Before & After- Living Room Part I

Hooray! We made it to post number two!

Alright, so since I just posted about three months of work under the "House Tour" page, I thought I'd spend some time breaking down all of that work, room by room. We thought we'd start with the room we spend the most time in- the living room! Our living room is the first room you walk into from the front door, so of course we want the room to be welcoming and inviting. You know, a "stop and stay awhile" kind of vibe!

First step- we painted the walls a darker netural with Olympic's Dusty Trail. We searched high and low for the perfect neutral color and luckily found one we love... and have since used it in about three other rooms in our house! Hey, when you find someting you like, stick with it! Our beloved Dusty Trail going on the walls:

As you can see from the "before" picture below, the walls were a completely blank slate. The mantel was painted an out-of-place bright white while the rest of the fireplace and walls were painted a blah neutral. These walls looked jailhouse stark!

I knew that we just HAD to bring some contrast to these blank walls. Soooo, we painted the trim, crown molding, and fireplace an off-white creamy gloss (for ease, we used the color that is currently the color of the trim and crown molding all over our house- a custom Porter paint color). Voila, high contrast.

Much easier on the eyes, right?

Alright, so, walls? Check. Trim and fireplace? Check. What other surface needed some attention in this room? The front door. While we chose a cherry red for the front (more to come later on the outside of the house), we wanted to keep the natural wood look of our antique, solid oak door for the inside of the house. So we simply stained it with a dark Walnut Minwax. (Sorry for the poor quality, this was an iPhone pic!)

You can see the natural wood color for comparisons sake in the above picture. And here's a final look at the stained door, from afar:

Again, staining the front door brought more high contrast with the very neutral walls. In my opinion, contrast is the best way to keep a room looking clean and crisp.

Well lucky for you, the living room was just chock full of projects and that's all I can get on here today. But of course, that means there will be more to come in subsequent posts! Feel free to comment on any of these posts by clicking on the box below! I would love the feedback! Until tomorrow....