An “Everything Gray” Living Room’s Makeover Adds Rainbow and Retro Vibes
ABOUT THIS BEFORE & AFTER
HOME TYPE: Historic Home
PROJECT TYPE: Living Room
STYLE: Colorful, Mid-Century Modern, Vintage
SKILL LEVEL: DIY
RENTAL FRIENDLY: No
If you’re a decade dabbler, or someone who loves retro style, take this advice from homeowner Mary Darling (@marydarlingxoxo), whose home is an all-over retro retreat. “Retro wallpaper makes a huge impact!” “Using bold retro colors like avocado green, orange, and turquoise or pastel retro colors like mint green, pale yellow, pink, or lilac will also really change the overall vibe of your home.”
But Mary’s living room wasn’t always the rainbow, retro zone it is today. (Or it was, and then it wasn’t.) “Our home was built in 1959, and it had one previous owner, and it was the quintessential ’50s and ’60s home with wallpaper, linoleum flooring, wood paneling, and a sunken living room,” she explains in her house tour, adding that the living room looked like it belonged on The Dick Van Dyke Show.
“Then the home flippers bought it and made literally everything gray. Gray walls, gray carpet, gray fake wood floors. And that’s how it was when we bought the house.” Here’s how she got rid of the gray and created a conversation (pit)-worthy living room.
Wallpaper made the biggest difference.
As mentioned above, Mary’s go-to for adding retro vibes back into a space is to use wallpaper. “You can find so many great designs on Spoonflower,” she says. “They have so many talented artists.”
Mary’s pick is from the designer Brains Are Pretty. “I wanted the pattern to be bigger, and the artist was more than happy to make it bigger for me!” she says.
A massive green sectional matches the wallpaper.
When Mary was envisioning her dream living room, she was picturing a green retro sofa — it just took a while to find the perfect one at the perfect price.
“The green sectional couch is from Apt2B,” she says. “They had an epic President’s Day sale … with the sale we got about $2,000 off! It was the best sale I had seen to date.” (Mary had been checking the website for about two years waiting for the deal of the century!)
She also added a circular shag rug “to really make it a cozy area,” she says.
A Retro DIY project is the icing on the cake.
The DIY project Mary is most proud of — and the thing she gets the most questions from visitors about — is the retro TV. She had seen styles she was looking for that cost about $3,000, but that was out of her budget. “One day I showed them to my husband, and he actually said, ‘You should just make one,’” Mary recalls. “So of course, I accepted the challenge!”
She measured their existing TV, drew sketches, and used an article on retro renovation for guidance for her custom creation. (Perfect for watching The Dick Van Dyke Show reruns, perhaps?)
It all comes together to make a colorful, cozy living room. “I love to mix patterns and textures which I think could go horribly wrong, but it’s turned out quite well in our home, I think!” Mary says.
Inspired? Submit your own project here.
Further Reading
Everything You’ve Ever Wanted To Know About Article’s DTC Furniture
See How a Stager Used Paint to Transform a 1950s Living Room
