Living Room Transformation

I know I have shown you pieces of my living room makeover but today I’m going to give you all the details.  This post is long overdue, I know.  It’s so overdue that I actually had a reader request me to write this post!

 

Here are the facts.  My living room before wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t great.

 

In our previous home we had a living room and a family room, so all the furniture used to be in two separate rooms.  However when we moved into town, and downsized {by over 500 square feet!}, suddenly all the furniture was stuck in the same room.  An out of town friend of ours was looking at pictures of our living room and said, “wow, someone really loves dark leather furniture.”  Which I totally don’t but that’s what we had.  Our couch was given to us by my belated grandfather, as a wedding gift.  I’ve never really loved it but it was very comfortable and it functioned.  I did love the brown leather chairs because in our previous home {that we built} they used to sit in front of the fireplace and they were the perfect for sitting by the fire and drinking a glass of wine.  My husband and I used to spend hours sitting in them talking.

 

However, once something starts to bug me I can’t stop thinking about it and it has to change.  Our living room needed change and it needed it badly!!!

 

My first project was a photo collage.  My husband was out of town for two weeks this summer so I took advantage of the time alone {after I put Malea to bed} to get as many projects done as possible.

I gathered all the extra frames in the house, and some that I had bought on sale just for this collage.

 

Then I started laying them out in different layouts to see what I liked the best.

It took me a few tries but I finally landed on this layout.

Once they were up on the wall it looked a little different and I could see that I still had a few gaps to fill.

I found a few more frames, hung them up, and then the next day I spray painted all of the frames.  Then I ordered a bunch of black and white pictures from Costco to fill the frames.  Here’s what the finished product looks like.  I love the way it turned out.

 

After that I took on painting.  It took me 6 paint samples {the other 2 aren’t pictured because I had painted over them} to find the perfect gray but I am in love with the color!  It’s called Woodlawn Colonial Gray, by Valspar.

 

It truly is the perfect gray!  Okay so I have to admit that originally I wanted to paint the living room yellow.  My husband admittedly refused the yellow though so after hours of searching on Pinterest I decided on gray.  I’m so glad though because, like I said, I’m in love with it!

After painting came new furniture.  I couldn’t live with all of the black and brown leather anymore so I headed out to Ross and TJ Maxx and came home with these beauties! They were each only $100, which I thought was a steal!

 

Picture taken with my phone that’s why it’s poor quality.

 

Next was a new coffee table.  When we had Malea we sold our coffee table {with it’s sharp corners, perfect for splitting open a chin} and purchased an ottoman.  I loved the ottoman because it was perfect for hiding her toys in the living room but now that she’s a little older I keep all the toys in her room.  I found this coffee table on Pinterest and just had to make one.  Here is what my hubby and I created from looking at the pictures.

You can see how we did it here.

I had also been dying to have a white couch for a long time {I know, call me crazy} so I went to a discount furniture shop here in town and ordered a new couch.  I couldn’t get it in white linen, which is what I really wanted, but I was able to get off white microfiber, which is probably a better option for having a 2 year old. 🙂  I had been dreaming of a new couch for years and I wanted something with style.  I did not want another couch that looked like it should be in a dorm room!  I wanted curves, something sexy, and something that wouldn’t break the bank!  I love the couch I ended up with, but it was a very very long couple of months waiting for it to get made!!!

 

 

While I was waiting for the couch to come I called up my contractor {who is a friend of ours} and told him that I needed him to make me a mantle.  He thought I was crazy because our fireplace was not designed to have a mantle but I told him I just couldn’t go another Christmas without having someplace to hang my stockings.  He was skeptical of my idea but in the end, after it was stained and decorated, he told me that I was right.  He actually have me a great compliment, he said, “you always come to me with these crazy ideas but in the end they always end up looking so great.”

Here it is before.  Blah.

 

Here it is after the mantle {prior to staining it}.  A little better.

 

So of course once I had a new mantle the red brick looked even worse and outdated then it had before!  The next part of the makeover was staining the brick.  You can see how I did that here.  Don’t you think this is about 1000x better than the “before” picture?!

 

 

Once my new couch came it was a little different size than my other couch so I did some furniture rearranging.  After moving the room around to 3 different layouts {and texting pictures to my friend to see which one she liked best} I settled on an arrangement.  I love the new arrangement because now both couches face each other, which is great for conversation, and the other chairs create a nice seating area on the photo collage wall.  I also love that I was able to move my “craft” dresser to the corner of the room and use that corner for adding other decorations.  After moving the dresser I brought in my full length mirror from our bedroom and used it as a wall separator between the living room and dining room.  I love love love the new layout!  Not only is the room more inviting because it’s not filled with dark leather, but the seating arrangement is way more inviting then it used to be.

 

After living in the room for a couple weeks I realized that something was missing.  The wall we look at while sitting on the couch started to look a little plain.  It had a beautiful piece of artwork on it but it just seemed like it was missing something.  And like I said before, once something starts to bug me, I can’t stand it until I do something about it.  Enter Cutting Edge Stencil.  Can I just say I {heart} Cutting Edge stencils!  I ordered the Moroccan All-over stencil and got to painting.  You can see how I did that here.  Once it was finished the room seemed so much more complete!

 

 

When I look at pictures of what my living room looked like less than a year ago I just can’t believe the transformation!

 

What do you think?  Do you love it as much as I do?  Okay, I have to ask, what is your favorite part of the makeover?  I have a hard time deciding because I love it all but I think my absolute favorite is out coffee table.  I still can’t believe we made such a beautiful coffee table!!!