Dining Room Makeover: Full Reveal!

This room has been a long time in the making. I started in July and am just now, eight months later, feeling ready to call it. Old Allison would have started this in July, finished in July, and been changing things by August because she realized she hated it.

I am by nature an incredibly impatient person, and that has come back to bite me in my flat, pancake rump many times throughout the course of updating our house. Design remorse is the worst remorse (aside from “cringe-y things I did while I was drunk” remorse) and I am finally starting to see the light. A room doesn’t need to/shouldn’t be done in a weekend. I took my time with our dining room, only chose things I loved, had a clear vision of what I wanted, and now it’s finished, perfect, and my favorite room in the house!

Starting out, we were working with beige walls, a builder grade brass chandelier (complete with frosted glass shades), a hand-me-down-table with chairs, and orange, shiny floors. I am so mad at myself because before we moved all the furniture out of the room to refinish the floors, we didn’t take a picture! Oh well. Here is the room, clear of furniture, but in all its nineties glory:

Man alive, that hurts my eyes! The first major change was de-orange-ing the floors, and it was definitely a terrifying project. They were in excellent condition, and I could potentially have caused thousands of dollars worth of damage to our house for no good reason other than I didn’t like them. In the end, I was willing to risk it because I hated them so. Damn. Hard. It was a lot of work but it paid off in spades! I didn’t ruin them, they looked beautiful (IMO) and everything is a-OK.

It was a vast improvement, but the room was still depressing AF:

Nothing some freshly painted walls, updated light fixture, a new table and chairs, lotsa plants, some fun artwork, black shiplap and a ballin’ new rug couldn’t fix!

Damnnnnn…those gross beige walls had to go. I hated them. They were almost bordering on peige (that is my word for pink-beige) and it was not cute. I painted three of the walls a nice crisp white, and did a black accent wall using plywood on the fourth. I also took down that haggard chandelier the first chance I got.

The black “ship lap” wall was inspired by Mandi at Vintage Revivals and turned out to be a happy surprise. I found myself wanting to keep it as clean as possible, with the exception of this amazing print I got from Society6 and framed myself in an $11 thrift store find from RE.

I decided to build my own table, and balance the chunky, farmhouse design with these awesomely affordable Eames chairs from Canadian Tire. Pro-tip: they go on sale every few weeks, so wait for the sale. (I sign up for notifications straight to my email!)

The photo ledge I DIYed was a nice addition to a boring blank wall, and I love the assortment of prints in all their mismatched, thrifted frames. It was such an easy project, and I am really happy with how nicely it fills up the space. How amazing is that leopard print by Balazs Solti? It is even more fantastic in person.

The hutch I flipped is the perfect solution for some storage, and another convenient landing spot for my precious, precious plants. As much as I hate painting furniture, this was totally worth it and a good investment of my time. I almost put it out on clean up day, but decided to give it a second lease on life and it totally ended up working in the space!

Can we talk about this rug for a minute? More than anything, I would love a vintage Persian rug like you wouldn’t believe, but sometimes, the practical side of my brain actually wins. It’s tough to justify spending a small fortune on a rug that is going to be absolutely trashed by your dogs’ nails, fur, and vomit. Honestly, EVERY TIME those little shitbirds have to puke, they go straight for a carpeted area. Why do they gotta do me dirty like that? Why, why, why? Someday I will have my dream rug, but until then, this beaut from Wayfair will do quite nicely. It’s the Kowloon Red area rug by World Menegerie, and I had it in my “cart” for three months before I finally pulled the trigger. I’m so glad I did, because it’s exactly what the room needed and the perfect ruby/wine color. It is even prettier in person and gives me the Persian look I wanted at a fraction of the cost. It’s easy to clean and I am not at all worried about it getting ruined. I already spilled Kraft Dinner all over it and it wiped up like a dream. I put a lot of butter in my KD, for reference. It was real greasy.

The change is crazy, folks.

I could stare at it all day!

It feels so good to have this finished. I am dying to start the kitchen but Matt is throwing up picks left and right. The nicer the rest of the house becomes, the uglier that kitchen seems to get. I can’t take much more of it…my goal is to wear him down by the end of April. I think it’s nice to have goals.

Welp, that’s a wrap! Are you down with this makeover? Hit me up in the comments!