Fire away.......

I've really got the bit between my teeth with this makeover malarkey.  Not content with turning the house upside down during the workroom revamp, I'm now turning my attention to our sitting room or in modern parlance.... lounge.

In which we neither sit NOR lounge.

We can go for whole weeks at a time without sitting foot in there at all.  Quite why we disdain it so much is a mystery.  It's quite a pleasant room with a lovely panoramic outlook over the patio, garden and up to the trees in the woods beyond.  It's not overlooked, and is generally considered to be a calm and restful space.  So why do we really only use it when we have guests, at Christmas, or if one of us is ill and needs a 'little bed' on the sofa?

I have no idea.

OK so it's a bit bland. Apart from a dramatic splash of red in the rug and cushions it's relentlessly neutral.... cream carpet, walls and curtains.

Also we probably shouldn't have bought black leather sofas.  Very expensive Italian leather sofas.  They're supremely comfortable and stylish but are a completely lacking in warmth and character. 

Then there's the fireplace, which should be the focal point of the room.  We've done what we can with a big mirror, festooned with lights..... and we installed a gas coal fire in the hope that it would provide warmth in all senses of the word.

However, a gas coal fire is not, and never will be, a real fire.  Real fires dance and crackle, they smell of woodsmoke, and the flame pattern changes every second.

They are more real in every sense..

You can't keep a coffee pot warm on a gas coal fire, or cook baked potatoes in the embers, or make proper toast.

However the final nail in the gas coal fire's coffin is that Small Dog would rather sit anywhere else in the room except in front of it.  In my book, a real fire should ALWAYS have a dog sprawled out before it.  

Cats are entirely optional.

So, our next 'project' is to make yet another unloved room into one in which we actively want to spend time.

With this end in mind, we've taken the bold step of selling our sofas, and our complete fireplace/hearth and gas coal fire is also for sale as we've decided to have a little multi-fuel stove installed in a new fireplace.

We're also changing the colour scheme.  Or perhaps that should be HAVING a colour scheme.  As opposed to a no-colour scheme.  I'm thoroughly sick and tired of 'bleahnd'.

At least doing a makeover in the sitting room won't cause the same level of disruption as the workroom did.  In fact, given that we don't actually use it much, it shouldn't cause any at all *fingers crossed*

So, let battle commence........