Which brings us to the living room. Now, I didn't purposely take these pictures in a way that made them look really awful, it was just a dark, rainy day and this room doesn't get the most light anyways, so things look a little more... dire than they really are. Here goes.
Our decision to paint the whole house with one shade of paint has really been pushing me to think of the house as one whole space. I find myself making decisions that work for each space, so that all of the pieces are mostly interchangeable. I'm trying to make design decisions that carry themes throughout the rooms, which for now is looking like soft neutrals, warm wood tones, dark wrought iron, and splashes of saturated color. So I am keeping all of that in mind as we work on this room.
We bought quite a bit of the furniture in here right away, so the foundation has been here for a couple of months which has allowed me to just think about all the nitty gritty little details. Let's talk about the fireplace wall first. When you come in the front door, the left wall is the back of the living room fireplace. It's a wall of brick.
And as you enter the living room, the fireplace and hearth are basically one entire wall of the living room. I think the mantel was made by the previous owner. It's sturdy and substantial. The plan is to strip off the existing finish and darken it up quite a bit. I'd like to try out a few different techniques to try and make the finish look more like weathered barn wood.
As far as what to put on the mantel, I'd love to hang a canvas of a family picture of the five of us up here. You know, once we actually get a picture of the five of us. Hehe. Maybe sometime this fall.
I love the color of the brick, don't you? Such a nice soft tan, with the dark gray grout. It's interesting and slightly different. The brick will be staying as is. It's one of the few things that Lover is adamant about - no painted brick. :)
The fireplace is functional, as far as we know. That brass insert is so fancy, don't you think? I think I am going to try and paint the insert with a high heat paint in flat black to make it fade away a little bit. Right now it's a bit in your face.
The window wall is next. This wall looks out on the street, or rather, on the two big trees in the front yard. It lets in quite a bit of light and fresh air, and is really quite enormous. It's taking me a while to find an affordable curtain rod that can span the 120 inches, and curtains that won't break the bank. The curtains there currently are very nice quality and we've been living with them for several months now. They're fine, I'm just looking for something that is more my style. Oh, and I almost forgot, because we removed them in the first few days of living here, but this corner also held a corner shelf and shallow bookcase. It made this whole corner feel heavy and off balance.
Oh and how much do you like that little loveseat?We found it for $20 at our local thrift store. It's super cute and comfy with great lines. Just needs a little reupholstering, and it will really shine. I can't decide if I want to go bright and happy with it, like a sunny yellow, or muted and soft neutrals, or kind of a burnt orange/brown combo. I need to go spend some quality time in a fabric store. Darn. :)
The back wall is where we decided the couch should hang out. It's kind of a cousin of the couch we had in the apartment - rolled arms, warm brown leather. We got it for ninety dollars from some family way up north in Arvada. It's super comfy and I am loving how durable leather is with the kids. We are considering adding another big window centered on this wall over the couch. It will depend on cost and feasibility since we'll be messing with exterior brick and such. I'll keep you posted on that decision. :)
We are tossing around a few ideas for end tables, but we are pretty sure that we are also doing some really substantial shelves on either side of the couch. I drew up a very rudimentary sketch to show what direction we are thinking. Initially I was thinking a sofa table would work behind the couch, but Lover convinced me (rightly so) that this room is shallow enough without sticking that couch out even further into the room. So end tables and shelves it is.
The shelves will hold pretty things, like plants and pictures, and useful things like ... all those little things that need to be kept out of the reach of sticky fingers. :) I'm planning to finish them the same way as the mantel - we will see how that works out.
A few more things of note - we found that super chunky coffee table at a yard sale. It has three deep drawers for storage and is the perfect height for building legos and making train tracks. But it's a little oversized for this relatively small room, so that's going in the bonus room. It will be replaced with an upholstered ottoman. We are also updating that ceiling fan to something a little less...ancient. And lastly, we settled on mounting the TV on that little wall between the bonus room doorway and the closet. It's on a swing arm so that we can pull it out and see it from the couch comfortably. We're in the process of switching that ridiculous useless light fixture behind the TV to an outlet, so the TV will plug in hidden behind the screen. The other cord is for the whole house antenna, which we only use when we are watching live TV. The rest of the time it's unplugged and coiled up behind the screen as well for a seamless look.
So - new curtains, furniture tweaking, fresh paint and some refinished wood should help this room along quite a bit. We're in the process of paint and curtains right now, so I should have an update on those soon. :) Or you know, in six months. You never know these days!
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