One of the rooms I was most excited about in our new home is the dining room. I loved that the space was in the front of the house and could be such a featured area, especially since the light is always so nice from the front windows. Even though we can eat at the breakfast bar in the kitchen, it’s nice to have a separate space to sit down as a family at the end of the day, especially heading into the holdays.
As we started ripping out floors and repairing walls for painting we quickly realized that the lower half of the wall under the chair rail was actually painted wallpaper, not just dark blue paint. I already have a long list of rooms on my wallpaper removal list and I was pretty frustrated to add yet another to the list.
But my best friend said to save the headache, cover it with bead board, and call it a day. Genius. The majority of our main floor has bead board, so it was actually a pretty nice complement to the rest of the home and saved me a weekend of peeling two-decade-old painted wallpaper.
To warm the soften the space up, I wanted to add some curtains. But I also didn’t want to lose any of the natural light in the room. By extending the curtain rods a bit longer I was able to set the curtains so they didn’t block any of the window while fully open. I also like keeping things symmetrical from the outside because our house is a colonial and I don’t like seeing opposing window treatments from the curb. This keeps them open and bright!
Of course the curtains were a mini project in themselves and required some hand-hemming. Typically I hand all my sewing projects over to my mother-in-law. She is a pro! But Covid-19 restrictions made that a logistical nightmare with all the back and forth shipping, measuring, etc. They live in upstate New York and due to the travel ban and household restrictions we aren’t able to see them right now.
She gave me some good tips and pep talks and sent me on my way to do the curtains myself. I’ll share those details another time! My fingers have finally healed from all the needle sticks.
The wall paint color is Sherwin Williams Crushed Ice. It is by far my favorite neutral gray and this is our third time painting a house nearly top to bottom in it. I prefer the Duration production in a matte finish. It cleans like a satin, but has the finish of a flat paint. It’s a win-win. Plus it touches up super well without any flashback.
The rest of the product details can be found here:
Hooks
Rings
Curtains
Rods
Light fixture
Dining chairs – project from several years ago, but can be found here.
Table is custom.