Can a Living Room Be Designed for Kids & Adults?

Why Not? It's Called a Multifunctional Space

It's taken me a while to write this blog post for two key reasons: 1)  good design takes time and can't be rushed and 2) writer's block. While I chuckled as I wrote down the words “writer's block,” I realized why it's been difficult for me to put in writing some educational tips for y’all.

Before

Transition

Simply put, many of the tips related to this new project, are concepts I have shared in other blog posts before i.e:

• Balancing form and function…making sure that while the space looks aesthetically pleasing, it functions for you and your family.

• Putting in place good architectural bones; and 

• Creating organizational solutions that will stretch your design and make it last.

To that end, I struggled with coming up with something new to share. God knows time is precious, and if you've chosen to devote some of it to reading my blog (thanks by-the-way), I certainly want to make it worth your while.

So as I kept looking through the pictures from this project - you can see them all in my portfolio in due time - I realized, I haven't talked a lot about color on this blog and how powerful of a tool it can be in design. You can use color to evoke certain emotions or hide a multitude of sins. And just like that, I have something new to share! 

We live in color, yet very often we design rooms that are devoid of it or lacking a color scheme that is cohesive. Not to say all neutral rooms are bland and boring -  far from it (heck, I have designed a few neutral spaces that I love) - but when you are designing a space that will be used quite often, might take a beating, and gets a lot of traffic by virtue of its location in your home, deep saturated colors paired with performance fabrics can create a sophisticated room you may never want to leave.

Enter my dining room turned kids play area/ sitting room. For starters, while this space could work well for a small nuclear family as a dining, it didn't serve my family's needs at all and became a relic in my home. While converting the space to a bedroom was a thought that crossed my mind, it quickly got shut down, because there's no connecting bathroom and putting doors to create privacy will just be unnecessary and costly. 

So what's a girl to do with a room that doesn't work and is on a budget? She turns it into a kids play area and an entertaining space filled with antiques and some contemporary pieces. With the primary focus of the room identified, I spent time researching kids play rooms on Instagram and Pinterest and shocker, those rooms were filled with bright colors. While I loved that for my kiddos, having vibrant primary colors won't age well and did I mention this room is seen right when you enter my foyer? So instead I settled for saturated timeless colors blended with colors you see in nature all the time. Specifically I;

• Color drenched my walls in charcoal gray paint - you know to create a sophisticated look while hiding what would inevitably happen, one of my kids writing on the walls. Side bar, I always use satin paint which is much easier to clean.

• Added a large green modular sofa that can seat 6 adults comfortably, but can also serve as a daybed for the kids when they are lounging and reading a book. I should note this sofa has storage underneath for shoving and hiding all the toys and the cover can be removed and washed. Speaking of storage, I added an armoire in the room to hide board games (those who know me, can attest to my love for monopoly), tea party set, books, and school trophies. It may hide a TV some day, but that's still under consideration.

• Brought in some browns and burgundy, by layering the floor with an indoor/outdoor rug and a deep plush brown rug that will hide spills - my son already spilled juice on it. I also added some burgundy curtains.

• Peppered the room with pops of color including a yummy yellow sofa (upholstered in performance fabric that makes cleaning and maintenance a breeze); a blue accent antique chair (in its original fabric) where I often sit to watch the kiddos play, colorful pillows, some with lovely velvet piping and texture and flowers from around my home.

• Included colorful coffee table books. This is a play area after all, so instead of using my design books as coffee table books (I do have one in the mix [lol]), I used my kids' colorful books instead. 

This design aesthetic and mix of color and pattern isn't for everyone, but it is for me and my family. As with every room I design, it will evolve over time as we use it more, but for now I love it as it is.  I hope the pics and this write-up inspires you to try color in your home coz remember nature is full of color, so it's just a natural progression bringing it into our homes.

Where would your dining room go? You might ask….Well, that's a story for another time, but I will give you a hint, it's quite close to my kitchen!

Until next time …Cheers❤️