Big wall for TV, fireplace and storage to replace 70s monstrosity - what works? Please come and give me some ideas!

[IHeartKingThistle]

At the moment we have one of those very special 70s brick fireplaces (with built in cubby for Betamax player, of course!) that stretches the whole way across the living room wall (4+ metres). I'm a big fan of retro but it is truly hideous!

Anyway, after 3 years IT'S GOING! Unfortunately I have no idea what to put in instead and we have to decide fast as we need to change the flooring. I'm thinking it could be good to have it all built in rather than use freestanding furniture, and we're happy to have a false chimney breast, alcoves etc built in if that's what would work.

So the wall needs to have the TV on it - DH is particularly keen to have a wall hung TV (and I am particularly keen to not see any dangly wires). We also need storage (I was thinking a mix of open and covered so I can put some nice things on display but shut the DC's dvds away) and I would like a fire of some kind (no chimney but there's an old gas fire there now so it's definitely vented).

I just need help with the configuration and the sort of LOOK. We tend to go with white, wood and lots of colour accents, and we do like a bit of whimsy (think mismatching prints and granny blankets). But this has to really really work and not date.

I saw a pic of a similar wall in white with big chunky alcoves in random places which looked great, but the tv was at a weird angle and I don't want it being a place that gets crap dumped all over it.

Any ideas or advice gratefully received!

PS if you helped give me ideas for my whimsy/eclectic/pain in the arse bathroom, thank you so much - it's done!

This isn't quite what you asked but could I suggest not having a TV but a projector? We didn't like the idea of a telly in the living room being a focal point that all the furniture points at, even when it's off. We considered painting the wall over the fireplace (you can do it in anti-reflective projection paint but light grey matt is just as effective) but decided we didn't want a fireplace as the central heating system is good.

So we put an projector screen over the window, which also acts as a very effective blackout blind, and put an Epson projector (£700ish) on the ceiling, can't remember if it's HD but I think it is. We had to put in a strengthening plate - just a piece of timber between joists really - and do some drilling through joists to run the VGA, power and HDMI cables, which then come out in the ceiling of an alcove which I call the Mother Ship; It has shelves with the netflix-linked Blu-ray/DVD 5.1 surround sound home cinema unit (£350, Phillips I think, from Costco) and a PC base unit from which we can watch iplayer and similar. Keep meaning to get a YouView box too, to make use of the conventional TV aerial. Our broadband connection comes into the side of the house at this point and we also put physical ethernet connections into the upstairs rooms from the router which sits in the Mother Ship too.

The projected image size we get is equivalent to a 90-inch LED/Plasma TV, and the screen takes up nearly no space. So, for comparison, I saw what is apparently an entry-level 90 inch TV in Costco the other day which was £8500+VAT. We ran speaker cables around the room behind the edge of the wood flooring and then put skirting back on, so the speakers have no visible cabling.

If the job is big enough that you're pulling down decorative 70s fireplaces (we also had one of those!) then I think the disruption to your ceiling of putting in a projector could be really worth it. Even if this idea strikes you as somewhat loopy, have a look at websites/blogs to judge what the right size and height of TV is best for the distance that your sofa will be at - there are a lot of TVs all over the land hung far too high leading to sore necks, and which are far too big to enjoy properly from the 'throw' distance of the average living room.

Pinterest!

Pinterest is bringing up hundreds of pictures of stylish spider traps log piles!

I'd like a projector actually but not sure Dh would go for it. I'll show him your post, thanks foe the info!

Any other ideas?

I quite like the configuration of this although my style veers more towards this and I have no idea how I could get that style into a built in wall!

DH and I both really like the idea of the TV being part of a gallery wall like this but given that we have to get a fire and storage on that wall too, I don't want it to be too busy.

I've normally got an imagination for this sort of thing, but this bloody wall is defeating me!