Drumroll please…. our first “after” photos are here! If you need a refresher on the “before” photos for our house, click here. We bought our 1926 bungalow in Nashville in March 2019, and I’m going room by room through our house renovating and redecorating. I’ll share each room as I finish them, one at a time! Our living room is the place we spend a lot of time when we’re home, and the place we do a lot of our entertaining, so it was important to me to get it finished first.

We painted our walls Agreeable Gray by Sherwin Williams, and that was an undertaking… not the painting. We hired someone to paint the whole house. But CHOOSING the color. Whew. Nine shades of gray later… we ended up with the same color I paint most of my listings. It’s just such a great neutral gray!

If you look back at our before photos here, you’ll see that the house had brown bamboo roman shades and this room was painted pale pink. Neither of those things is horrible by themselves… but together… oof. Switching the old shades out for white linen-texture roman shades totally changed this room. It’s so much brighter now, and I love the way these add texture without being distracting. Because we have an older home, almost every window is a slightly different size, so we knew we’d have to get custom shades, and that can get really pricey really quickly. Luckily, with some research, we found these custom roman shades at Home Depot. We ordered ours in Shannon White Flint and added the cordless option for the living room and music room. I love them! Home Depot’s return policy is also great: when one of the shades was delivered dirty, they replaced it really quickly for us.

This was such a fun project, and I loved mixing new items with things we already had and pieces we’ve picked up around the world. We love to travel, and I love a room that tells a story about the people who live in it. For example, I love using pretty books for decor, especially ones I actually use! These are two cookbooks I use a lot and highly recommend… particularly the bacon brussels sprouts in Magnolia Table.

Y’all know I love pillows… the more the merrier! Jonny thinks it’s dumb to have to move pillows off our bed to sleep in it or move them off the couch to make more room… but what does he know? Pillows & plants = happiness. This shot also gives some perspective, and you can see our music room, a sneak peek of our Dalmatian dining room, and our dark green kitchen.

We found those midcentury diamond framed prints at a vintage shop in Fargo, ND last Christmas. One of our favorite things to do together is go vintage shopping, and I love using pieces we find in our house.

Possibly my favorite project yet has been small: styling our mantle. Every single item on the mantle means something to me, or has a memory attached.

This horse statue is from a vintage shop in Bristol, TN, as is the mirror. The books are from a different shop in Bristol that seemed like it kept on going for ages. The books were in a pile in the back, forgotten about, so I like to think that they’re getting a second chance at life.

This geode is from a tiny town in central Mexico called San Sebastian de Bernal, where Jonny and my Dad and I climbed Piña de Bernal, one of the largest monoliths in the world. The ocarinas are from my study abroad trip in college to China, which brings back so many good memories.

I had so much fun decorating our living room, and I hope you’ve enjoyed this little tour! Thanks so much for reading!

xo

GW