Rooms We Never Use

On the heels of OfficeChairGate last week, my eyes turned to the problematic living room. It's a hard room - there's the front door and fireplace and big window on one wall, a giant arch to the dining room on another, and a set of French doors to the patio on a third. There's one wall where the sofa can go, and we can't float it because there are no floor plugs, thus ruling out lamps on side tables because of the visible cords. (Five pets = no rugs, by the way). In the past, Sister Meg and I have had two different sofas in here, and for years we were resigned to the uncomfortable slip-covered sleeper. But with Sister Meg's new job, we once again have a source of decently-styled, inexpensive furniture. So voila, here is the new sofa, chocolate brown micro-fiber (spot-cleanable!). We don't ever sit in the living room, so it looks pretty all the time now.

And it looks incredible with the vintage chairs I had recovered a couple of years ago. That's a massively discounted Todd Oldham table I snagged from Overstock.com between the two chairs - it's a nice piece; I was surprised. Very well made. And even though we are on a NO RUGS regimen, I am going to make a narrow polyurethaned floorcloth runner to run between the sofa and chairs, something mod and low-key.

I'll throw in a pic of the dining room as well; it's a prettier room than shows in the pic. We're looking for brown and green striped curtains, and we'll hang them high, almost to the ceiling, to make the room taller. It's hard to find one SPECIFIC thing when you're looking for it.


The two Phillipe Starck clear chairs have always been a problem as well, though I like them in the living room now, paired with the Chinese Chippendale-style card table my Dad made years and years ago. I thought this scene would be another space we didn't use, but there is a wall-mounted TV opposite it and Sister Meg and I have had supper there a couple of times and even played Yahtzee one night. It's a thrilling life, here on Sunnymeade Drive.