Usually on a lovely long weekend like this one, I’d be out and about with the kids making the most of our time off together but this weekend is a bit different. This weekend I’ll be redecorating my living room on a budget along with some other jobs that I really need to get done around the house.
My living room which is red and cream at the moment with some random orange and cream wallpaper on one wall which used to be our feature wall until a furniture move about when we got our new settee – now it just looks odd!
Here’s an idea of what it looks like now:
To me, it just doesn’t look co-ordinated and it needs a complete makeover!
I was lucky enough to have a chat with the very lovely Jo Behari on Thursday night and she gave me some brilliant ideas on how to achieve the look I was after on a bit of a budget. She had some great ideas that I can’t wait to put into practice today….
I explained to Jo that I really wanted a more vintage shabby chic kind of look in the living room and that I was planning on painting over the wallpapered wall and wallpapering the back wall behind the settee. That was all I really knew for definite at that point.
The first thing Jo pointed out was that the easiest and cheapest way to change the look and feel of a room is to change the accessories and soft furnishings and keep the walls themselves quite neutral.
She also explained that I didn’t really need to wallpaper the back wall as I had planned and suggested that a good cost effective way of bringing wallpaper into the living room would be to do it in panels. I loved her idea of wallpapering large panels of MDF and hanging these on the wall instead of doing the whole wall and I completely agree that this is a great way to change the look of a room without having to change a full wall of wallpaper.
I was completely sold when she suggested that I use some large ornate frames to make this look more in keeping with the shabby chic style I was after – even more so when we talked about being able to use wallpaper samples to achieve this look rather than having to buy wallpaper!
I asked Jo where she would recommend that I buy some shabby chic frames to use for this and she told me that they can be found cheaply at auction houses or charity shops. She suggested that I ask an antique shop owner for any paintings they might have in their store rooms and use those frames.
I was concerned about painting the frames as I’d imagine that the more ornate frames can be quite hard to paint but Jo just advised me to clean them well and then use spray paint as the top covering as that will allow a nice even spread of paint over the frame.
Next we moved on to lighting and Jo suggested using independent lighting like floor lamps and table lamps to create a lovely atmosphere and change the feel of a room through the course of the day. They also don’t need to be fitted by an electrician and can be sourced second hand and painted to keep in with the room theme.
I can’t wait to get started now!
My call with Jo was set up by the team at MoneySuperMarket who have been doing a bit of research into the types of DIY we do as a nation and whether or not we would tell our home insurance providers about our home improvements. Clearly they’re not going to want to know about my shabby chic makeover but it wouldn’t have occurred to me that they might need to know about our planned garage makeover. MoneySuperMarket have some great suggestions for making sure that you get the best deal possible for your home insurance as well as guidance on how to make sure that any home improvements you have planned will be covered by your policy.
I’ll be back over the weekend with the after pictures from my living room makeover.
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