Y’all. Pulling together your home to a level that you are proud of takes so much time and money. This isn’t meant to make you feel bad or throw your hands up and give up, but just know that even I have unfinished rooms or rooms that I’m not happy with, and I do this for a living, with a team and access to resources and partnerships. DO NOT BE EMBARRASSED. It’s neither easy nor cheap, and when you are living in it with a million other fires to put out or bigger fish to fry, it’s just so easy to put it off. Forever. Listen, with how much things are costing these days and how hard everyone is working to just get by and have fun on the weekends, I’m impressed if anyone has a room even slightly pulled together. So when these readers sent through their rooms that they want fixed, I was so happy to see if any of my styling advice could help. I did this quick and dirty, with ideas to try and no major purchases or changes (but enough suggestions if you wanted to take it much further). Thanks so much to the brave and willing readers for sending their rooms through to us. I feel honored to be able to help 🙂

The Almost Done TV Room

From reader: I have two rooms in the house which I am stuck with. I would love your help and ideas! Keen to keep the budget to a minimum and not have to do a lot of work! One is the TV snug. I like the sofa and don’t think the room is bad, but something is missing/off, and it doesn’t feel exactly cohesive.  I can’t work out why – wonder if it’s the shelving and that corner?”

My quick gut response: Paint color and sofa are great, warm, and happy (love that red sofa). And nothing you have here is “wrong”, but you could make the following changes to see if you like it better:

• Upgrade to a larger ottoman or coffee table. Not only will that be more comfortable and functional, but the room will feel less empty in the middle.
• Pull the rug out from under the sofa 4 more inches towards the TV (so that you have less of a gap between rug and credenza), which will make the room feel bigger and less chopped up.

• Move the fig tree to the corner where the tall shelf is. The sculptural organic shape will take up more space, but be less busy (and will soften the window lines). If you can’t leave it there because it needs more light, then put the standing lamp there instead with that piece of art (which is very cool). The shelf is drawing my eye over there, but the little things on it are looking busy and messy in an otherwise pretty, calm room.
• Lower the large, pretty painting by 3 inches.
• If you want to go full snug, paint the ceiling (and maybe all the trim) the same peach.

A “Slightly Off” Living Room

From reader: I really need help with this big center room in our house. It has lots of character, great light, tons of space – just feels blah and “off”. It’s high-traffic and high-chaos with three kiddos at home. Thanks for considering!

My quick gut response: You have a lot of great things happening! It looks comfortable and easy for people to hang out in. If you feel up to it, you could think about these ideas:

• Try the larger sofa opposite the fireplace, flanked by the two chairs and the large matching chair on an angle. There is probably a reason you didn’t do this (maybe it’s too big and there won’t be enough of a walkway?). But I’d try it again, even if it’s closer to the fireplace.
• This current iteration feels off balance since it’s so big and only on one side of the fireplace. Angle the big chair so its back is aiming at the doorway, allowing a pass through space in front of the sofa. This might create a more inviting (yet balanced) conversation area (think how we have our blue velvet Soho Home chair at an angle to our sofa). You might want to give that chair a friend – either a side table, a standing lamp, or an ottoman.

• Layer your rug on a larger sisal rug (or just get a larger rug). The scale of the sofa and chair really wants a larger rug to ground them. If you are going to replace the rug, get at least a 9×12 and ideally a soft color or pattern (solid, striped, or Persian-style, based on the style of your house). I love Chris Love Julias Loloi collection. Super classic and versatile.
• If the coffee table feels too small (round ones often do), then give it a smaller round ottoman as a friend (kind of like nesting buddies) to make it visually larger.

• Hang the photos above the shelf instead of leaning 🙂
• Add a pretty throw on the back of the sofa to break up the long gray mass that people will see as they walk into the room.

Love those built-ins and the fireplace (and mirror and chairs). So pretty!

The “Underdesigned” Guest Room

From reader: This is our tiny, under-designed guest room in our midcentury home. We love the house, but this room has just never been finished… due to my design fatigue. I love the newer bedding we added, and that my own paintings are scattered around. The blue dresser was a thrifted find I painted for my son’s nursery ten years ago. It gets pretty good light, but just feels unfinished. Do I paint the ceiling? Color drench the whole thing in a warm pink? Help!!!

My quick gut response: I’m the queen of “guest bedroom just gets leftover furniture,” so I get that this isn’t your first priority (it shouldn’t be!). That being said, I think this room has a lot of potential if you are open to putting in some sweat and tweaking a few things.

• Ok, you know I’m going to say it – Color drench!! If you do a dark color, then do the window trim and baseboard, but if it’s a light color, its ok to keep white. I really love that pink color in the bedding (and I love our pink guest room), so you could do something tonal, which I think looks great and keeps the room feeling big while also being cozy.
• Replace the gray curtains with a cream or tonal color that works with whatever you are painting the walls. I would get two panels per side since the window is so big (to help it feel full and proportioned). If you are up for it, raise the curtain rod and get taller curtains (to make the room feel taller). Check out this post for my rules🙂
• Pull the rug out from being so far underneath the bed, reducing the amount of wood flooring that is in front of it. I’d pull it out til its about 10″ from the closet wall.

• Add a headboard to ground the main wall. You don’t have to replace the whole bed, but a simple fabric headboard will make it feel more finished (they often can be screwed into bed frames or just set on the floor).
• I think if you add a headboard, then three small pieces of art might not look so lost on the wall (but they are still pretty small). I wonder if you could frame them to have more presence? Otherwise, they might need to go into a smaller room or on a smaller wall to have more presence.

• I love that painting by the chair!! So beautiful!!
• I think that the dresser works in the corner, just hang the art so it doesn’t sit on the dresser, and add a lamp and a low stack of books.

This was soooo fun. In a perfect world, I could teleport to each house and do this in person, just rearrange furniture and tweak, restyle, but until some billionaire tech person invents that booth, this will have to do. Thank you to all of you who submitted their rooms!

Opening Image Credits: Photo by Kailtin Green | From: A One Day Makeover For My Friend – A Teen Basement With Colorful Gallery Wall Using What They Already Had