Reveal: Living Room & Library Makeover (& Sources)!

Melissa Meares
Feb 23, 2025
3 min read

Cozy living room with tan sofa, floral pillows, and quilt. Wall art and floral vase on side table. Warm, inviting atmosphere.

It's impossible to overstate how far this room has come since we moved into our house 5 years ago. Before, it was a dark dungeon with a weird choppy layout. Now it is bright and airy, cozy and comfy, and has maybe the best view in the house - the library!

Vase with yellow flowers on table, blue-white pattern. Wooden cabinet with floral artwork on screen, mirror on wall. Cozy living room.

Many of the pieces here are vintage, including the dresser that was my grandparents from the 60's, the chinoiserie vases (a yard sale), and the mirror (a thrift store!). For the pieces that are not vintage, I tried to find a way to make them look lived-in and collected. The gallery wall is a collection of thrifted frames, original paintings, and impressionist art prints.

Close-up of a wooden ornate picture frame with floral artwork in shades of purple and white. The frame rests on a wooden surface.

I made a frame for my TV, which was my second time with this DIY. You can read the tutorial here.

Cozy room with a beige armchair, ornate mirror, and wooden table holding photos. Floral rug, wall art, and soft lighting create warmth.

This side of my living room doesn't get shown a ton but it is honestly one of my favorite views. This mirror still reigns supreme as my best thrift find ever- it was $10 and I picked it up and RAN to the register when I saw the price tag.

This leads us into the other half of this room, the library. One of my goals for this makeover was to make the two sections of the room feel a little less disjointed, and I think this view shows how well they work together. I was initially worried that the brown leather couch would clash with my red settee, but I feel like the warm tones I brought in with the ivory rug and the wood accents really helped the two coexist nicely.

Cozy library with red sofa, colorful quilt, stained glass window, and bookshelves. Yellow flowers and a lamp add warmth.

The library was added in the fall of 2024 as part of the one-room-challenge, but I did add a few little upgrades here including this dentil crown moulding which I made a tutorial for here.

Vintage library with red velvet loveseat and white pillows, a wooden ladder, colorful stained glass window, books, and ornate ceiling. Cozy ambiance. — I snapped this photo on the first sunny day after adding the stained glass

The settee was an estate sale find and I cannot tell you how many comments I have gotten from people who said their aunt or grandmother had the same sofa! I actually see this or one similar pop up on Facebook Marketplace quite often, if you have a hankering for Bridgerton parlor vibes.

Stained glass window with floral design in a blue library. Shelves filled with books create a cozy, peaceful atmosphere.

The window clings were another addition from this makeover and I am truly over the moon about how well they turned out. You can read the window cling tutorial here. Installing new windows is on our 2025 project list {link} so in the meantime, adding something fun and colorful to cover up the fog is a win-win in my book!

Before

Brace yourself, this one is a doozy. I took these two photos in 2020 before what was supposed to be a room makeover. This room gets very little light, and the grey walls and grey floor made the whole place feel like a dungeon. That makeover never got finished because our house flooded and we had to rip out all our flooring and the bottom of our drywall in every room.

Cozy living room with a gray couch, red pillows, a fireplace, guitar, banjo, TV, and piano. Books and flowers on mantel, muted colors.

Cozy room with piano, chair, and bookshelves. A fireplace with flowers on the mantel. Glass doors in the background, wooden floor.

I noticed that the fireplace had a really bad smell and discovered that it was sitting on top of blue carpet which is about as moldy and disgusting as you could probably guess. I ripped out the fireplace, which then required ceiling patching.

Room under renovation with a concrete floors, maroon wall paint, a hole cut out, and a ladder leaning against a cabinet. Tools and books scattered around.

A moment of silence for the horse carousel wallpaper border. And may wallpaper borders never come back in style. Amen. ANYWHO. After months of installing wood tile, baseboards, and many many tears, the room was ready to start becoming cute again.

Enter my dad and we built these amazing bookshelves together!