coffee table (similar) | gallery wall black frames | bench (similar) | mirror (similar) | rug | throw pillows | throw blanket | black candlesticks
We’ve been living in this house for about 18 months now, and have been slowly working on the living room since the beginning. For those of you that are interested in the process of what we did and why we did it, I’ll take you through the whole process! If you are only interested in the sources of where you can buy everything in our living room, scroll down to the end of the post and I’ll link everything there :) Here we go!
*What this room looks like in the zillow listing house listing when we bought the house.
Bye popcorn ceilings! Hello recessed lighting!
Before moving into the house, we knew that getting rid of all the popcorn ceilings was our number one priority. Popcorn ceilings can make a home look dated and they cast bubbly shadows everywhere making the room look darker then it is. So before moving all our stuff into the house, we scrapped all the ceilings, remudded, sanded, and painted.
Since we were already going to be doing a lot of ceiling work, we decided that this would be a perfect time to also reevaluate the lighting. This room had only one single ceiling fan in the middle of it. A lack of lighting can be a huge annoyance. We installed ten recessed lights on dimmers, which we love! Good lighting (or even just updated lighting!) really takes a room to a whole new level.
A year of saving and smaller projects
Over the course of a year, we slowly added furniture and built a couple things for the room (building floating bookshelves and a concrete coffee table). My next goal was to replace the carpet with hard flooring, and upgrade the cracked fireplace tile. We eventually bit the bullet this last June (when I could not take that dirty carpet any longer)!!!
Flooring Installation! It’s never as easy as you think it will be.
Floor installation was only expected to take 2 days max. Unfortunately after pulling up the carpet, the workers found tons of water damage under and around our back deck door. Apparently it wasn’t sealed properly when the deck was built. Every time it rained, water would seep under the door and into the subfloor of the living. While the subfloor was being fixed, we took the opportunity to replace the door with custom french doors! We also decided to tend to the broken fireplace tile. Ground tile was replaced with big gray slate tiles, and replaced the wall tile with a white/grey marble herringbone pattern. This was our first tiling project by ourselves, and I’m so happy with how it turned out!
Once those projects were completed, we were able to schedule the flooring people to come back and finish the job. Hardwood flooring is the best and I’m so in love with the results!
Choosing furniture and decor that worked best for dogs.
Having a big dog has really made me conscious of everything I put into my home. Is it be easy to clean? Will it be long lasting? Boris drools, rolls in dirt, and wipes his mouth on everything. Definitely things to consider when choosing furniture and decor for our home. Allergens in the home lessen significantly with hard flooring (which was why I was so eager to get rid of the carpet). I specifically bought this low pile, synthetic rug because it doesn’t trap dog odor (like carpet or high pile rugs). Synthetic rugs also don’t absorb stains and are also super easy to clean. To save money, much of the furniture was bought at homegoods, facebook marketplace, or made ourselves. But I’ll try and link many similar items if you want to shop the look!
coffee table (similar) | gallery wall black frames | bench (similar) | mirror (similar) | rug | throw pillows | throw blanket | black candlesticks | Wooden Buffet Table (similar) | Wall color- Seagull Grey from Behr (we doubled the tint) | Trim color- Simply White from Benjamin Moore
