Looking in: Living Room

I'm hard (HARD) at work right now on our Spring collection and a new website (YAY!) but I'm going to pop in every coupla days with some pictures.  Welcome to our living room...

Here is is.  I guess I should label this the "before" shot.  We're slowly changing the things around our home that we don't love for those that we do-- on a shoestring.  And here's my little caveat:  I'm SO not a designer.  I never could be (talk about a crazy-hard job!)  I do love beautiful things and spaces, and I do my best to make our home beautiful.  And under-accessorized;  it's not that we don't have them-- Eddie himself would DIE to see my closet full of silver and carvings and generally wonderful goo-ga's that my tres stylish grandmother accumulated over decades.  It's that I have an awesome little road grader who goes by the name of John Harper. 

We live two shakes from High Point, furniture capitol of the world.  I found our sofa (Miles Talbot) 85% off at a before-Market sale, and the down chair, including ottoman and slipcover, for under $300 from Thomasville's Outlet.  I'm hoping to get the cushions if the sofa down wrapped and get a slipcover (white linen?  Are we there yet?  Maybe white denim.) made this year.  I made all the back cushions and the drapes myself.  We have AWESOME fabric shops around here that carry remnants from the furniture manufacturers for dollars a yard.  Good stuff.

I was super-excited to find this little chest at one of my favorite little haunts, Thrill of the Hunt.  It's Davis Cabinet, and I paid a big fat $75.  Others (if you can find them-- this style is really hard to come by) go for around a thousand.  Yay me.  Even though it's been done two million times, I really want to blow up the Paris map wall-size.  Maybe instead of breaking it up into a grid, I would hang it as one piece, like Lauren's "tapestry"

 

Right now, this little corner is very useful to me as is.  The 19th century library table is another steal from Thrill of the Hunt. Those heinous hanging built-ins need to come down.  We already removed a giant and totally useless cabinet that was below them. 

I want a little corner like this one from Something's Gotta Give:

We're debating on a rug.  I have two criteria: cheap and easily cleaned.  Please reference my sweet sons for reasons.  I'm thinking this one fits the bill nicely-- we aren't going with a custom cut right now because this thing is going away soon...

 

Useful-- yes.  Because where else do you put your enormous TV.  Eats up floor space, covering up an original fireplace, and full of all the JUNK we throw in there for convieince-- yes.  I'm hoping to find two free-standing bookshelves that will hit our ceiling height or close to it, and the center console will be removed, all the LOOSE WIRES hanging down in the firebox relocated and the fireplace and mantle restored.  We'll get a smaller TV and put it on a side shelf-- I have a neat idea for covering it with an oil painting when it's not in use.  And the red/cream chairs will go somewhere else (probably back to the Goodwill that I rescued them from and recovered them myself in my French country phase...).  I am hoping--everything crossed-- that when this all happens I'll be able to find something at the Lee Industries showroom sale after Market-- anything from Lee would make me happy, but I'm wishing for a pair of these.

We'll talk about this soon-- this is a very cool story.

Thanks for looking--I can't wait until I get around to some more projects (choosing the perfect white for the walls-- much harder than it sounds!)  so I'll have some good "afters" for you!