Rate My Space #1

Now that you guys have all seen the space we are working with I thought I'd show you the tentative design thoughts I've had floating around in my head. Not all the images were available for me to polyvore so you'll have to work with me here a bit...

Living Room by LifeAccounts on Polyvore.com

Ok, now for my clarifications. The hutch image you see above will actually be a dark brown espresso stain (exact same lines though), the couch also isn't identical but these were the closest images I could find. Everything else is exactly what we have so far. Oh and there will be two of those bookcases!

The bookcases and couch are leftovers from our previous house and have been sitting in storage ever since. We don't have the heart to upgrade the couch yet though we are already discussing how soon we will be upgrading it down the road since it's kind of small (heaven knows that won't work with my family).

The leather recliner is hub's man chair that we bought in North Carolina this year and is the most comfortable piece of furniture I have ever sat in. The hutch and chest (upper right-hand corner) are also being shipped up from North Carolina, the chest is actually a piece from our bedroom set that we will more than likely use out in the living room to store linens and other kitchen misc (or I'm thinking we should upgrade to a bar!).

The rug is a recent online purchase and I have high hopes for it (though I have yet to see it in person). If we love the pattern as much as I'm hoping we'll love it, we are thinking about buying it in gray as well for our bedroom.

Right now the walls are a brownish-gray color that you saw in the previous post. The artwork we currently have includes:






The maps are in the process of being framed with leftover molding, they are mounted on foam board and marked with tacks from all our travels (they are also pretty big-like 46x30 a piece). The typography pieces are a tribute to my husband's involvement and love of baseball-the Fenway Park piece is one that I researched and custom-designed with a fantastic artist for his birthday last year. All the pieces have a whole lot of brown/vintagey vibe going on.

As you can see, we're looking at a whole lot of similar but slightly mis-matchy dark browns and black except for the rug. I'm hoping the rug will add a lovely pop of color and I know we can always add pillows/blankets and decorative knick-knacks for more color. Anything that this room is just screaming that it's missing to any of you? I know many are of you are quite talented with design, I've seen pictures of your homes/weddings/etc. so I would love to hear your input, even if you think it's horrible and we should start fresh (just break it to me gently if that's what you think)!! I have a collection of old milk glass vases that I was thinking might be lovely to display and we also have a lovely selection of Whitney Smith Pottery of which I've included a sampling of her work:

Contrary to how it may seem, we don't actually have an aversion to color, we apparently do really love our dark furniture though... :) I would love to do a gallery wall with photos, we have so many beautiful ones from the engagement/wedding/trash the dress/honeymoon/anniversary/boudoir shoots. I have also been thinking about perhaps hanging some vintage antique china plates? I inherited a few from my great-grandmother that I would love to perhaps add to and maybe hang on the wall (gotta take advantage of this now before I have kids tearing through the house right?)!

Ok, so that was a lot and random and all over the place but if you followed any of that, any thoughts and opinions would be very much appreciated! :)