AIBU to not longer want a boring two tone themed house?

[Bangtastic]

I want to decorate soon, I don't need to, despite having a sticky fingered toddler my magnolia living room walls have done me well. But I want to inject some spark into the place.. right now it is your basic magnolia walls with a mocha coloured feature wall, TV on wall, brown leather settee, oak flooring, oak tables, oak photo frames, pretty lillies in vases, the odd candle etc. Looks nice enough, but it has about as much personality as Kerry Katona on a come down.

How do you all know what 'style' to go for? I love the shabby chic look, always have before it became 'fashionable', but DH would blow a gasket if he one day came home to find distressed console tables adorned with pretty trinkets.

What does your living room look like? Did you plan it to have a theme or has it just sort of evolved over time?

[Laquitar]

You wouldn't like mine then .
All the walls are white, thats how i like it.

[Bangtastic]

A white house.. shivers

I just don't know where to bloody start, too many options! Everyone seems to have the same style. Lately when I walk down the street and have a good nose in peoples windows with my side eye it seems to be horizontal stripe wallpapers on one feature wall.. bloody huge twigs in a vase and a ghastly all glass mirror plonked on the back wall. It has muddled my creative juices :(

[Kayano]

My living room is pink and yellow.

Quite by accident, I thought I had bought a neutral cream paint to go with pink... Turned out I hadn't read the label

Just went with it lol.

[SparkySparrow]

I've always been a cream and browny type girl. Then I moved into my new place and it needed alot of work. Originally we decided cream boring all the way through and then one day I thought ' I want to be a bit different' less boring , so I chose bright red for the living room (on one wall though, but a large one), and purple (again on one wall) for our bedroom. The rest of the walls are cream, so its still bright but the colour just adds something to it.

Just go with what you fancy! If you don't like it, paint over simple!

[LordOfTheFlies]

White walls is my idea of hell.

Years ago my mother decided (don't know why) to paint all the downstairs rooms white.
It can look ok if the accessories are well thought out. Clean, crisp, a nice foil for colour.
Hers was none of this.

it was like living in some sort of clinic but without the clean, crisp aspect.

[OlympicGoldPennies]

Add lime or purple accessories and soft furnishings. Cheaper and easier.

[SparkySparrow]

Although, I will say, since decorating, I have discovered that I like thing to 'go'. I have red cushions and red flowers etc. Anything that doesn't match with a certain room goes in the kitchen, which is cream!

[makinglemonade]

I love interior magazines and websites. Don't be scared to be different. Feature walls do my head in (although I do have one in my sunroom) as its got so predictable.

Im the opposite to you - have so many ideas that I haven't been able to decide and my brand new house has no personality at all!

You can revamp without having to change too much or spend too much. My mums living room was very bland cream and brown and before Xmas myself and my Db did a 60 min makeover type thing when we got her out for the day!
New curtains, cushions, rug, pictures, lampshade and a few accessories and it transformed the room completely! We added rich orange and reds with really bright cushions. Unbelievable the difference this made for £300. It made the suite of furniture look brand new.

[cantspel]

I live in a magnolia world and hate all these bold block walls. stripes or large floral walpapers. I use colour as acents in cushions but thats it.

[ViviPru]

Of course YANBU.

I like plain, muted walls and furniture and think the colour and interest looks best when it comes form textiles and objects. We had a Pinterest thread on here before Christmas, so not suggesting this should turn into one of those, but I love it for interior inspiration. Feel free to have a nose at my Interiors Pinterest board

I think a living room needs to be restful. My own living room has off-white walls, which are the same shade as our sofa & arm chair, they just kind of disappear. We have a contrasting grey armchair. The highlight colour theme has evolved from when I got my vintage ochre, cream and grey welsh blanket like this, and over christmas I bought one in the same colour but a different design and made cushions with it. The rest of the cushions are all cream fat corduroy and ochre velvet. I recently got a tan moroccan pouffe which I'm sure people will consider to be a foul 70's throwback but I love it.

I've got two of these lamps in different sizes and an ochre velvet lampshade on the standard lamp. I've also got Ikea Ludde sheepshin rugs all over the place.

I'd love a load more wood, but the white coffee table, side tables and sideboard we got when we first set up home are inoffensive enough for now.

[Grumpla]

I like white walls

Mind you I do have a lot of clutter tasteful objets, books, pictures, small random pieces of furniture etc everywhere. If my house were ever tidy more minimalist I can see it could look a bit stark.

[Hulababy]

We also have all white walls - every room in the house. We use colour in pictures, cushions, frames, and other accessories rather than the walls/carpets themselves.

But I do like quite a modern look/feel anyway.

[krustyloaf]

Ooooo wall stickers are good too - grown up ones, nice flowers etc (not pepper pig ) we rent and they worked a treat for jazzing up the place. The one we got for our living room is a big dandelion with the seeds blowing off, I love it!

[Laquitar]

I love 70's pouffes. And your lamps too.

Oh that laudry room in your link !

[ViviPru]

I know - THREE washing machines.

That image doesn't really do the Pols Potten lamps justice. They're this amazing tactile matte biscuit porcelain with the design hand-cut in. This might be better

[Chinateacup]

YANBU!
I think you need to find things that you love and evolve around them like Vivi has. Or if you don't have any key pieces you love, then you need to choose your colour as a starting point. I do hate that "just ordered the entire room from the Next catalogue" look, but if I had my way my living room would be dark and opulent in a gentleman's club meets souk kind of way!

[Groovee]

I went to B&Q after only having plain walls. I picked a tonne of wallpaper samples and stuck them up randomly. For the first time in 11 years we have a wallpapered feature wall in a paper I really like and the rest plain paint matched to the background paper and the fireplace and boiler pipe box paint matched to the brown colour in the paper.

My bedroom is next

[Laquitar]

They do look fab Vivi.

I think that nice lamps is one of the best things you can do for the living room.

[kickassangel]

Depending on the size of your rooms & height of ceilings. You could paint just one wall in a room a bolder colour.

If you don't like accent walls, you could do a horizontal stripe about a foot down from the ceiling (depends on height), or even a couple of stripes, that go around the room, so that you have some colour. (Could be two stripes fo the same colour, two shades, or two completely different colours if that would suit your house)

Soft furnishings are pretty cheap (not as cheap as just painting one wall), and you can change them seasonally as well if you want to. I am v definitely going for a neutral 'palette' as the background, but gradually making quilts as throws/cushions etc that can be changed around every so often when I get bored.

I am also trying to find a way to have some kind of tree/branch like thing that I can hang decorations on all year round. So, I may well have some artful twiggy stuff, but get a range of christmas/valentines/spring/easter/summer/fall/halloween type ornaments, so that I can make the twiggy (dull) part look better and less brown.

My problem is that the outside of my house is cardboard box brown - that is taking neutrals too far. As soon as spring is here, I'm getting it repainted in something like duck egg blue, or a sage green (have to get certain colours around here)

[AnnoyingOrange]

I wonder when/if we will see the return of stencilling and rag rolling

[LordOfTheFlies]

HaHa I drive along a road where on one side theres a house that is Prussian Blue and the other side Grizzly Bear Brown. Imagine looking out and seeing that.

Do you think it was a revenge paint job

[ViviPru]

The next village on from ours is a real picture-postcard heritage jobby with loads of thatches and original tudor framed houses. Slap bang in the middle, someone has painted their thatched cottage Smurf blue. Its a joy to behold.

[HugosGoatee]

Vivi your decor sounds utterly gorgeous. I tend to use Laura Ashley as a starting point - I love the grown-up, opulent look - then supplement with stuff from holidays and travel like Moroccan pouffe, ornate mirror and lamps. I have magnolia walls, and cream textured sofa and brown leather big armchair, so I could trade in the current dark red and gold theme which is only soft furnishings if I wanted at some point. I do sometimes struggle to balance my love of eclectic, cosy and detail with my desire to be clean and tidy though, I need better storage to replace my Ikea dark 'wood' stuff.

[moogster1a]

I've got the poppy field from here www.muralswallpaper.co.uk/landscape-mural-wallpaper.htm on my largest wall. It's the most fab. decorating scheme ever. The other walls are blue to match the sky.
Well, I think it's fab. you may think it's a bit Delboy!