Consider me a hard surface flooring convert. Our new house only has carpeting upstairs. The entire bottom floor is hardwood. So much easier! Now to convince hubby that we should change the carpet LOL.
Let me know how that works for you(convincing hubby)....I've been trying to convince M that the upstairs would be so much better with hardwood instead of carpet.
I'm getting no where...
I have really dark mahagony stained woodwork, and beamed ceilings in FR, kitchen, DR and LR. All my walls are a french vanilla. I gave the painter an invitation I had received and told him that was the color I wanted. It's the same everywhere. With the floors on the main level either the antique red brick or dark hardwood, I needed to have the light walls. Otherwise, when the trees are in full leaf, it's just too dark in here. Upstairs, the carpet is the color of sand...it's ok...but I'd rather have the hardwood with pretty rugs.
I have never really cared for stained wood trim, but this is so dark, and almost all the wood furniture is cherry....it works well together and I like it. Which is a good thing, because there is no way on God's little green earth, that M would ever let me change it.
The rooms get their "color" from the rugs and furnishings. Lots of blues, reds and golds...with a bit of green and black. Kitchen and FR is one big room, and with the brick floors, darker cherry cabinets, black granite counters and the dark wood....I had to go with light and bright...and started with an Oriental rug that I liked.
I had 2 Orientals, and we bought 3 more before we moved in (there was a fabulous rug store going out of business and we waited until towards the end and got all 3 for less than the least's original price)....for downstairs, and I did each room with the rug as the start, and worked all my colors from the rug. Each rug is really different, but somehow it all flows together.
My house is a very, very traditional English Tudor, and for the most part, so are all the furnishing. About the only thing that isn't is my office. I have my daughter's old desk and chair that are painted a bright deep yellow, and the rest of the furniture is the white stuff that comes in a box and I put it together. Loveseat has a dark blue denin slip cover. All the books, and my teddy bear(
) collection give it color.
You have to do what will make you and your family comfortable, BEG. I'm a firm believer that a house should reflect the occupants and what make them happy, comfortable and content and be furnished as such. If it works out that it goes with whatever the current fashionable thing is - well, terrific. If it doesn't, that's even better, because that means it's reflective of the people who live there.
My house is still a work in progress...not because I'm changing it, but because I'm taking my time (and as I can afford it) and finding stuff that I really want, not just something to fill a space. Hopefully, I will finish this year, as we have been here for 6 years...