apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Your Number One problem isn't color or stuff - It's your furniture arrangement: You walk in the front door and run right into the arm of the sofa.

Move your sofa to the other side of the room, put the front legs on the long edge of the rug and arrange your other furniture and lighting around it.

Your brown wall needs a console table with a lamp and a mirror above - This is your "Landing Strip" to catch mail, keys, cellphone, etc. when you come home.

Finally, your curtains are too short. Hang the rod just below the ceiling and sew some contrasting fabric (dark brown like the accent wall?) to the bottom so that they just touch the floor with a 'break' like a pair of pants.

I would also lose the table and go for a longer and lower one.

I agree with all of the above comments. My first thought was "too much brown" but moving the sofa to the opposite wall would help. And a landing strip with a mirror above and maybe a colourful bowl to drop keys etc into would be nice (and would tie into the swallowfield print) I think the coffee table should go or at least get an overhaul with some high gloss spray paint and maybe a wooden tray or something for the top of it. Flowers are also a nice boost. It woud really benefit from some personalizing.
Good luck!

I love the blue and the neutral tones. I think you need one more color -- maybe yellow or mango? -- as a foil for the beautiful blue. I would look to a color blocked rug for more color drama. Your walls need art! Consider some natural-white sheers bewteen your silk panels. Mirrors too. :-)

i think the accent wall would benefit from a darker shade, more like chocolate. the current color blends in too much with the sofa and rug.

Everyone else has made good suggestions. I personally would lose the accent wall because I think it's only making the room darker. I would repaint all walls a light, warm beige (kind of like the lighter color in your rug), play with the furniture arrangement, add fun pillows and artwork, add a mirror and lengthen the curtains. Also, your sofa -- wherever you end up placing it -- should anchor the long edge of your rug; so if you flip the sofa, flip the rug, too.

It could be really cute. Good luck!

A few thoughts... (although I agree strongly with all suggestions from "bepsf")

I'm not sure what the other 2 walls in the space look like, but I would consider a different furniture arrangement. I agree with "bepsf" that opening the door into the sofa isn't ideal. You also might want to try pulling the furniture away from the walls. Of course, sometimes these things can't be avoided--I have a tricky set-up in my own living room.

I like the brown-on-brown monochromatic look with pops of blue, but I do think it's a bit much and needs to be broken up a bit. The brown wall won't look nearly as imposing with some art or a mirror. Perhaps a landscape that incoroprates some of the blues in the pillows. Or maybe that print you were talking about ordering.

Definitely move the furniture away from the walls a bit!

I love the browns! Maybe bring some of those fun accent colors you mention in via objects like glass, pottery, flowers, etc: a small collection of some sort? The space seems lacking in details. Possibly a large planter painted a bright color with a beautiful plant?

Also think about bringing in some more lighting, like lamps!

oooohhhh... could you paint the door?

Great suggestions here so far. Having two matching sofas, and two matching glass/iron tables in that small space seems a little oppressive. Agree with suggestion to switch one table for a longer, lower one.

Everywhere you look (from this photo vantage point) is brown! I don't think the rug adds much - except more brown. And it closes up an already small space. How do you feel about eliminating it or using it elsewhere?

A large (COLORFUL!) painting on your accent wall would be so fabulous, and/or floating shelves with artwork, colorful vases, photos - just something of interest and that shows YOU. You need things to take your eyes up up up rather than down down down to the brown! :)

I definitely agree with some colorful artwork on the walls and a rug that isn't a neutral color. I think orange and/or pink would be a great accent color. I love pink, blue and brown together. I think a lighter side table and coffee table would look better with the dark wall. Glass would probably be best, but white might work.

Ooh, I like the idea of painting the door, too. I wish I knew what the rest of the room looks like!

More blue! Have at least three things in the blue (may be as simple as more pillows.) Then, if you possibly can, change the rug -- it's the same color as the furniture, so everything looks bland. If you pick something that picks up both the blue and the brown (such as Flor patterned tiles), the room will come to life.

plants! a cool tree and some potted greenery or flowers would add more of a "homey" feel. you could get pots in colors to compliment the print you've ordered which would add a bit of color with the added benefit of better quality air in your home. and plants are normally way cheaper than art!

http://www.polishposter.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=2497

yes, i agree, move the sofa from that wall.......next, paint the top 2/3's of the brown wall, white. if you're brave, tape off the other walls and paint those on the bottom 1/3 as well....truthfully, i would be tempted to paint that lower third a cantaloupe color instead of brown.the line of demarcation should be level to the bottom of the door window. a poster similar to the one above, or one more appealing to you, could go above the "landing" strip/table that has been suggested.

another art option is a kid's book with sophisticated images, pages cut to fit in a standard frame. create a grouping over the landing strip........5, 10?

colorful pillows: oranges, hot violets, aqua, pink or rose......target, tjmaxx have fun choices. if the rug is inexpensive, find a place that will bind it with one of the above colors...it will provide color contrast to the floor. the curtains are too short, but you can lengthen them from the top by finding a beautiful, strong cording, and making a longer "tab". a few low succulents (easy care) and books on the tables will make the space more interesting.

very good comments so far. i think that the black tables could work well if, along with a bright accent color, you brought in touches of black. black frame on mirror and/or artwork? black and white print on a pillow or two? black lamps?

Your colors are all in that mid-range of shades. Add some brighter blues, darker browns/black, and pick another color or two to liven it all up a bit more.

I think a few shades lighter than your curtains. I'd also scoot the rug in so it at least touches your sofa...so it's not floaty. Probably get chocolate and blue accent pillows to bring the color down onto the sofa and that one blue pillow isn't so lonely.

If you wanted you could also touch it up with ceramics or books for your tables that integrate either a brown or blue with an orange or yellow. And I agree with the above pants are great too.

I plugged in the wall color here on your photo. I'm really interested in the brown and blue combo so i've been fiddling around with it for my own room.

This appears to be the exact same type of front room as I have in my house...I moved my couch to the wall (where the person taking the picture is), and I painted the door in a faux wood grain, and it actually looks really cool. On the accent wall, I wall-papered for impact in a really big graphic design and I have a console type piece of furniture there for keys, scarves, and purses. I moved my chair to the left of the entrance when you walk in and did a bench under the window. It flows nicely and is really livable. Hope this helps!

You have a dark room, adding a dark color is only going to make it even darker. Go with a pale green that brings out the colors of the vegetation outside.

Right now you have some brown, to go with your beige, and a little more brown and beige.

Those look like slip covers over your sofa and chair, what color are they underneath? Or consider new slip covers. You have nothing on your walls (that tiny thing beside the door doesn't count). You have nothing on your tables. It doesn't look like anybody lives there. Accessorize the bottom shelf under the glass on your coffee table.

Also, take whoever's advice it was above, and flip the layout of the room. You photograph doesn't show what is on the opposite side of the room, but that sofa is not working inside the door that way.

Invest in a couple of lighting fixtures, some torchiers to throw indirect light off the ceiling would greatly benefit this room.

Hello helpful readers! This is my house. I would like to respond to all of your great ideas to give some further clarification. First -- unhappily, there is no possible way to move the furniture around. It is a quite small living room, and on the opposite of the couch is a corner fireplace and a small piece of wall for our TV cabinet. Where I am standing in the pic is a hallway and staircase.

Second -- the couch is IKEA with a Bemz slipcover. I'm not happy with the fit but we are truly on a budget (I'm in college still) and there is no way that we can change any of our furniture. I actually love our glass tables since we have a toddler and she scratched up our last two wood ones! But I am super interested in learning how to decorate the bottom of them. For those of you who suggested that, what would be a good idea to put there?

But I would like to say that here are my ideas: I'm thinking about just scraping the accent wall idea and painting the whole living room a very pale pink. Not ballerina-pink!

Also, here's some of the artwork I either have ordered or would like to order. I don't know if all the colors will mesh but I like everything.


http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=12143500 (HAVE ordered) -- Plus a few more of her smaller prints.

http://www.thumbtackpress.com/browse/product_info.php?cPath=121&products_id=1017&osCsid=50234417b503f7ff7a0caf6c8df2ae68

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=12248577

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=12171832

My first inclination was to beef up the elegance angle with rich brown and blues and some mirror/gold touches--plus everything bepsf said!
But now that you have shown us your art tastes it looks like you are going in a different direction entirely and want to play up the colorful and playful touches--like the rug pattern.
In which case I think the wall is too dark and should be painted. I'd lean toward cool colors. Add some similar colors and patterns to your artwork with pillows and other accents. Maybe some of those could include some black so those tables don't stand out so much?
Can the sofa float anywhere then?

Landing strip!!

Here are my suggestions for simple fixes, given the limitations of the space. I think the brown wall is fine, but the stark white looks incompatible next to it. Paint the white wall a warmer neutral, like pale taupe or grey. Move the sofa away from the wall creating a corridor to walk behind it into the room, rather than walking though the middle of the room to get to the stairs. This will also free up your wall for a big mirror (perhaps a tall leaning mirror), a large artwork, as well as a landing strip. Lose the small patterned rug and get one large enough to define the whole living space - solid colour, natural fiber. Get some good interlined drapes that are long enough the reach the floor, as bepsf suggested. Interlining makes drapes more substantial and the room will look more finished. Replace the small print next to the door with something larger and more interesting - it should look like something from across the room. Finally, look for a few interesting items to display on the lower shelves of those tables - simple sculptural things with scale, not little dustcatching tchotchkes.

If you're looking to juice things up with an accent color, an easy way to find one that works is with fresh flowers. Just bring home different kinds of bouquets until you find a color combo that works.

I thought my blue/white/brown living room was totally boring and needed some spice, but nothing I tried seemed right (hello yellow!). Then one day I brought home this bunch of orange Alstroemeria, and I loved the way the colors popped off the blue. So I added some fun orange chairs and throws, and I think it looks super cool.

I think that the new "neutral" that you should paint the lighter walls with (which are now white) should be the beige-ish peach color in that first print.

The accent wall should be the terra cotta color in that first print, because it's SLIGHTLY warm enough to go in the direction of the sofa and rug, but can kind of help that sofa shake hands with that bright pink pillow you ordered.

There is no way that I would have guessed that the person who has that living room would have ordered those items, but if you do as I say, it will work. I'm not kidding.

thought about this since my first posting, and came back to suggest moving the couch forward, in order to create a walkway. however, amed studio said it first!

you commented that you werethinking "pink".....pick up a 3.99 sample pot of ben moore pristine(0C-75) and pink moire(050)...pick up their palette list of sample sizes.

let's say you have no budget......you're keeping the tables, and you have a kid. you don't want non-kid friendly stuff on it. one way to brighten it up: BACK PAINT the glass.....create a pattern with tape or adhesive dots, and spray(from the back side) with dupli-color car paint(nice spray, and quick dry). peel off the dots, and spray a contrasting color. finish with a clear coat. dry outside, and then carefully place it back in the table top channel(move your child to a safe place, and grab with rubber gloves). if you can sew, pick out colors from your artwork, and make pillows...outlining them with black cording or black topstitching will pull everything together.

you could even bind the rug in black to tie it in with the tables......and shouldn't be expensive.

i think a few ppl above have already said this, i didn't read them all but yes - the accent wall isn't working. It's almost the same color as the sofa (which isn't a very dynamic color in itself) and it's all just melding together. I dont think you need an accent wall necessarily - just find some fun artwork/mirrors etc to hang above the sofa.

As for other additions, I'd get some great pillows in fun colors to pop in the mostly neutral room. Throw one on the chair too. Add some books and accessories to the coffee table, maybe a pretty tray on top to contain remotes and things that tend to lie around.

I think you're doing fine, and just don't be afraid to use some color and stay away from any more neutrals! The blue curtains look lovely.