![]() Consider the scale of it - you don't want tiny furniture drowning in a huge room, although small living rooms can often benefit from some oversized furniture. The right furniture can make a huge difference to the feeling of a room. MAY WE SUGGEST: Christmas decoration ideas How to choose your living room furnitureĪt that point, it's time to consider how to choose your living room furniture, taking into account how you use the space, what kind of sofa you prefer, how many armchairs you can fit in, whether you need a sofa bed, and the importance of a coffee table or ottoman, and of course side tables to put a drink on. When you've mapped your key bits of furniture and chosen the paint colours, that's when you can add in the flourishes to make it cosy and choose cushions, a rug, storage and so on to fill the space out. For how that might influence your decision, you can read Joa Studholme's guide in our gallery of Farrow & Ball paint colours in real homes. Once you have that in your mind, consider the light the living room receives and that will help you choose the paint colours. Certain things are easy, such as an ottoman or coffee table will go in front of a sofa or in between two facing each other, but others depend entirely on the space you have. You should start with the space itself and map out where all your big furniture could go – so your sofa, any armchairs and freestanding bookshelves for example. If you're lucky enough to have a fireplace, make it a focal point, arranging your sofas and chairs to face it, and decorating the mantelpiece with pictures and ornaments. Consider putting in some joinery and bookcases that can help you make the most of the room's height and provide valuable storage. We love the distinguished feel of wooden flooring, preferably with some rugs layered on top for softness. Starting with the bones of the room, there are paint colours and flooring to decide on, which will set the tone of the space. To make it more complicated, you need to consider the fact that you'll spend time in a living room at various points of the day, so it needs to work as well at midday as it will with the curtains drawn and candles lit. ![]() Don’t take a shortcut by spot-refinishing isolated damage or a chipped section: “No stain will match the way your grandmother’s walnut table aged in the sun of her dining room for 60 years,” Hamm says.There are so many elements involved in decorating a living room and it's a room that we spend a lot of our time in so you want to get it right. If you don’t love the natural color of the wood, find a stain you like. ![]() “Furniture oils sink in and protect wood beyond the surface, and can be reapplied in the future to bring out rich colors in the wood without shine.” Try teak oil for denser woods, or tung or Danish oil for all-purpose finishing. “Once I strip everything off raw wood, I’ll go straight for an oil,” Hamm says. Finish by wiping down the table with a tack cloth so it’s free of dust, then sand the surface again, this time with your 120-grit, to polish the wood. You can sand by hand, but a mechanical sander makes the job go, ahem, much smoother. Starting with the roughest sandpaper (60-grit), sand in the direction of the grain. Sand down the table after with an 80- to 120-grit sandpaper to ensure that the surface is as smooth as possible.Īlternatively, use coarse sandpaper to remove the original top coat from the table. Once the stripper softens the finish, run a putty knife or scraper along the grain of the wood to remove the first finish. In general, you’ll want to wear rubber gloves and long sleeves and work in a well-ventilated area. You can use a chemical stripper to remove the original coats of paint or stain just make sure you’re following proper instructions on the product label. When it comes to the old finish, you’ve got a few options. Use standard cleaning supplies, like an all-purpose cleaner. Before you strip the current finish, thoroughly clean the entire table to remove any dirt, oil, or grease, Otherwise, you’ll be grinding the debris into the wood as you sand. The biggest mistake first-timers make with refinishing is not reserving enough time to clean, or prep the surface. ![]() If you’re not sure what kind of wood surface you’re working with, Hamm recommends looking at the grain of the wood: “If it repeats across the width of the grain, it’s veneer, because it’s been rotary-sliced off a single log to make a sheet.” Step 2: Clean your wood table Refinishing laminate won’t work-it’s plastic. Solid wood is a better candidate for refinishing than veneer, which tends to be thinner.
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