Living Room Re-Design Unveil Part 1

Back in June, we decided that we'd just about had it with our living room.  It was dark, chaotic, and depressing.  The black IKEA shelves from my husband's bachelor pad sucked all the light out of the room, and when combined with the half unpacked boxes and the disorganized books and knick knacks, the effect was more basement storage than living room chic.

Living room "before": All that's missing is some lava lamps and drunk teenagers

Slowly but surely, we unpacked (or moved) the boxes, engaged in some much-needed space replanning, and sold/donated our old furniture and appliances.

One of the first items to retire?  Our tube television.  (Yeah, we were so old school that I didn't even know that you can't even buy a tube tv anymore. I actually went to Best Buy and asked to see their "flat-screen tvs" as though there were anything else!  Doh.)

Our ridiculously awesome (and affordable) AV team from Harmony Home Theater got our house cable ready, installed the new TV and a new entertainment system (complete with a rad Sonos multi-room music system), put in some serious ceiling speakers with an even more serious subwoofer for my audiophile husband, and basically brought us into the 21st century.

Living room "during": Even just taking out the black shelves makes a world of difference

And then were were ready to move all the furniture back in and redecorate.  You might remember that our living room mood board looked like this:

Living room vignette 1 by Jellyby on Polyvore.com

Well, here's what the finished entertainment area looks like:

It still needs a bit more art work, but we love how much brighter, more organized, and "us" it looks.  Look at how happy and sassy Skeletor looks perched atop one of the big floor speakers (which were actually my husband's parents' speakers from their very first home!).

We're almost done with the other side of the living room, with the bookshelves and seating vignette, and I'm looking forward to showing that to you soon.