Help me find some curtains!

[Lalallama]

Our living room is dark, and as the nights are drawing in it seems even more dingy and depressing. Ideally I'd love to completely redecorate but we don't have the time or the money at the minute. The thing I hate the most about it is the curtains so I think just replacing them will help to brighten it up a bit.

The walls are natural hessian, with the chimney breast dark teal (think it was called teal tension). The fire surround is dark brown wood. The sofas are brown, so I've covered those with throws and cushions. I'm trying to introduce a bit of bright colour so the throws and cushions are teal/green/yellow. I like the teal wall but I don't like the brown.

The curtains are currently dark brown, so I want to replace them with something lighter and brighter. I was thinking something with a light background but with some teal and yellow in. I was wondering something like this but this is a bit grey based and not sure it will go with the brown.

Another problem is the window is floor to ceiling French doors 260cm high and similar width, and most curtains I've found don't go to this length. The current ones are eyelet on a pole.

Any ideas?

Not sure re print etc, but I have discovered recently that ikea's curtains are 250cm long (which was perfect for our french doors) and dunelm have 270cm ish length available in a few sizes on their website only. My local store only had up to 230cm-ish .

I'd not thought about ikea, good idea. They have loads in the right size and not expensive. They're all plain though, not sure what colour would work. Wondering whether just white, or would that look wrong?

Hmm, I wonder if white curtains would need washing a fair bit due to showing dust etc?
I'll be the first to admit that I've never washed a pair of curtains...

Warm yellow, ochre etc coloured/patterned curtains would look nice with that room scheme. Ikea do make patterned curtains and sell curtain material.

I really like these from Ikea:

www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/fjaederklint-curtains-1-pair-white-green-50369095/

They would go lovely in the room you've described

They're nice, I'm also wondering about being brave and going for yellow . Do you think that might be too much? I wish they did samples before ordering, we're too far away to go and see them in an actual Ikea. Can't tell from the pictures whether they look too custardy.

Agree about the samples.
I like the yellow, we have 2 pairs of yellow curtains in our house.
I'd be cautious of ordering without seeing them ( or be prepared to return )
Some of their cheaper curtain fabrics aren't great. Although I have a textiles background so I'm super fussy about fabric !

I'm sorry but hessian and brown that must be dark .

If you don't have must time or money could I suggest that you visualize the wished for end result, and buy/fix one thing at a time.

So the curtains you are going to buy will be the first thing in your make over, not just a quick fix. (Not meant snappy, perhaps this is what you are doing already ).

Perhaps buy fabric to cover your entire sofa, it gives a more 'calm' impression if not too many throws. And coordinate with curtain colours?

But then again you might ignore me, I'm Scandi and we loove white .

I agree I don't just want a quick fix, I'd like to gradually replace things so I need to choose curtains that I'll continue to like.

We're stuck with the sofas for now but I wondered about painting the fireplace white. It's currently dark brown varnish against the teal chimney breast. I'm rubbish at picturing how things will look though!

Same with the curtains. Will they go with dark teal wall, sort of apple green tv cabinet and beige walls? They're the main colours apart from the brown sofas.

Can I suggest that you start out choosing three colours you would like as base for your end result? (Eg wall colour, fabric colour, accessorie colour). Then choose according to them, bearing in mind the new things shouldn't collide with the present decor.

If you can't picture the colours together, put them on paper side by side to get an impression. Or get fabric samples and put them on the furniture you want them to go with.

Beware a white fireplace might stand out a lot if surrounded only by brown and greens (cover it in white paper and see if ok).

For inspiration i like Pinterest, soo much inspiration .

Colour mix suggestions.