Furniture for this project is from our title sponsor, Front Room Furnishings.  We purchased the art and accessories at a local deep discount store and the draperies came from a retail department store.  The indoor/outdoor rug was ordered through one of our decorators.  The paint is from Sherwin Williams.  For additional decorating details please contact Colleen Lora.  

For more behind the scenes photos, please visit the  We Decorate Columbus Fan page on Facebook. 

Before

After

After

Tablescape

Our client is a fantastic young family of five.  The homeowners are two busy professionals, in fact Amber owns Fireflies & Fairytales, a children’s boutique clothing store located in Upper Arlington. 

Since three young children live here the dining room table needs to not only function as an eating area, but the homework, cooking  and crafting hub as well.  So we need to deliver style to this space that is not only beautiful but durable and wipeable too!

When our interior decorators asked for adjectives to describe her dream dining room, our client said, “Beachy, comfortable and kid-friendly.”  She is tired of her “hand me downs” and wants a “grown-up” dining room in which to entertain friends and family. 

The main challenge for this project?  Space, the room is on the small end and has three doorways and a window.  So there is very little wall space.  But, our team is always up for a challenge and is confident that we will deliver the dining room of their dreams.

We are to complete her job next week and I’ll blog more project specifics once we reveal our room to the lucky homeowners.  For now, here’s some photos of our client enjoying the perks of being on TV — hair and makeup by the phenomenal stylists of The Charles Penzone family of salons.

The Bramlage family of New Albany, Ohio graciously opened their home each day to our tornado of transformation as we designed, demolished and decorated their media room in just four days.   Our hostess Venetia stepped back as her kitchen table was turned into a make-up and hair salon and enjoyed the same pampering as we have by the stylists from the Charles Penzone’s family of salons.  

Client needs:  This family moved into the home two years ago and had a large, expensive picture tube television that would not fit into the existing wall of built-in cabinets.  They debated bringing in a finished carpenter to reconfigure the cabinets to fit the television that though relatively new, is out of date because of the emergence of flat screens and home theater technology.  Colleen explained that with little design expense they could reconfigure the room to deliver the home theater experience the whole family would enjoy for years to come.

The clients had three home theater reclining seats but needed more seating for optimum entertaining.  After a quick tour of the home, our decorators saw that the client had a large sofa in her master bedroom and would gladly allow us to use it in their media room.  We explained that a riser could be built upon which to place the sofa behind the theater seats therefore accomodating six guests rather than three.  Though she had trouble visioning our design she trusted us and let us take over from there.

So, it was time to bring in the experts.  On this project demolition and construction were key – for that we turned to Josh McKinley who removed the existing media cabinets, repaired the exposed drywall problems, installed new baseboards and painted the walls and ceiling.   A special thank you to Randy Stewart of Handy Randy contracting and remodeling services for pinch hitting on the drywall repair. 

Thank you to Sherwin Williams for providing the paint – this week’s color used was “Perfect Greige”.  A great neutral that really is a cross between grey and beige.

Once the cabinets were removed, we needed to patch the carpet – for this the experts from Carpet Express were in and out of the job in less than an hour. 

And of course you can’t have a media room without the fun technology to bring your theater dreams to life.  For this, we turned to Buckeye Audio.  After consulting with the client to learn their family’s needs they installed the wiring, projector, speaker, screens and even built the riser in just two days. 

To incorporate the theater room theme without using the predictable movie posters, Liz and Colleen installed wall adhesives in the shape of movie tickets and film reels.  Carman and Darlene accessorized the clients existing bookshelves, hung artwork and even made popcorn for that theater aromatherapy!

Though the project didn’t allow for a lot of traditional decorating, it illustrates the importance of bringing in a certified interior decorator or designer like those of “We Decorate Columbus” to consult, coordinate and complete a construction related project without having to deal with finding the right contractor for every element of the job yourself.

We hit four different local stores HomeGoods, Joanne Fabrics, World Market, and Lowe’s to pull together this look within 8 hours.  In this case we were working on a modest budget which makes our job more challenging. 

We chose a mocha leather accent chair to create a corner vignette and accented the area with a crisp white pedestal table.  The striped baskets were the modern gray and yellow color scheme.

We discovered a great coordinating damask and  a stripe fabric to create a custom headboard and trim for the off white sheers.  The window treatments were so special with the striped trim at the top along with the Button accents hand made from the damask fabric we had left over from the headboard creation.

Lighting was a huge issue as the room had no permanent lighting.  We found an awesome chrome lamp dripping with crystals for sparkle and shine.  This reminded me of a Classic Hollywood lamp, so luxurious.  The pair of bright yellow tableside lamps with damask patterned shades sitting on the mirrored bedside tables were definitely the icing on the cake.

All the elements of the room were addressed: color, furniture placement, lighting, bedding fabrics and pillows, window treatments, accessories, furnishings and a rug within timeframe to the client’s total satisfaction.  Another complete WOW room by the We Decorate Columbus team.

And, you can read the article, “A Day in the Life of a One Day Decorator” to see how our Team worked hard in three homes creating one day magic. Click on the images below to view them in full size.

Beginning shortly, we will provide examples of “Before and After” Make Overs to highlight those special spaces that our residential and commercial clients love.  Subscribe here to receive our next Make Over article and you’ll receive interior decorating tips as well.

If you have an immediate needs or any questions, please contact us:

Sally CaJacob
Owner, Interior Designer
Columbus, Ohio
Ph: 614-485-0917
Email Sally