Bright & Tropical Inspired Makeovers

So remember my dresser makeover post from a few months ago? Well here’s the big project to go with it! And you’re actually getting a two-for-one deal with this post – a living/dining room and office makeover!

This project was seriously such a blast to work on, and was also such a great learning experience for me. Ceci was always incredibly enthusiastic about the process, but her resourcefulness was something that got me super excited! She can find anything online, figure out how to get it here, and since she’s also a DIY master, can also work her magic on it as well. She ordered anything and everything we could possibly think of for this space. It totally opened up my eyes to the endless possibilities of what you could get delivered to Saudi!

When I first walked into Ceci’s home, I thought the living/dining room was a great space and that the layout that she had picked was just perfect for the flow of the room. Even the furniture worked really well in the space, but it just needed tweaking. Her home style had been like this for 10 years, so I was brought in to implement a major change of scene.

She wanted a space that felt like Hawaii, so that meant we had to change the purple, gray, black and white color scheme. We decided to go in a gray, green, and teal direction instead, with pops of hot pink and yellow. Since she had furniture we could work with, we decided to reupholster, reimagine, and refinish almost all of the existing furnishings in this room to suit our needs. It was practically like getting new furniture!

The spa room, however, had to be completely rethought… We decided that this room would be converted into her home office. The color palette was changed to something that worked with the living room, but still different, and all of the furniture was taken out and replaced with office furniture. Since I love IKEA office furniture, we bought a whole bunch of stuff from there and changed this room in a pretty dramatic way…

Enjoy the changes!!

| BEFORE |

| AFTER |

Isn’t it crazy to think that it’s all the same furnishings as in the before picture?!

So let’s start in the dining room where we made a few very critical changes… The old rug was taken out and replaced by this one from Al Rugaib. The brown EKNÄS armchairs from IKEA were reupholstered in a patterned fabric from Al Guthmi Fabrics – brown wasn’t going to work with this color scheme at all. The matching footstools were also reupholstered, but in a solid gray so as to not make it look too matchy-matchy. The Korean cabinet in the back was refinished by Mohammed Ameer and his son in white for an updated and modern look. And since we had to remove the recessed lighting, we bought two gold lamps and 2 sets of LED spotlights for additional lighting.

For more visual interest and some height on the walls, we added a tall palm like indoor plant, a decorative wall hanging from Desert Designs, and a set of small framed photos.

The darker pattern on the back of the cabinet below was removed, and a black-and-white spotted wallpaper was added so that you could better see the items inside. This totally sounds like a small change, but it really had a huge impact on the entire space. The contrast actually made this piece and this side of the room stand out a lot more – and in a great way!

In the living room, besides adding some cushions and accessories, we brought in two major pieces – this rug from West Elm and this coffee table from IKEA. We also reupholstered and refinished two big pieces – the existing purple armchair and media unit.

The original round coffee table was the right shape, but it was just too big. The glass-topped IKEA one is much smaller, and because Ceci is so good at DIY, she was able to cover the glass top with marble contact paper to make it look even more glamorous!

The side table with the “Love” sign on it, was an old table that was spray painted white, and Ceci added a custom glass top on it. The cushions were ordered and shipped from Pier 1, Etsy, AliExpress, and then some were custom made or restitched to the proper size by my favorite upholsterer, Ali.

The purple armchair was reupholstered in a teal cotton velvet fabric, and redesigned by raising the back cushion by a couple of inches (it just looked too low to me), switching the tufting to the seat cushion, keeping the back cushion plain, and finally adding acrylic legs to the chair. Ceci even changed out the sectional sofa’s legs to these wooden ones since she hated the original ones so much.

She also inherited an elephant garden stool from her parents that she wasn’t sure what to do with. Since it’s super cute, we decided to spray paint it white (from black), and added a custom glass top so that it could be used as a side table!

For the media unit’s transformation, you can check out this post…

As I said up top, the office on the other hand was a WHOLE different ballgame! Almost everything was removed, except for the light fixture, and replaced with new furniture. It became such an inspirational and productive space for Ceci that she created a beautiful clipboard wall to help her stay organized.

I really love how this space turned out…