Have you ever kept buying pillows, art and accessories, hoping the next purchase would FINALLY make your room look finished?
That’s exactly what was happening to Praveen in her New Westminster loft.
She had beautiful furniture, a modern kitchen and a dramatic reclaimed brick fireplace wall. She’d been living there for a year, buying things she liked, but the decorating just wasn’t coming together.
In fact, when we met for her makeover, her car was full of pillows she was returning!
The problem? She was buying individual pieces without an overall decorating plan.
So we headed to HomeSense, and seven hours later, her living and dining rooms looked completely different.
And the most interesting part? We worked with two of the strongest existing finishes in her home: the orange-pink brick fireplace and the very dark kitchen.
How to Decorate Around an Orange Brick Fireplace
Orange and pink brick fireplaces are common decorating challenges. Homeowners often wonder whether they should paint the brick, cover it or replace it altogether.
But if you’re keeping the brick, there’s another solution. Repeat its colours in your decorating.
Praveen actually liked her reclaimed brick wall. The problem was that the rest of her living room wasn’t relating to it.
The brick was giving us an enormous field of warm terracotta, orange and pink tones. And the black television and modern fireplace already looked great against it.
We simply needed to bring those colours into the room.
Look at the difference!
The area rug, pillows, artwork and accessories now repeat the warmth of the brick, while the black accents connect to the fireplace and television.
The lamps add another layer of sophistication, and the carefully chosen accessories make the room feel collected instead of randomly decorated.
The brick hasn’t changed. But now it looks like part of the decorating plan.
That’s the power of a cohesive colour palette.
The Dark Kitchen Wasn’t Working Either
Praveen’s kitchen was modern, dramatic and very dark.
But because nothing in the adjoining dining room related to those dark cabinets, the kitchen almost looked like a black hole.
The pale wood dining chairs and bright sunflower artwork were perfectly nice pieces on their own, but they weren’t helping the space feel cohesive.
And here’s an important distinction:
There’s a difference between a dark room and a moody room. A moody room has been DECORATED.
Instead of trying to lighten the kitchen or ignore its dark finishes, we repeated them throughout the adjoining dining room.
And what a difference that made!
The Artwork That Transformed the Entire Space
My favourite find of the entire makeover was the pair of oversized, framed sepia tree murals we installed in the dining room.
Their dramatic charcoal tones repeat the kitchen cabinetry, while the warm sepia backgrounds connect beautifully to the brick fireplace and the earthy colours throughout the space.
Because the kitchen, dining room and living room are all part of one open-concept layout, these pieces of art help connect all three areas.
Why This Makeover Works
There are three reasons this transformation is so successful.
1. We decorated around the existing finishes.
The orange-pink brick fireplace and dark kitchen cabinetry became the starting point for the colour scheme instead of two unrelated elements.
2. We repeated colours throughout the open-concept space.
Terracotta, peach, coral, warm neutrals and charcoal now appear in the art, upholstery, rug, lamps and accessories. Those repetitions are what make the rooms feel connected.
3. We chose furniture and accessories with the right scale and style.
The curvy upholstered dining chairs, oversized art, well-proportioned lamps and carefully layered pillows give the space that rich, professionally decorated look.
And none of this happened by simply buying more random things!
It happened because every choice had a purpose.
How to Make Your Own Home Look Finished
If you keep buying pillows, lamps, art and accessories but your room still doesn’t look right, the answer isn’t necessarily another shopping trip.
You need to understand how to choose the right pieces and, more importantly, how to make them work together.
That’s exactly what I teach in Styling School.
You’ll learn how to choose and arrange art, create beautiful gallery walls, select pillows that actually work with your room, and find lamps in the right size and scale.
And Praveen’s makeover is proof of just how dramatically the right decorating decisions can transform a home.
Want to know how I pull off these transformations in ONE DAY, shopping at ONE STORE?
For 3 days only, when you purchase Styling School, you can add my exclusive two-hour workshop, The Art of Finishing a Room, where I’m pulling back the curtain on exactly how I do it! I’ll share the decorating decisions you never see on camera, the ONE question I never ask my clients, and why you think my HomeSense is so much better than yours. (I promise you, it’s not!) You’ll learn how I choose the right pieces, pull together a cohesive look, and know when to stop shopping. These are the styling secrets behind my one-day makeovers, and I’m sharing them with you!
Watch this weeks makeover here:
Related posts:
Is the Natural Brick Fireplace Back? Yay or Nay
Read this Before your Stone Fireplace Makeover
