Living room with no features/focal point. What would you do?

[SadPander]

We currently have a lovely Victorian terrace, the living room has high ceilings, cornicing, chimney breast, cast iron fire and bay window. We are possibly moving to a 1960's/70's ugly boxy semi. Great family area, which is why we are making the move, but the living room in particular is uninspiring to say the least!

The room is squareish, around 14x13ft. A window to the front, electric fire on wall to the side (this will be going as I hate it), door to kitchen to the rear wall, door to lobby and stairs (hall has been opened into living room) on the other side wall. No focal point, the room looks and feels lost, boxy and boring!

So far my only ideas are to build a false chimney breast (probably wont have a fire in it the position would only be suitable for electric or flueless gas and I'm not keen on either) with an opening and either an interesting mirror/art above or TV recessed into wall. Or a wall of Ikea storrage filled with our books and TV.

Has anyone made a dull room look good or got any bright ideas or links to pictures?

Watching with interest! In a victorian terrace with 2 chimney breasts and cornice but no fireplace and no focal pt..... desperately need inspiration!

haveyou our current house didn't have the fireplace when we moved in, but we bought a cast iron fireplace for about £300 and paid about £200 to have it fitted and chimney checked(could fit it yourself if you don't want it to be a working fire) so not too expensive if you already have the chimney breast.

Buy a fabulous photo from my DP in a super large size and sit around admiring it!

You can buy virtual fires which are a bit like a flat screen tv but I doubt that's your cup of tea.
If you could manage a fake fireplace you could put some hidden lighting in there, candles or flowers.

We have a couple of these in living room areas www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Calor-Gas-Heater-Fire-Provence-portable-stove-New-/281098994371 they are really clean and efficient ! Can make a nice focal point too !! I can't work out how I can attach photos on here - or I could show you the false fireplace we build as a feature with one of these in - www.houzz.com/photos/4419829/So-Houzz-wants-photos-not-drawings---living-room-other-metro manged to get one photo that I uploaded on another chat site here ! Hope that helps !!!
:-)

Ooh thanks I was wanting to put an old or old llooking fireplace in but thought it would be at least a grand and no chance of getting sign off from dp!

ladderax shelves could work with a cool retro scandi look for the era of the house?

log burner unless I'm totally stupid I don't think you need a chimney? Although you'd have to want to use it I guess for what it might cost.

Some great ideas, thank you! wookieswife that looks lovely, is that your actual one, and was it hard to DIY?

Would LOVE a log burner and would definitely use it, just not sure about the technical side of fitting it. The obvious wall for a focal point is part wall between us and nextdoor, I'm guessing to not have a chimney we'd need to put it on an external wall, or can you just run a flue through both floor of the house? Anybody have any rough idea for the cost of fitting a log burner where there is no chinmey?

Leonie toatally agree its hard to get out of the chimney breast/fire mindset. What you're describing sounds nice though, and I guess I could amybe achive that look with the Ikea shelving combinations?

I have a 70s ex council house and have installed a woodburner on the internal wall betw us and neighbour. No chimney, so we have the flue up thru small 3rd room. The flue is single skin up to 6 inches before ceiling and then is insulated straight up through both ceilings and out of the roof.

It took them about 6/7 hrs to install. The only issue we had was cracking in the plaster immediately behind the stove, we resolved with a fire/heat proof mdf back board, sprayed black in stove paint.

The flue upstairs isn't currently boxed in, it heats to radiator levels, so helps heat upstairs a bit as well. I love love love it. I think it's the best money I've ever spent.

Sorry for the essay but 5 years on and I still can't wait for winter to get it lit!

Oh and ours cost about 3.5k, but about 1.2k of that was the stove (clearview).
Wasn't the cheapest quote, but were the nicest, most professional of the 4 and could fit the soonest.

Due to issues beyond our control we moved into an 8-yo newbuild.

Every room is a box! We bought a pretty much wall-sized bookcase (would have thought of a fire but we're in a smoke free zone and I didn't want a fake!). TV in corner, bookcase right down the wall. Have to admit dh took a long time choosing the books - they're our most show-offy titles as our bedroom is also lined with bookcases!

With dc of 9,11,13 the TV (and associated box sets!!) is the focal point (we chose that when we said no tv in bedrooms!).

Hi ! Glad you like it ! Yes that's in our lounge ! We have another in the garden room ! They are great as they are powered by an internal Calor gas bottle - you don't need to have anyone install it for you - just buy one - add a full bottle of gas and put it somewhere sensible ! I sketched the fireplace and hubby built it ( there wasn't much complaining so I assume it wasn't too difficult ) - the room is 14"ft high - hence it's quite large !! But we are happy with it ! Would be fine on a party wall...
Re a real log burner - the chimney has to go up and out and end up being taller than the roof height - this is probably the most expensive bit - and the main reason we hadn't gone ahead and had a log burner installed there instead ! They are lovely - but can be a little messy to deal with !

We have a wall of shelves.

I'd love a fireplace though, if the house was slightly bigger I'd have one put in!

onedogandbaby The flue would come up through our bedroom so I guess this would be fine. Did you creat a false chimney breast, or just have it against the wall? Would really love to do this, but budget is over stretched to do the essentials, so at 3.5k I think this might be something for the future. Sounds great though!

Wall of shelves is sounding like the cheapest option. I always think the rooms in Ikea look nice, and they tend to just have this, just hard to imagine when we have so many features at the moment! We do have lots of books though so this could work (currently displayed by colour in an ombre sort of effect, DH says looks like I have too much time on my hands, but I think looks quite nice!)

Arrr love love love the wood burner chunk has linked to, need to find another 3.5k!

I would avoid fake fire places and fake fires. i think if you have a modern "box" house trying to make it look period isn't going to work well.

I think fires are not the only focal point - can be windows, mirror. Buying great art is good idea - could be sculpture - you could invest in beautiful pieces for the same price as building and buying fake fire feature.
Book cases and books if you are book people. Plants. Furniture.

If you are a "normal modern family with kids - sin't the TV & gaming equipment the focal point of the room! You could do that.

We have one of these

www.ostermann.de/content/pop_xxl.php?artikelnummer=0491360&w=820&h=680&ordner=xxl

I have no fireplace so have a wall smothered in art and a nice clock. The clock is not central but way off to the side!

SadPander ours is freestanding, every now and then I think about creating a false chimney breast as i'd like a mantelpiece, but for the time being, it's just against the wall.
Probably fits in better in the 70s house as a freestanding fire...you could try getting some quotes, and I think it depends whereabouts you are in the country. Plus we went for a pricey stove!

I think a woodburner would be lovely, you can definitely have one with no chimney - best bet is to get a local company round to quote. Clearview or charnwood are probably the best stoves, but aren't cheap. I agree with MrsTara about avoiding fake fires, I think it looks a bit odd if I'm honest. A modern, real log burner would look lovely though.

Weegiemum, you can have a log burner even in a smokeless area.
www.charnwood.com/range/c-series.aspx

Alfiecat - that looks great or some variation on that theme for a modern featureless room would loo great.

For all the men in my life the TV would need to be much bigger. The shelves would be covered in xbox games and he 3d glasses could be inside the cupboard!

Alfiecat, that looks lovely!

I think a woodurner is definitely winning as my ideal option. But they have just rejected our (supposedly) best and final offer on the house :( Could go up slightly but its eating into my already too small referb budget. Literally everything needs ripping out and starting again so think the woodburner is becoming more of a dream and the shelving/books option more reality. Think I will def get a quote for the woodburner if we get the house though, I'm totally in love with them now I've starting looking!

How about some horizontal cladding or tongue and groove on a dummy chimney breast with a log burner. Check out Pinterest I have lots of pics of cladding (Colporter is my name). Quite a scandi/Hamptons look.