kim5409's Profile

I agree that the room should be divided. I would switch the TV to the other end (by the windows and away from the doors) so that you will not have to walk awkwardly around the couch to exit to your patio. The french doors are a great feature and should be easy to access. I would select a comfy family sized L shaped couch to divide the room and face both the TV and the windows. Since this is a large room that will house several furniture arrangments there will be many different peices of furniture in the room. One large couch will help rein in the crazy and keep it all looking planned and beautiful. Also an L sectional is great for a family. You can seat a lot of people in much less space than you can with multiple couches, plus you'll both still fit to watch tv, even while laying down with the baby.

The space between the window and the french doors should be a striking viniette. Maybe an armoir, or a console table with a great piece of artwork, etc. It needs to anchor your attention when you enter the room. By making a powerful statement here, you allow the couch-tv arrangement on the left and the furniture arrangment on the right to jive together without being "matchy matchy". They will seem secondary in comparision to the vignette between them. This will make decorating your space with your existing stuff much easier because the spaces within this room will float indipendently because they are both tied to the centerpiece.

For the furniture arrangment on the door side, consider a second seating area with an additional couch, pair of chairs, chaise, and/or a small game table with two or three chairs. You will likely have many toys as your baby grows, so a wall of bookcases with cabinets below or storage baskets could be placed along the wall opposite from the TV. Verticle storage is awsome for keeping a LOT of stuff close at hand without ruining the appearence of your room. Just becuase you have a child does not mean that your house has to be a constant disorganised, toy coverd mess.

If you keep your TV on a credenza consider a pair of tall lamps to mirror the verticle thrust of the bookshelves on the other end. Again the key to keeping the entire room from pulling apart into a disjoined mess is to consider similar elements symmetrically between the two halves, like strong verticle elements on the ends. A pair of similar rugs is another element I would incorporate to help the two halves work together while mainting independt functions. By "similar" I do not mean the same rug in different sizes. The rugs should jive with color, pattern, or scale.

Even though the entire point of dividing the room is to get two usable spaces, you need to be very mindful of the room starting to feel like two living rooms sitting next to one another. The duplicity will result in you only using one side of the room becuase both sides are trying to fullfill the same function. Also, if you make sure both halves maintain an independent function the room as a whole will appear more visually dynamic and appealing.

One word of caution to keep your room feeling vibrant, multifunctioning, and mainting a strong visually hierchy: You do not need to have a coffee table on the door side of room. Tables centered in a furinture arrangment often become a pivot point and are visually dominant becuase of their large surface area. (This is why transparent tables are so effective at making a room feel larger). Since you will most likely have a good coffee table on the window side of the room, you don't want to have another one on the door side. It will most likely start pulling the room into two spaces and feel like you are duplicating the function of the room. A more open furniture arrangement on the door side will allow easier access to the doors (multipe travel paths) and leave you with plenty of floor-play space. Coffee tables can be constantly in the way when you need floor-play space. Consider end tables instead.

To summarize, the window side of the room is for nesting and the door side is for play. Both sides are tied together by a powerful vignette between the door and the window. The nesting side should feature larges stable pieces like the L-sectional and the TV. The play side should include a storage system and smaller, lighter, easily movable furniture pieces. The play side will have more circulation paths which is perfect for the door side. The nesting side is a lower energy space perfect for the window side with no circulation demands.

i cant believe i can't figure out who george is....help! Cute room. Comfortable, clean, great use of space.

The lack of upper cabinent space or shelving is really unfortunate. It's lovely now, but once there is no where to put stuff up on the kitchen won't look so great. It's a big improvment but adding some shelving would really help the kitchen function. Afterall the kitchen is a function driven room and storage is a must.

Rotated Option 1
Option 1 is a great idea with the chairs facing the couch, great for conversion, visually appealing because of symmetry, and good for room flow. However in the current positioning you are not making good use of your space. Believe it or not, but placing your furniture up against the walls (like you have in all the options) is not always the best solution, even for a small space. Creating an arrangment of furniture with some room to breath between the walls and furniture will actually make the room feel larger becuase the furniture is not crammed against the walls. Therefore I propose that you rotate your furniture arrangement from option 1 to place the couch in front of the window (like option 2). Centering the couch in the room with the chairs in front will create a nice arrangement that anchors the room and make all the other elements (the windows, doors, hallways) seem more interesting instead of unbalanced like they do now. Furniture should improve the room, not be a slave to the open wall space. Another plus with a rotated Option 1 layout is that you can place your TV on the wall between the hall and the kitchen across from the couch. The chairs (across from the couch) will flank the TV and reinforce the power of the room anchoring furniture arrangement (couch & chairs).

NAVY blue will complement the orange tones (complimentary colors are always reliable for a polished look) and the intensity of Navy will match the strength of the tone of your wood. Matching intensities will harmonize the walls and vanity making the most of the small space in the bathroom.