Beach House Makeover Preview

Good morning my dears!!

I have been dying to show you what I have been up to in my own home.  Due to constant military moves, we live in a rental house.  As much as I loved renovating our first home (that has now been sold), our new home is a cute beach house half a mile away from the Atlantic ocean.  We are some lucky ducks!

Well, the owners prefer us not to change the wall color on the main floor so I have been stumped trying to mix in our existing furniture with straw yellow walls and still maintain our style.  If only they were grey or taupe…*sigh*.

Here is our existing living room.

Not bad, I painted the two side tables glossy white from their original mahogany.  The rug is from rugsusa.com, the ikat pattern reminds me of squid! =) The room design is just not there yet!

Living room view facing the dining area  (this is my least favorite spot in our house).

There is to much brown furniture, it looks to traditional for my taste. What I do love is the West Elm capiz chandelier I bought as soon as we had moved in.

So now that you have seen the “before” pictures of our current living space! (UPDATE: You can see the full room makeover here!)

The reason I love it (besides all of the pops of color!) is that the wall color is almost an exact match to mine!!! This is the first room I have seen that comes close to what I want in our space.  Here is the sneak peak of the beauties I am bringing in to our home to help with the transformation.

Handmade pillow slipcovers from Etsy, I love the menswear inspired herringbone pattern!

Acrylic painting (by myself) then photoshopped.  Gotta love free art work.

And not so free artwork that you will probably recognize if you are an avid blog or pinterest reader from Cozamia.

Gorgeous!!!

The bookcase in my living area, here it is…..

 I would love to just paint the bookcase and dining room furniture gray or white but I have to make some compromises with the hubby, who is away saving the world so how could I say no to him (and his dimples)!

I do have a plan for the dining room.

Here she is!
My friend/fellow designer and I are swapping our tables (she has this same IKEA table featured in this dining room photo) but keeping our existing dining chairs/bench while we are stationed here.  Love a free solution.  Maybe someday I will find the “right” pedestal table and Chippendale chairs in a raw wood similar to my inspiration room.  This solution is perfect for our entertaining needs and breaks up all of my dark wood.

Adding pops of purple and yellow to my existing brown, gray, and blue will give this space a younger and more fresh appeal.

What changes have you been working on in your space? Is there a new color you want to try out? Or new projects to update your style?  I would LOVE to hear your ideas and thoughts as always!!