Decorating Update

The redecoration of the dining room/second reception room has now been completed and I promised an update.

Here's the room before we started:

Very stark and white, but looks worse because all the pictures and other items have been removed.

I wanted a  cosier feel to the room, as we have our wood burner in here, that we use to heat both this room and the adjoining living room in the winter. The colour we used needed to look okay with the colour we are using in the living room too, as the doors that join the rooms are usually left open.

Now, I know I said that we were going to add colour to this room, but you might disagree that the colour we used is actually a colour, as it was grey. It is not to everyone's tastes, but as we already had a full tin of pretty expensive Little Greene paint left over from decorating the kitchen, (which we were going to use on the cabinets before deciding to buy new cabinet doors) we decided to make use of it.

The problem was, it was a kind of battleship grey colour, which really didn't appeal. As a consequence, we decided to go darker, so OH got hold of some black powdered paint dye from a local paint shop and darkened the paint to the colour that is now on the walls.  It was also oil based paint, so was very difficult to put on and get a good finish, but after a lot of effort, OH eventually got it to work.

Steel yourselves for the results:

We really like the colour and how it looks in the room, but realise that not everyone might. OH did some adjustments to the book shelves, adding a lip to the edge of them, as they were sagging a little under the weight of  the books and vinyl we keep on them. We painted them and the cupboard doors below the same colour as the walls and we like the effect.

We both had a good sort through of all the books and LP's before putting everything back and tried to declutter as much as we could. We filled two cardboard boxes, which wasn't too shabby. The walls still look a little bare as we haven't yet put any pictures back up. I'm considering swapping out some of the artwork in the room too, just for a change.

Currently, the room is set up as our living room, so it has several things in it that wouldn't normally be in here, i.e. TV, fire screen, flowers, footstool, standard lamp, cushions, etc. These have been moved in here from the living room, whilst we decorate in there next. We will be moving these sofas out of the room, and bringing in our big blue sofa and armchair, as they are just not comfortable for sitting watching TV. We will probably be using this room in this way for a month, which is way too long to be uncomfortable for. That will be a job for later today. We've currently got the partition doors closed to keep out any dust and dirt from the decorating next door, which makes the room feel especially cosy.

As the room cost us very little to decorate, I think I might brighten up the sofas with some new cushion covers when I get back to work.  We are selling lots of designer cushion covers in our charity shop, that were donated by a famous London Interior Design company and we have been selling them for £15 each, so I may splash out on a couple to brighten up the dark sofas and inject a pop of proper colour into the room.  I just need to get back to work and find designs that I like. I think it's worth putting quality soft furnishings into the room for once. I'll let you know if I eventually get them.

Now it's onwards with the living room redecoration, which won't be changing a lot, as we'll be using very similar colours on the walls, due to the fact that we really like the décor of the room as it is. In this sense, it's more of a freshen up. I'll post again when this room is completed.