Living Room Update

I really need to blog more frequently, ideally this should have been updated in real-time and thus broken up into a few shorter posts.  Warning: this is going to be long.

The living room has been my biggest struggle since we moved in - it was a definite hodge-podge and I was really struggling with the color palette and figuring out how to frugally pull it together   I think I've finally found some fabrics, trim and a rug to move it in the right direction and still work with what I already have.  For better or worse, I do like things to be light, feminine and mostly monochromatic with a pop of another color here and there.

As everyone knows, it really does take time and patience to transform a room and looking at this picture from one year ago reminds me we have made more progress than I've recently thought.

The room looked like this until a week or two ago.  Fine, but just not my vision.

And currently - view from the foyer:

View from the french doors in kitchen / den:

View towards the kitchen:

Jean's (my MIL) good friend Jackie works at Summer Classics here in Raleigh and they located some market sample chairs (86% off!!!!) for me during a recent sale.  Being furniture market samples, they didn't have matching leg finishes -- one is dark wood and the other cream -- and they didn't have matching fabric -- one had cream damask (on the left) and the other a very grandma floral slipcover (since stripped off!), but they had a lot going for them.  I love that they are on brass casters.  I love the shape.  I love that they are actually quite comfortable and substantial.  Most of all, I love the quality of the chairs for such a bargain price.  I want to recover them in cream / off-white velvet (but again, that is going to take time, patience and will power to save up).

Here is what I'm going for -- minus the piping:

Source: Christie's

Finding these chairs was the motivation I needed to save up and turn this room into one that I love.  Josh, a typical man, recently asked me if we could mount a TV over the fireplace.  Sorry honey, that is not in the cards.  My priorities: rug, lighten up the drapes, find fun fabric for pillows.  Longer term: mirror over the fireplace, decide on art (do a new large abstract?), find secretary or something with height to left of french doors.

Rug

Sticking with the clean look of a sisal in the living room.  I found the sisal at Eatman's and it should be finished any day!

Source

Pillow Fabric

While selecting my rug at Eatman's I went over and browsed in their fabric section.  Lots of gorgeous "to-the-the-trade" lines.  Of course I fell in love with a Jane Churchill velvet dot fabric, only to find it was actually discontinued in the green colorway.  Luckily the worldwide web found me a meter in the UK.  It is on its way across the pond to me now.  I'll have two pillows made for the cream velvet chairs.

I also found a Cowtan & Tout fabric for pillows on the couch.  I know they are similar, but I couldn't resist.

Lighten up drapes

The drapes in my living room are the ones from my dining room in our Edenton St house.  I love them, but they have also been part of the reason I've been confused about the direction of this room.  They come off darker than I'd pick out for the room and the trim colors were taking me in a different direction.  However, I don't want to scrap them completely because they are really well made and I didn't want to spend the money to start over.  For $50 I'm going to change the trim and hopefully that will change their overall look.  The ribbon is from Mill Outlet in Raleigh and had to be ordered, so I'll update you in a few weeks when it arrives. (Josh informed me this evening that it does not go with the fabric...hopefully he is wrong)

I'm impressed if you are still scrolling down -- that was quite long-winded.

Have a great week!

XO,

Whit