It was a weekend well spent as the dining room makeover is now well underway. If you’ve been following for a while on Instagram you’ll know that I originally gave the dining room a budget makeover back in autumn 2019, but last year found mould on one of the walls under the wallpaper. That led to a frantic stripping of the wallpaper and we’ve been staring at a blank, very damaged wall ever since, until Pete started repairing it in the summer.
I really didn’t know what to do with this room as a second makeover, because it will eventually form the bulk of our extension in a couple of years time. Then we took a holiday to the Cotswolds back in September, visiting Daylesford whilst we were there and the inspiration was everywhere. I’ve finished upcycling a second hand dresser that I bought from Facebook marketplace and have settled on a new colour scheme.
I had Friday off work and spent Friday, Saturday and part of Sunday painting the dining room in two colours of School House White by Farrow and Ball for the top half of the walls and Green Stone by Little Greene for the dado rail and bottom half of the walls. I can’t believe the difference it’s already making to the room which already feels much calmer and grown up even though it’s still in a state of chaos at the moment.
Now the majority of the paint work is completed, I’m starting to think about other projects for this room. I’m pondering the idea of having a little shuffle around and creating space for an occasional or recliner chair. Currently we have a drinks cabinet in one of the alcoves but I could switch that to another corner and create a cosy little nook with a lamp for reading or listening to music.
Aside from searching for the perfect chair, I have a few other projects for this space up my sleeve. I’ve decided to re-hack our already hacked IKEA drinks cabinet by painting it the same green to match the lower walls and adding some beading/moulding to the front to create a mor elegant look in keeping with the new style of the room.
I’ve bought a new lampshade for the table lamp in the dining room and am planning to paint the base, again to tie it in more closely with the new colour scheme but not needing to replace the lamp entirely – it gives me a great deal of joy in repurposing something for our home.
I’d still love to build a new dog gate (it’s where Maddie sleeps so we have a very unappealing baby gate attached to the door frame) out of all our scrap wood but I think I’ll be relying on Pete’s help for that one so goodness knows when it will happen, hopefully this decade if we’re lucky 😉
And finally, the fireplace. I really love that we have an additional fireplace in the dining room even though it isn’t a working one. It’s such a gorgeous feature and whilst I still love the original glow up I gave it of a grey surround with terrazzo hearth and inlay, that no longer works with the new colours. So I’m going to paint the surround green and then I’ve bought some pink patterned vinyl stile stickers for the inlay and hearth. In my head it works but I’ll do a dummy run and see how the pink vinyl tiles look before sticking them down.
Its been a long time since I’ve felt this enthusiastic about home projects and I’m really glad to have my drive and motivation back… even if everyone else is decorating for Christmas whilst I have tins of paint lying around the place. There’s always next Christmas!
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