We've Been Dancing With Mr. Brownstone

Obviously, I do NOT have a brownstone, or a cute but cramped little Victorian row house, it being suburban central Texas up in here.  What I DO have, though, is a long, narrow common area:

Arranging furniture in this football field of a room has always been a challenge.  And not just because it's long and narrow;  another big factor in furniture placement is that the north and south walls of the room are made up of windows and doors, which means the seating area placement has always either been centered on the west or east wall (it doesn't help that my cable outlet is on the east wall. When I laid my laminate flooring in 2005, I ran a cable around the room underneath the baseboards so that I could use the west wall, too, if I wanted, which is what I prefer to do).

I've always hated how unbalanced the room has been - no matter which side of the room the seating area is on, it makes the whole space look lopsided and cramped. Granted, a lot of the cramped-ness comes from the fact that I have too much large furniture, and too many little pieces filling in empty space around them.

At the moment, what's been pissing me off recently is the fact that the couch is floating out in the middle of the room all by itself.

But, browsing through casaCARA's brownstone reno posts this week reminded me that there are plenty of  options for decorating a room of this shape (brownstones and row houses, ofc, being long, skinny, 2-storey homes, most often with windows and doors at either end, sometimes with a bay at one or both ends, with bedrooms (or apartments) above the main living space) ...which I knew, but you know how sometimes your brain just refuses to work with information you already have until something shiny pops up to catch its attention. :)

So I'm thinking of doing something like this, instead: 

Most of the smaller pieces are gone, as well as the large bookcases that were on the west wall (by the fireplace) - they were eight feet tall (!) and 24" deep from the wall, and were just towering over the entire space (again: I knew this, I just hadn't figured out what to do with them).  I moved them out of the room last night (into the bedroom, where they're *perfect*) and replaced them with the long, low bookshelf that had previously been under the bar at the north end of the room (bottom).  Just this small change opens up the room, and will allow me to move everything else around:

• The main seating area pulls off the east wall, out into the center of the room.  This is something I've tried before, but not since I got my new couch (my old sofa was eight feet long, and overstuffed - it dominated even this 16x24' room no matter which way I turned it!)
• Centering the seating area leaves lots of negative space around each piece and between the back of the sofa and the windows in the rear (south) of the room, and allows for traffic to flow around either side of the seating area, instead of skirting around behind it the way it's been.   (And I'd really love to stick a chair into the end of the seating arrangement, opposite the television - preferably this one)
• This leaves the TV/entertainment center alone on the east wall, and a bit too far away from the sofa for my tastes; but I plan on replacing the long, heavy unit with a small dresser made into a TV/electronics stand, with the electronic components in the space where the top drawer used to be.  I love those.  I also plan to pull it out from the wall a bit, and back it with the turquoise fabric screen that I showed you last week, for a large splash of color and a bit more space around the unit.  
• The long, low bookshelf being on the west wall also opens up the space under the bar at the north end of the room, which I'm hoping will encourage a colony of wild bar stools to take up residence on their own.  *looks around hopefully*  Having that space under the bar unoccupied also actually adds to the length of the room, visually - which I find I like very much, although if you'd asked me before, I'd have said, "No! I will MAKE this room be square if it KILLS me!"  Uh-huh. Sure.
• The next step is to flip the couch and the weird little transforming settee thing ( this thing from World Market):  the heavier (visually) couch will anchor the windows a bit, and the colors will set off the sheer, breezy curtains (er...once I get it slipcovered, hehe). 
• The settee thing itself, though cute at first sight, has proven to be a major pain in the ass - literally:  it's totally uncomfortable, even with the 8" thick cushion I made for it to replace the flat, egg-crate cushion it came with.  It's also a weird shape that fits nowhere; and the frame, when completely open, is pretty much a big padded seesaw which regularly dumps me and my friends out onto the floor when we sit on it the wrong way!  So I'm going to spend the weekend removing the back and move-able arms, and creating a new cushion for the seat, so that it becomes a large ottoman/lounger thing that will divide the room visually without taking up too much visual space and blocking the view of the seating area, and also provide extra seating for the cats parties.  

Like I needed more projects, right?  Heh.   Moving the gigantic bookcases was the biggest job in the room, though, and that's done (although I broke some of the trim molding on my floor in the process, damn it). The rest is all pushing furniture around and juggling knick-knacks and houseplants.

And eventually I'll finish painting.

And eventually I'll re-cover the couch. 


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