maybe if they stick a big canopy bed into their small house they might somehow add some glamour. Let me save you some time, you won’t.

So the wannabe does one of two things. Either they dig deep into their bank account and splash out on the real deal or they try to recreate the look with some form of DIY bed. Those who pick the first option usually end up trying to shoehorn a four poster monstrosity into a room that can’t take it and a home decorated in a completely unsuitable style. A worse fate awaits those who try to do it themselves. For those poor souls a botch job beckons. Something that was supposed to look stylish and cool in fact just looks cheap and nasty. If you’re a professional interior designer or someone with a great eye and some skill you can pull it off, but these people are few and far between.

Finally there are those who don’t even pretend they’ve got the money or the style and think that buying a bed canopy, that they can attach to the ceiling via a plastic hoop, will create some sort of old world, colonial style. They can’t. They end up looking like they’ve put up a fancy mosquito net, something that they might get away with in Florida but certainly not in Nebraska!

So my advice is to steer well clear of anything canopy bed related. There is so much cool furniture out there. So many talented designers who have worked hard to come up with new ideas, new twists on an old idea, and if you will just take a moment to hunt them out you can fill your home with any number of modern and stylish pieces of furniture that will say so much more about you and your home than a canopy bed ever could. Save the canopy bed for your honeymoon suite.