Vintage Inspired Dining Room Makeover

Last night was one of those nights that I was up way too late in anticipation for today’s reveal. Our dining room has gone through a few stages just like any old fixer upper would, I suppose. When we got the house last year the dining room was pretty awful. What made it worse was the fact that it was one of the first rooms you could see from the foyer. Because we had so much to do in the rest of the house, the room got a couple coats of primer and that was it. I’m happy to say that’s not the case anymore. We finally got around to making our vintage inspired dining room makeover happen! Let me remind you what the space looked like before.

Here’s the space before we moved in –

A bit scary, right?

A few months later I revisited the space and did just a few quick things to make it a functioning dining room. I painted the walls Simply White by Benjamin Moore, hung some curtains, and brought in some simple furniture. We are slowly planking the ceilings in our home, which is in keeping with the colonial style. We figured this was a great room to start in. I kept the existing chandelier and just gave it a little makeover.

Here’s how it looked earlier this year –

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Since then over a year has gone by since I first worked in the room and I’ve had plenty of time to really plan what I really wanted for the space. The whole room has seen some big changes but I’m excited to say the whole makeover was under $400!

Vintage Inspired Dining Room Makeover

Let’s take a look at the finished space, shall we?

I went the opposite direction since the last spruce up and opted for a more moody and dramatic color. The walls are Chelsea Gray and Simply White by Benjamin Moore. It’s a mix of new and old things. You know me, I love a classic and timeless feel while keeping the room simple.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before but we have a very large attic that runs the length of the house. A couple months ago we found chair railing all bundled up in the rafters. We pulled it down and lucky for us we had just enough for the dining room. It was 80’s orange but we didn’t care. A little sanding and paint did the trick! It’s almost as is it should have been in the space all along. It adds a little charm back to the room. I eventually want to add some bead board wallpaper or shadow box trim below the chair railing for a little extra something.

We finally addressed the big blank wall in the room. This wall as been the cause of a few design frustrations for me. I shared the details and the how-to for this faux fireplace a couple weeks ago on the blog.

We swapped out the previous chandelier for this crystal beauty. If you follow me on Facebook you may have noticed I shared a flash sale that Pottery Barn was having. This fixture was 50% off. I just couldn’t resist. I’ve had my eye on it for some time and it’s the matching chandelier of the fixture in our staircase. It’s on sale again for those who love it as much as I do.

One thing that’s always fun about freshening up a room is that it’s a chance to go shopping in your own home. We had this upholstered bench at the foot of our bed for the last year but I really like it here too. In it’s place I put a wooden bench we had in our upstairs hallway at the end of our bed. It works great and it’s nice to switch up spaces from time to time. If you grow tired of a piece in one room try moving it someplace else for some change.

 

Most of the decor was existing with the exception of a couple pieces.

We kept the same curtains. The Swedish clock also stayed in the same place. However, I’m seriously thinking about painting the dark gray/brown body. We’ll see if I get up my nerve. The antique mirror above the fireplace was a $10 consignment shop find.

The painting was a $25 find at an antique show. It’s unsigned but I’m completely in love with it. The colors remind me of my favorite season, fall. I did gold leaf the frame to brighten the frame up a bit. The wooden serving tray on the buffet was a DIY project I shared last week on the blog.

I almost forgot the rug! I certainly don’t want to do that. There used to be a large natural rug in this room. I got a wild hair one day (I seem to get those a lot) and decided to move it into our master bedroom and fell in love with it there. The dining room then sat for a few months without a rug. We really did not want to go without a rug in this space for very long. Unfortunately the hardwood floors in this room are very stained and worn. Eventually they’ll need to be replaced but for now a large rug works fine. I searched for a rug for a couple of months for this space. Every rug I found was either not the right color, size or price. I was over the moon when I finally found this rug on JossandMain.com and instantly loved it.

I hope you’ll join me in two weeks to see how far we’ve come in the last year and a half on this old house. I haven’t done a full home update since our 6 month post so I’m really excited to share everything with you all. There has been so many changes and new room makeovers since then. I hope you’ll join me!

 

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