Living room makeover plans- ORC Week One

Week one of our family room makeover for the One Room Challenge

Our living room is getting another makeover! We are so excited to be joining the One Room Challenge! We missed the last two rounds due to pregnancy (I was very sick!) and then the new baby, but we are back in action and ready for our fifth ORC!! 

Thanks to Loloi Rugs for providing product for this project. This post contains affiliate links for your convenience. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. For more information, see my disclosure policy.

Our living room received a mini phase one makeover back in 2019 . That got us through for the time being, but now we're ready for phase 2 which means purchasing (some) new furniture finally, painting the staircase that we've been meaning to get to for three years, and a few other small changes. (When our kids are older, there will be a big phase 3 of hopefully restoring some of the original details, but we're waiting due to lead paint and tiny kids!)

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Our living room before

First let's take a look at what our living room looked like before. Unfortunately I don't have any great pictures from when we first moved in, but here are a few from when we had the floors refinished a few months in.

These are not the original floors. I believe the originals are hiding underneath (and probably covered in lead paint like the upstairs floors). We would love to uncover and restore them when our kids are much much older, but in the meantime we decided to ditch the orange and go more neutral.

We painted the walls a lighter color and worked with the furniture from our previous home.

A feature of our living room is this 100+ year old staircase. It was gloss white when we moved in, but the paint was in rough shape, exposing the lead paint underneath.

So that's the true before, with a few small changes.
And here's where we left off with our first living room update.

I painted the back of the built ins black, and we bought some heavy duty slip covers for our sofas. We have since learned that slipcovers are a nightmare! (at least the kind that you have to tuck in. Custom fit would have been much better!)

I painted the antique French door in a sage green. And brought that antique secretary desk in, which has become my favorite piece to style vignettes on, but zoomed out, it's actually very awkward in this room.

I painted the banister and newel post black to add some contrast and reseal the lead paint. That's a change I still love, but I'm thinking I'm ready for even more contrast!

So the before is not too shabby, but we're ready for better. We made some changes that we will keep, but there's also more to come!

Plans for our living room design

If you've been around for long, you know I've gone through quite the battle of finding my design style in this house. Lesson learned, don't rush decorating when you move into a new place! Just get to know your house for a while! 

Over time I've learned that I want to highlight and complement the historic features in our home with traditional pieces, but also balance them with contrasting modern and minimal details. I call it modern traditional, but that's become a style in itself and I don't think I quite fit the mold. 

This room is the only room in the house that has a lot of its original character. I have learned that adding too much antique doesn't feel right to me. It's all about balance.

I love to incorporate one statement antique in every room, but in this case, I'm going to try to let the staircase be the antique star of the show and fill the rest of the room with a range of eras for a more collected and eclectic feel. As my style continues to evolve, I'm learning that I like a room to feel storied rather than feel stuck in one time period or one style trend.

Here is my mood board so far, but keep in mind this isn't a true picture of my plans because there are some things I wasn't able to find photos of, like the coffee table and end tables I will be working on, or the staircase itself. But it is a good representation of some of the pieces I am including, along with the textures and colors. 

Sources:

Rug- Loloi
Sofa- our existing Haverty's sofa
Spindle chair
Oversized green chair
Black marble table
Wood side table
Coffee table
Sconce
Peony art
Sketch art
Head planter

Green pillow
Block print pillow
Floral pillow
Plaid pillow
Fuzzy pillow

Don't forget to stop by the One Room Challenge website to see everyone else's projects!

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