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So far this forum has been amazing and I have some yet another decorating/furnishing questions. The house I just purchased is a 1.5 story and, because of this, the living room is large...but it is long and with the window situation and the fireplace, I am in a quandry about furniture choices and TV arrangement and wanted to see you all's thoughts...here are the pictures:
So, personally, I think I am going to have to mount the TV over the fireplace using a tilt mount unless anyone else sees other options. I had originally thought about buying a sectional to put against the back corner in the same fashion as the current furniture. Now, however, I am leaning more towards maybe a 3 piece couch set to kind of mask the length of the room by placing them in a diagonal fashion like this
/ ---- \ centered around the fireplace.
As for the room...I plan to tear down the back wall as it is made of wood planks and have it drywalled in then painting it the same color as the wall with the front door. I feel this would be a better choice and better on heating and cooling.
Also, does anyone have experience with cathedral ceilings? There currently is not an overhead light in the room. The people have been using floor lamps. I would like to put in one ceiling fan with a light at least...maybe two. They would have to hang down a decent amount. I am not sure if there is currently electricity to tap in to on the ceiling. Does anyone know what it runs to have electricity wired and ceiling lights put in?? I am sure it isn't cheap but I think I would be happier with overhead lights...the master bedroom has the same problem as well.
What a cool room! I really like it. As for the TV, the only other option I can think of (besides over the fireplace) is to do a hidden TV console that goes on the "empty" side to separate spaces. Like these: Handcrafted TV lift cabinets and consoles
But I'm not sure - I am kind of partial to above the FP.
As for overhead lights, I just had to run wire to install two light fixtures in a gameroom that had none and it was around $300 or $66/hour.
Wow, that is a very cool room. It is big enough to have two entirely different areas so I think the question is, how do you want to use the space? How many people generally need to be able to watch TV at any given time?
The cost of any contracting work is going to depend on where you live. I am in Maryland. My electrician would charge $75 to install each light fixture.
Do you HAVE to put a tv in that room? Is there another space where you could set up a tv? I would NOT mount it above the fireplace. Sit on your couch and stare at your picture up there for 5 minutes and see how comfortable that is. You will HATE having the tv that high. You could move the love seat to the opposite side of that arrangement and put the tv on that back wall inside of a cabinet of some kind.
What are your plans for that empty space by the stairway. Is that supposed to be a dining room or is there another dining room in the house?
That was my concern as well...having a tv that is so high that it would give everyone a serious neck injury to watch any standard sporting event. There is a separate dining area on the other side of the walln and I currently have no plans for the open area towards the front of the room...that was why I was going to "fan" out the furniture a bit. This is the view from the dining room/kitchen into the living room...I thought about knocking the wall down and opening up the dining room a little bit and create a "floating staircase" but I am not sure the feasability of that.
There is a downstairs that is finished but it was turned into a bathroom, bonus room, laundry room, and a smallish living area. I feel like it might work but it would probably be a little cramped to put in furniture. I think the upstairs might be my best bet.
How about putting the TV where your hutch is, put it on an extendable wall bracket so you can tilt it toward the fireplace area if needed. I would put a table (game table maybe) more in the center of that area or put in a couple recliners and a table (pulled away from the window a bit more then the chairs that are there now). That way you have an area to watch tv and a conversation area around the fireplace.
You could also move the couch in front of the windows and put in a couple wing backs or similar chairs opposite the love seat, put the hutch where the couch is now.
I would get a console and put it on the wall with the window where the sofa is now. Put the sofa facing the TV. This way you can see the fireplace and TV. Since it is such a long room I would make it into two with two different furniture groupings.
If you want it to look wider, however, and less long, a couple of things that could lead the eye side to side instead of straight down to the end - you've got really strong lines from side to side in the ceiling beams, that's great - the floor is gorgeous, but it does make straight narrow lines down the length of the room.
A larger rug at the fireplace end that will cover more of the wood flooring and extend a little farther toward the kitchen end of the room would cut the lengthening lines of the floorboards and make that end of the room look larger, especially if the color of the rug contrasts with the color of the floor. A larger rug will also enable positioning furniture closer to the wall opposite fireplace, which will visually widen that end of the room. And if you have a one-way design in your rug, running from fireplace to opposite wall, that would give a strong visual width to that area. Doesn't have to be stripes, but even a subtle line of texture in the rug running in that direction would give the effect.
Also on your end wall, that's a lovely window that opens up that end of the room, but it's a vertical line where you could use a long horizontal to further the impression of width. Of course you could do the age-old curtain trick where you hang a valance so as to cut the height of the window, and use a curtain rod wider than the actual window so that it "broadens" the window; that can work with a heavy close-woven fabric that doesn't show the actual shape of the window opening when light shines through.
It seems to me that I may have seen a TV mount/covering consisting of a painting that either slides down on a track or moves out from the wall and lowers on a spring-loaded hinge to reveal the flat screen television behind it. Depending on the size and dimensions of your TV, you might be able to get a piece of artwork that's wider than it is high to hide the television and give you that width-making line. The torchere lamp on the end wall also gives a vertical line where something wider and shorter would give you less verticality.
I think the sofa positioning you're thinking about, with two sofas flanking the fp and one on the opposite wall, is great - having a long sofa with its back to the rest of the room will really establish the end grouping as a separate area, "widen" it, and cut the length of the room. If you put a folding screen on the staircase side of the room just this side of the sofa grouping and extending a few feet into the room, that would also help to delineate the fireplace end of the room as a separate area. I think your ceiling fans/lights will also "bring down" the height of the ceiling a little and make the room seem wider.
Well, forgive me for running on, your house is just beautiful the way it's arranged already, and I know whatever else you do will be just as lovely. The reason I have so much to say on the long narrow room subject is that a friend once asked me what she could do to make her L-shaped living room/dining room/kitchen look wider and less long, and I didn't really know, so since then I've been interested when I see articles or decorating shows on that subject. I've been waiting all this time to get all of this information off my chest, so thank you for the opportunity! I hope you'll post pictures of how the room looks when you're done!
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Making the long narrow room look wider, less long
