NEW HOUSE: LIVING ROOM PROGRESS
Y'all keep asking to see more new house pictures so today I'm sharing a little bit of our formal living room. It seems I'm not the only one who is working slowly and you appreciate seeing me decorate in stages. Real budgets and real ideas take time. This is what our living room looks like now but I have big dreams for where the space will end up one day.
Our living room is huge. It is very long and narrow like you see in most older traditional homes. Such a large formal space just isn't practical for our lifestyle so we've broken the space up into three zones. The bar. The lounge. And the study. Using furniture to break up the spaces has really helped us to utilize the whole room which is nice. No one wants a room that you only use twice a year.
My desk and our mail chest (where we keep bills) are all the way towards the back of the room in zone three. We've got Tagg's train table in that area right now but that's not permanent. This forces us to access this room daily.
Zone one is the pass through to the playroom and also where we keep our bar set up. I use an old chest I found on craigslist instead of a bar cart because it holds more bottles. I like how this gets people in this room when we entertain.
The middle area in front of the fireplace is zone two. We've got a sofa and loveseat squared off with the wing chair to create a cozy nook facing the fireplace. I don't plan on styling the coffee table. Wells and Tagg are just too young to have things sitting out looking pretty at this age. It's really just a space for making puzzles at this point.
PHASE 1
new matching end tables
new coffee table (either lucite or an ottoman)
matching lamps
plant (I love the look of a fiddle fig but I need something low maintenance and less fickle)
window treatments. I'm leaning toward natural colored linen
reupholster cane chairs
add sconces to the mantel
PHASE 2
built-ins on the far wall in zone 3 flanking the large picture window.
replace fireplace screen (perhaps add a gas insert)
reupholster sofa and loveseat
And just for reference, here is a look at the BEFORE pictures taken the day after closing. This room needed the least amount of work. We've painted everything in this room. The walls, (BM Classic Gray), the ceilings (Lowes White Ceiling Paint), and the trim (SW Designer White). We also added white wood blinds to the windows. I'm still navigating the navy sofa and loveseat. They came from my in-laws and are a great size and shape. The dark color is out of my comfort zone but I'm okay with that.
Our living room is huge. It is very long and narrow like you see in most older traditional homes. Such a large formal space just isn't practical for our lifestyle so we've broken the space up into three zones. The bar. The lounge. And the study. Using furniture to break up the spaces has really helped us to utilize the whole room which is nice. No one wants a room that you only use twice a year.
My desk and our mail chest (where we keep bills) are all the way towards the back of the room in zone three. We've got Tagg's train table in that area right now but that's not permanent. This forces us to access this room daily.
Zone one is the pass through to the playroom and also where we keep our bar set up. I use an old chest I found on craigslist instead of a bar cart because it holds more bottles. I like how this gets people in this room when we entertain.
The middle area in front of the fireplace is zone two. We've got a sofa and loveseat squared off with the wing chair to create a cozy nook facing the fireplace. I don't plan on styling the coffee table. Wells and Tagg are just too young to have things sitting out looking pretty at this age. It's really just a space for making puzzles at this point.
PHASE 1
new matching end tables
new coffee table (either lucite or an ottoman)
matching lamps
plant (I love the look of a fiddle fig but I need something low maintenance and less fickle)
window treatments. I'm leaning toward natural colored linen
reupholster cane chairs
add sconces to the mantel
PHASE 2
built-ins on the far wall in zone 3 flanking the large picture window.
replace fireplace screen (perhaps add a gas insert)
reupholster sofa and loveseat
And just for reference, here is a look at the BEFORE pictures taken the day after closing. This room needed the least amount of work. We've painted everything in this room. The walls, (BM Classic Gray), the ceilings (Lowes White Ceiling Paint), and the trim (SW Designer White). We also added white wood blinds to the windows. I'm still navigating the navy sofa and loveseat. They came from my in-laws and are a great size and shape. The dark color is out of my comfort zone but I'm okay with that.
