Will it look good old?

This is a great litmus test for ANYTHING you choose to put in your home. If you have kids like mine. And don't want to spend all of your time cleaning. 

Will it look good when it is dirty? Will it look good in 1 year? 5 years? Will it look good chipped? Or will one chunk out of that melamine table make it look like it got pulled out of a dumpster?

This is a reason I mostly try to purchase thrifted, solid wood pieces that can be refinished,  painted,  patched,  whatever. 

Even if that solid wood piece "takes a hit of damage" as my kid would say,  it's still salvagable. Even better,  if that piece isn't getting refinished for another ten years it's nothing a wood stain marker can't fix. 

Same with paint colors & more importantly, finishes. Whatever color you choose, is it dark enough to hide fingerprint smudges as they trail along the wall after chicken nuggets?

I'm not saying never clean your house. But it should be decorated or designed in a way that those smudges can wait until the next time you actually planned on washing your walls. 

On that note, since it feels like I have to wash my walls quite often, choose an eggshell finish for your walls. I lived through the matte trend. It's great, it's beautiful. But the first time I washed my walls you could see wash streaks. And they've been there ever since. I used good quality paint. Who knows, maybe I'm washing my walls wrong. Don't really care,  quite frankly it's amazing I washed them in the first place.