Better Design Does Exist, Despite Obstacles Like A Carousel Horse
It’s hard to enjoy a room if the furniture and clutter don’t let you in
“We just can't seem to make our living room work, and we have an antique carousel horse that we'd like to display more prominently,” my client complained. “We need help!” Upon visiting their home, I could see that their living room had some inherent challenges. It's difficult to arrange furniture in a room with an angled fireplace, plus having to step down into this room created a choppy transition between the other spaces. And, you were forced to walk in front of the fireplace to get from one room to another. The built-in cabinets added storage but also made it difficult to create a satisfying arrangement.
Our challenge was to create a more natural-looking seating area, to rearrange their accessories and to show off their prancing horse.
Before
• Two chairs blocked entry into the room.
• The furniture looked as if it were placed willy-nilly. It's usually best to aim your seating area facing the focal point (the fireplace on the right), but here the focal point seems to have been ignored.
• The horse sculpture was corralled off in the corner and couldn't be appreciated. He also was too close to the tea set, causing both to “jockey” for our attention.
• There were many beautiful accessories here, but they needed to be repositioned.
After
• How can you feel invited into a room if the furniture won't let you in? We had to clear a path into this living room. Since there were only three people living in the house, we could remove one of the chairs and still have enough seating. Moving the other chair away from the entrance created an even wider opening.
• We angled the couch and matching chairs to face the focal point (the fireplace is out of view on the right). The U-shaped seating arrangement is better for conversation and adds some much needed symmetry to the room. The new arrangement also improved the traffic flow.
• The prancing horse now has more space in which to cavort. He is a delightful greeter and adds lots more personality to the room now that you can see him.
• By rearranging the accessories we were able to create more balance in the room and to show off some of the owner's favorite possessions. We repositioned the tea table under the window to give it more prominence and found artwork to place on either side. We added prized art books to the coffee table and pushed the library ladder against the cabinetry.
Kit Davey, an interior designer based in Redwood City, Calif., helps clients redecorate their homes through the creative use of their existing furnishings. E-mail Kit your questions: kit@ctwfeatures.com
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