the renovation : the dining room

It has been a long time since I've posted on the 'dream home' renovation progress.  Not that there hasn't been any...just nothing all that noticeable.

But since Thanksgiving is this week and we hopefully are all feasting somewhere, I thought I would share our dining room progress!

This room, when we purchased our home, was the living room for the back unit (then a two bedroom rental.)  Someone had the brilliant idea of painting one of the walls and all the built-in bookshelves black.  There was really icky, old carpet, a very outdated (not in a good way) light fixture, and the white on the trim and ceiling was pretty dingy.

So we changed all of that!  :)

Here you can see the door that was once separating the front of the home from the back...which we have opened up!  

You can tell I love warm colors! The large canvas art I bought when I first moved to Cincinnati and also hung in the dining room of our first home.  The dining table and rust-hued chairs we purchased when we got married seven years ago.  Both the art and the table still make me happy!   I am getting ready to host Thanksgiving dinner next week, so I've decked out the table with a few things.   I love the afternoon sunlight in this room so we haven't put any window coverings up.  Do you think it is necessary?   I kind of want to keep them bare, which is probably a design no-no.  (Sound off in the comment section below!) 


Here is the before view, looking in from the bottom of the back staircase.  While the back of the house has less Victorian architectural detail, the built-ins and this arch are two things that made me happy when we first looked at the house.

The wall color we used is Sherwin Williams "Dorian Gray" which is a warm medium gray.   The light fixture we custom ordered from Etsy.

Isn't it amazing what paint and decor (and sunlight) can do for a room?

We also added a doorway in that corner leading down to our basement.  Prior to that if I wanted anything out of storage (which, let's face it, we have a ton down there due to the renovation) I had to walk outside, around the house, and unlock a separate exterior door.  Yuck.  So I am very glad we added this door for inner, convenient access!

While I actually love a black accent wall...the lovely built-in shelves got lost with this choice.  So we painted them white and did away with the black:

Beyond the stairwell / hallway you can see the family room, which we are still working on, but you can see our progress from this post.

Now we are trying to decide on hallway colors, as you can see.  

(There are quite a few walls in our home with paint samples galore!)

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!