Friday, December 27, 2013

Sitting-room - in progress and plans (and yet more photos!)

Cleared off table - white side-table moved over to other side of room and drawers moved from corner.
Smaller pile of stuff to still sort - working on it! Eventually I want to move the writing desk into the bedroom and then these drawers will move over to where the writing desk now is.



 Still not properly hung curtains but I took down the white ones, strung up more stable twine to replace the wool and hung these long tablecloths up. I got these on very special offer (they hadn't sold as no-one wanted the extra long size) last year sometime, thinking I might be able to turn them into curtains. So I'm just trying them out now to see if I like the colour. I do but not sure it really works with what I want to do.



 I bought this rug at the beginning of the year, using a refund from something or other. I kept waiting for a time when I had properly tidied up and decluttered to put it down and when I had my bout of clearing-up a couple of weeks ago, I decided it was time to stop putting it off. The colours aren't quite right, the orange stripe is a lot closer to red in reality - still orange but a very red tone, if you know what I mean. The yellow stripe ties in nicely with the couch and the green is my main colour inspiration for what I want in this room.
These are the curtains I bought, oh, two or three years ago probably, to hang across the bookshelves which are all along one wall at the end of the room. Again, colour is not great but you get an idea of the pale blue and green. The green in these curtains matches the lighter green in the rug quite well, it's maybe one slight shade darker. And the blue, I think, complements the turquoise of the Van Gogh print quite nicely.




The felt landscape I want to hang here is mostly yellows and greens as well, so that works, too.

Essentially, it's going to be a very pastel kind of room, really, which is surprising as I'm not a big fan of pastels. But I wanted something light and airy.

The walls on three sides were re-painted white last year and I don't plan on changing that. The fourth wall, behind the bookshelves, is a yellow paper I have come to loathe - just as well since it has started to peel off in places. I bought a nice white paper with a swirly green design on it which I will put up at some stage - but there are other priorities first. Like trying to get rid of/find a home for some of the excess stuff here.

I've toyed with the idea of fitting overhead cupboards (the type you have in a kitchen) above the bookshelves but then realised it would make more sense to hang kitchen cupboards in the kichen and move the stuff that's in the tall-boy into those. If I used vacuum bags I should be able to fit most of what's in the cloth wardrobe into the tallboy. That's my next stage of work. I do need to get all that stuff washed first though, to make sure I'm not vacuum-packing any vialbe moth eggs or larvae! Will attempt to do one extra load of washing every week in January perhaps. I'll get through it soon enough. The duvets will have to go out to be cleaned as my machine is not big enough for that so that will need to wait until the end of the month, when funds allow. I am very tempted though to unpack all of the stuff from the tallboy into a big box to shove under the kichen table, just to have made a start.

So, what do ye think? While I like the ecletic collection of furniture well enough the numerous colours of wood do get to me a bit sometimes. There are one or two pieces that are too nice to mess with but at some stage I think I'll try sanding and painting the tall-boy, the dark bookshelves and the crafting cupboard. Very taken with the idea of painting them white to lighten the place up even more. It's more likely a project I won't do until I move again though.

P.S. If anyone notices that in any of these posts it is possible to clearly see people in photographs that may be in the shot, please do let me know - it's very important to me that I don't impinge on people's privacy (my own included!) by posting photos of them on an accessible to all website. So far I don't think you can but someone with a better system or bigger monitor than me might be able to so please do let me know if so and I'll try and do that swirly faces thing you can do.

3 comments:

Ron said...

I just had this conversation with Mel... we also have accumulated various tones of wood finish, and bugs me. I'm a big fan of paint... at least you can patch it up and change colors when you feel like it.

Fiona said...

I've seen some wonderful, eclectic rooms that are full of character with mixed wood tones. I think a lot depends on how it is put together and made welcoming as a whole. But it suits more rustic looks, I think. We've got a really modern house and mixed wood tones would look funny, I think.

Moonwaves said...

It must be a universal theme or something. LOL. I really like what AmiExpat did with her guestroom wardrobe (post here) but I'm pretty sure she makes it look easier than it is so I was thinking plain white would be easiest. I could always embellish later if I get more confident. You're good at that kind of thing though and winter is a great time for making plans.