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help ! ideas for kitchen / living room updates

4 years ago

Ok our new house has two living rooms instead of one big one and I am still trying to adjust. One is by the front door and I will post that one separately when I’m ready. The living room we are currently using you enter from the garage into it and it is open to the kitchen. The other door is to the back patio. It is open to the left to the dining room. Here are some pics things are still a mess so I haven’t included all angles.

We are about to paint the wall with the tv on it so please excuse all the white marks. I plan on getting a longer bit thinner tv stand and also hoping to get the return duct moved soon.

My thoughts are to paint the cabinets white , do a medium dark laminate over the ceramic tile, and granite countertops, new barstools ect. Looking to see the pros opinions on my ideas and maybe get new ideas.

Many houses have the living and bar back up like this but for some reason in this house sometimes I feel like my couch is in my kitchen. I think it is because the kitchen is actually bigger than the living room since there are two living rooms. Anyway , how can I make it feel cohesive but like separate as well. I’m looking for comfortable with just a touch of farmhouse stuff. I have not purchased anything new and planned on waiting until I have a fully developed plan for the updates before going a buying a bunch of stuff.

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Comments (3)

grapefruit1_ar
4 years ago
Congratulations on your new house! I hope that you will enjoy the whole decorating process.

Personally there are a couple of things that I would address before thinking about painting cabinets. The first would be the angled pantry. Could that be " squared -up" somehow? It juts out into the room too far. Next would be the ceiling fixtures in the kitchen and adjoining room. That lighting is so harsh. The kitchen light could be replaced by a nice semi-flush light, and the fans are okay in the other room, but not the lights. Lamps are needed instead.

Those projects will take some time/money so maybe you want to hold off on them depending on your budget. Could the sofa toward the island be moved to face the other sofa?
dlparry
4 years ago
could you not turn this living room into a formal dining room and use the other room as your living room?
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If those are laminate cabinets, you might find laminate paint. I've seen Canadian designers use it to redo those same cabs, but not sure what the paint would be called in the U.S.
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I don’t know if you ever finished your kitchen, but in case you did not, and in case others come across this thread, I thought I would tell what we did. We remodeled our kitchen using a 24 year-old high end kitchen from a kitchen charity reseller (Green Demolitions). It had a huge island that I could fit into our space if we did not have a kitchen table. I have lifelong knee problems and could hardly rise off a regular chair height, so moving to 24” kitchen stools sounded like a solution. We went with the island, with space for four to comfortably sit. It turns out that my knees don’t much like sitting on stools, either. We are a family of two and take our meals in our recliners, anyhow. The issue became how to have people over and sit comfortably. Then I discovered convertible furniture of Italian design! They make coffee tables that rise up on scissor legs to dining height with tops that swivel 90 degrees and open like a book, doubling their size. There are other designs as well, all creating full size dining tables. We found a leather sofa at Macy’s that has a seat height of 20” and we keep our old dining chairs in the basement to bring out when people visit. Our family room is now easily and quickly converted to a dining room with banquette seating. Here is where I got our table. If you live near NYC there are local choices, too. https://expandfurniture.com
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Run the great room off the entire side or across front of structure. One position only for opening to bedroom and bath corridor. You have two openings to bedrooms ... not feasible. Don't you want to run the great room all across one side or the other w kitchen contained within....toward the rear, envision French doors to outside deck or patio. Use a table at a position within the great room that is an easy position for real use. There are lots of manufactured homes popping up w similarities...maybe you should have a look Instead of wrestling w something nearly impossible.
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I think the bones of your living room are excellent, it only needs a few tweaks. It needs more color and interest in the way of texture. I'll give you some suggestions, using the furniture that you have. I'll assume that you like blue and yellow, because you have a blue throw, a pillow with yellow and a yellow lamp. Blue and yellow work very well together, think of the iris. You need to increase their presence by way of wall art or other displays and I would put something in those color palettes on the long narrow walls flanking the french doors. I have absolutely no idea what type of art or collectibles you like. I am just picking things that have these colors in them. On those narrow walls I myself would either hang plates (since I collect them) or butterflies (since I collect those as well. I would not do blue and white plates, that's a cliche by now. I would find some marvelous vintage china plates on eBay or some other auction site. But check out mounted butterflies on eBay none of them are going extinct, you don't have to worry about that, and they are all reasonably priced. Or interesting decoupage plates. For added interest, go a drop to either side on the color wheel from blue and yellow, or add some black. Behind your chair with the yellow floral pillow I would get a piece piece of art with both blue and yellow in it, and the same for the other wall where you know have the shelves. I would move the small pictures elsewhere. I would change out the throw pillows for something more like : I would also replace the rug with a quality, timeless, hand-made Oriental rug, you can get either a hand-knotted Persian, or a woven tribal, and the prices of these have gone way down lately. I think the room would also be enriched and grounded by switching out the current ottoman by using an ottoman of brown leather, with a marvelous tray on top. Also, instead of that tiny green plant on the mantle, bring life into the room with at least one, may be two large floor plants, at least 6 feet tall , such as a fiddle leaf fig or a kentia palm. Also, get a large flowering plant such as an orchid. try not to get a phaelanopsis, the whole world has those, Trader Joe's has all sorts of interesting orchid plants, some really look like weird butterflies. (isn't nature marvelous??) On one mantel on each side you can put some things of interest. Think odd numbers for each side. So on the left use 1, 3, or 5 things, same for the right, and they should be of varying heights. examples can be vases of differing textures (think Jonathan Adler), candlesticks, statuary. Here is a nice video on color and texture and interest in decorating from here on Houzz from a marvelous decorator. https://www.houzz.com/houzz-tv/designer-tips-for-creating-a-coordinated-color-palette-stshtvvw-vt~138774527
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Buehl
4 years ago
Welcome to the Kitchens Forum Robyn!

Personally, I wouldn't do anything until you've lived in it for awhile to see what works/doesn't work and can afford a full remodel (if you're willing). The cooktop location in that tiny island is a big red flag! I would not want to spend $$$ for granite with that cooktop or put granite over what appear to be basic (builder-grade?) cabinets or in a Kitchen with a layout that needs improvement. When I finally re-did, I'd feel bad about having to tear out perfectly good granite (it will last decades!) b/c it won't fit with the new and improved layout.

OK, maybe I'd replace the tile counters with a laminate b/c I don't like dealing with grout lines. But that would be it.

.

I see what you mean about what is probably the "Family Room". I suspect the other room is more of a "Formal Living Room". Our house was built that way as well. The difference, though is that our Family Room is 14' x 22', bigger than yours. Our Living Room was also the same size (after we added 4' to the length of the house), but we carved out a narrow (9') Library/Office out of it and then converted what was left of the Living Room into a Music/Homework space (digital piano + space for practicing sax & clarinet + small desk; oh, and sleeper sofa).

I think your Family Room space also feels small b/c of the small carpeted area -- it makes it look/feel smaller than it probably is. The stools at that peninsula make it feel even smaller.

For now, I'd probably just get a much larger rug to put down over the tile so the room looks bigger and will give you more options for arranging the furniture.

A full-floor layout would be very helpful for other ideas.

One idea: If you redo the Kitchen, stop the Kitchen at the wall that has the outside door around the corner (I think it's a door to the outside -- the one with a full-length glass door) -- not just on that side of the Kitchen, but also on the opposite wall as well. I.e., no cabinets like I see to the left of the Refrigerator. I would probably also remove the peninsula and, possibly, the island (I'd have to have measurements to be sure). That would open up the space more and allow the Family Room to expand a bit. The Pantry might be able to be worked around, depending on what you did with the rest of the space. (Or, you could change to a shallow, rectangular reach-in pantry along the wall with the current ovens, move the refrigerator and ovens to the wall that currently has the sink, and move the sink and cooktop to the opposite wall. A movable island could be in the middle so it can be moved out of the way when needed. All of this, of course, is speculation until you're ready to do a larger project, if that's a possibility.

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