My Pad : Dream Living Room

When I was in High School I wanted to be a Interior Designer and have been planning in my head how I want my dream house to be decorated for a long time. Still living with my lovely mother, I don't have free reign of the decorating and so have to make do with re-blogging photos on Tumblr and pinning on Pinterest. I love the whole rustic, vintage and shabby chic cottage themes. I can't wait to have my own house and start decorating!! Mr Kate is my all time favourite lady for home advice, her style is so me, and I want to make everything she ever shows on her YouTube channel and blog! Today I am going to share with you my dream living room ideas.  The way I see it, the Living Room is the heart of the house. It's the area the family usually comes together to watch TV, talk and chill out. At the moment our living room and dining room are combined but I would love to have two separate rooms so that I could make the living room a den where it's cosy and a place I can imagine spending Christmas Day (that's the right way to imagine a living room...right?!) I'm going to share my living room Mood Boards (that I had way too much fun making) and a few tips I would share about how to make the most of your Living Space and what I would do with my room to make it look chic.  1. Choose a Colour Scheme and Theme. Naturally for me, my dream living room is a shabby chic, vintage vibe so I'd choose natural colours. It's easy to update a rooms feel if you keep the room the canvas. I'd paint my room a light duck egg, or even white, and paint the skirting board a glossy white. I'd also choose a cream or light brown carpet. This means you can inject the colour and character with the accessories, furniture, flowers and wall hangings. This makes it easy to change up your room whenever the mood takes you. You could even make one wall an accent wall with a gorgeous wallpaper. 

Choosing paint samples is always fun, a tip is to test paint behind a photo so that you can put the photo back on top afterwards to keep your room tidy in the meantime.

2. Create A Focal Point. All your furniture may be pointing towards your TV, but it's become a big thing to make your fireplace the focal point of the room. That doesn't mean you need to hang your TV  up there, but a big ornate mirror will make your room feel bigger, and give you somewhere to check your make up before you run out. You can adorn your fireplace with oddities and candles to make your room homely. 

If your fireplace is boring, you can always buy special paint and change the colour to match with your room. 

3. You Don't Need To Spend A Fortune! Gumtree is a perfect example of how to furnish a house without spending extortionate amounts of money. One search for Shabby Chic in my area brought up beautiful hand painted furniture that would be perfect for making a room unique and personal. You can head to flea markets and car boots to find pieces cheap and then with a lick of paint and a bit of sanding create your very own signature pieces. Not only will it look great but it makes the room something you really worked on. Gumtree also has mirrors, sofas and anything else you could think of, second hand doesn't always mean dire. You can bet that when I own my own house it will be kitted out in Gumtree finds and tins of white paint! Up-cycling has quickly become a major part of decorating and bringing new life to old pieces is fun. You could upholster chairs, Add legs to a Vintage trunk to make a coffee table or make your own floral lamp Ala Mr Kate. (I'm far too excited to start and I don't even have my own house)

Everything marked with a yellow flower I found on Gumtree for under £150! Don't underestimate the power of the internet, check out freecycle as well!

4. Get Personal. You don't want your room to look like a show house, so add a frame wall with photos of your family! You can pick up some beautiful frames in TKMaxx and in charity shops, that with a quick spray paint you can transform into art. It means less frames lying around and injects life into your room. You could even add a couple Chalk board frames for people to draw their own art on. Think outside the box and search sites like Pinterest for great DIY ideas! 

If you live with someone else or have children, then getting them involved in the design is a great way to make sure that the living room suits everyone. At the end of the day it's not just for you, even if you do want to be in charge of the makeover.. like me.

5. Accessorise Accessorise Accessorise. Once you've got the basics like your shelving, seating, TV and painting done, you can start adding accessories that will bring colour and life into your room. I suggest a colourful rug in the centre that you can put your coffee table on top of. Buy colourful (or colour schemed) objects for your shelving and fireplace. Just have fun with it and try things out in different places before settling on a final design. Decorating should be fun not a rush, so pick things up here and there, look at car boots for things you can up-cycle and see what you have lying around the house that might look good in your living room. Keep in mind the feel you want your room to have, weather that be lots of free space, a cosy environment or a mix of colours, textures and patterns. 

Check out your local home bargain stores for cheap alternatives to some highly priced accessories, I just bought a huge ceramic owl for £1.99 from B&M!

So that's my five tips and ideas on how I would decorate my dream living room. Let me know what you've done with your house or what you have planned for your future home. What kind of environment would you like your room to have? Cosy or spacious? Do you like shabby chic like me, or are you a classic type. Check out emoov for how to make the most of your living space. 
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