Do you ever start those small projects that snowball
into something bigger? That was us earlier this year.
I've always disliked our Family Room - it is a long rectangular room with the far end housing a fireplace & built-in shelves, faux-wood painted ceiling beams, paneled walls, pegged wood floor and only a sliding glass door for minimal natural light...so dark and drab!
This Spring one son needed a sofa. That's all it took! The sofa we had although still in sturdy, good condition, was the sofa we bought when our sons were teenagers. It was a huge, over-stuffed sofa, perfect in its day for teenage boys to hang out on, but its size consumed the room. The sofa became his.
My husband was happy as it meant we'd no longer fell over it when trying to get around it. There were also other pieces of over-sized furniture -
time for a room redo!
time for a room redo!
You know where I'm going with this story...Yep, replacing the sofa lead to painting the ceiling beams all white, a new side chair and table, a new rug, a new cabinet, new lamps, new pillows...and my favorite, finally painting the back wall of those built-in shelves around the fireplace!
For years the shelves and paneled walls have been crying to be painted, but my husband likes ALL the wood. Finally with this room redo, I talked him to letting me paint the back walls of the shelves. He now agrees how much better and brighter it makes this room. He even painted the ceiling beams white along with freshly repainting the ceiling.
He draws the line though on painting the paneled walls.
One step at a time...smile.
Here are some before photos
Before
Before ceiling beams are painted.
Back walls of shelves finally painted!
Back walls of shelves finally painted!
Bright shelf walls and painted ceiling beams!
Too bad the new rug doesn't show better with its pretty grey, cream and teal colors. Since this photo, we've added a footstool for the chair and a bench stool for the settee.
This cabinet was a good find and perfect for this space. It holds my collection of 'smalls' for altering our home decor. The photo is of my paternal Grandmother. She happens to be wearing the same shade of teal that is on the lamp next to it and sprinkled throughout the room. Wished my photo wasn't so blurry as it does not show off the gorgeous antique wall mirror.
From this photo what are your thoughts, should I paint the fireplace bricks white?
I love the mix of the white and brick. It keeps the warmth of the wood and coziness but certainly lightens everything up with the other furniture and accessories. I have a feeling if you paint the fireplace white it will stick out from the walls in an obtrusive way and then you'll be wanting to paint the walls -- and I'm not sure that a) your husband would like that so much or b) that it would retain it's original character. To me, too much white can look cold. But that's just me! I think what you've done is just spectacular! (I have the knotty pine thing going in my family room too -- and I know what you mean about dark. It's the same wood at the cottage but with lots of windows, it never looks dark!)
ReplyDeleteI think I'd leave the fireplace brick as is. It looks good with the wood paneling. If you ever do convince the hubs to paint the paneling white or cream, you could paint the fireplace then.
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