Living Room Transformation Part 1: Find Your Inspiration

After a gruelling 6 months, GUYS, we’re finally almost done our home. It brings me close to tears to think about how far we’ve come. For those unfamiliar with Dave and my #InspiredHome project, last year we bought a Centurian Home here in the heart of Toronto. We loved the character that came with a beautiful Centurian home, but with it came a lot of work. We gutted the entire house with our own two hands and built it back up from the ground up. It’s been a true test of our relationship and a lot of determination to create this dream home.

But after plenty of dry wall, plaster, plumbing, and dust (lots, and lots of dust), we’re finally here – a beautiful, shiny, marble-floored home. Our dream.

Well, except for the fact that it’s currently empty. We can’t wait to be putting together our home piece-by-piece after spending days and hours dreaming about what it would look like. And now that the shell is done, we are so excited to be filling it. We’re starting with the living room because it’s the first thing you enter when you come into our house. It’s where we plan on hosting our friends, it’s the first thing we see when we come down the stairs in the morning, and it’s truly the heart of our house.

If you’re not familiar with Structube (where have you been?!?), it’s literally where Dave and I have purchased almost all of our furniture. The quality, affordability, and aesthetic of Structube pieces is literally unparalleled (and we’ve searched far and wide). So we are SO excited to announce that we’re embarking on this journey and 3-part living room transformation series with our friends at Structube.

Kicking off the series with today’s post:

Where and how do I start when trying to transform my decor?

Well, my friends, if you’re in the same boat as us, thinking of redecorating, or perhaps just wanting to add a little bit of extra shizamm to your pre-exisiting decor, we’re sharing the 4 things to get down pat before starting to shell out the coin.

1 Find Your Aesthetic

This might sound simple. You might be thinking, Mel, I know my style girrrrrl; but I also thought I knew mine, before decorating our previous place with so much “here and there” that nothing had a central theme. Let’s be honest, there’s a lot of cute stuff out there, but it doesn’t always go together. Find your “aesthetic” whether it’s pastel, modern, neutral, bohemian, and stick with it.

We’re going for the “Modern Industrial” aesthetic – but what is that you ask…

2 Create Your Mood Board

This is where your mood board comes in. In fact, you can do this before “finding your aesthetic”, especially if you don’t know what it really is. This is where our trust friend Pinterest comes in handy. Start pinning, clipping, and saving all of the spaces you think are beautiful. After a while, you’ll start to see a reoccurring theme.

Here’s our mood board for our living room:

Structube was such an incredible fit for our aesthetic. They cover the entire spectrum, but if you’re going for anything modern or trendy, they will literally have everything that you’ve circled on your mood board.

3 Hone In On Key Statement Pieces

After becoming obsessed with everything on your Pinterest feed, you’re going to want to buy all of the star pieces in the Pinterest photos. Instead of buying so many statement pieces and not knowing what to do with them when they get to you, start sectioning off the space, know where you want your key statement pieces, and start planning with those spaces in mind (measure, measure, measure!).

4 Understand Your Budget

Because let’s be honest, we all have one of those finicky things called budgets. We just spilled most of our savings on our renovations, so dollas were tight, let me tell you. That didn’t stop us though. We had a number in mind and worked around it, focussing on key pieces we couldn’t go without and ditching the pieces we really didn’t need.

Our budget for our entire living room is under $5000… for everything.

Structube is a blessing from above when it comes to budgets. They really have something for everyone and pieces that are so beautiful and on-trend (without that trendy high price). Here’s a wishlist of some of the pieces we’re considering:

1. Evo Coffee Table ($499)
2. Taj Nesting Table
3. Fiddle Leaf Plant ($149)
4. Kinsey Leather Sofa ($2299)
5. Sina Nesting Table ($149)
6. Meri Nesting Tables ($249)
7. Berwick Bookcase ($219)

8. Kay Nesting Tables ($189)
9. Tristan Leather Sofa ($999)
10. Kinsey Leather Sofa ($1599)
11. Kaia End Table ($179)
12. Lea Table Lamp ($59)
13. Elia Table Lamp ($99)
14. Bastille Table Lamp ($99)

15. Zurich Table Lamp ($25)
16. Newport Mirror ($159)
17. Taro Plotted Plant ($43)
18. August Pillow ($15)
19. Juneau Pillow ($19)
20. Nilsson Coffee Table ($299)
21. Axel Coffee Table ($399)

After planning, you’ve got to see it in person. As much as I love buying online, it’s important to see some things in person. So we are so excited to be hitting the Structube store soon to get some more inspiration and expert advise from the staff there. We’ll be solidifying exactly what we’re picking up from our wishlist and cannot wait to share what we finally decide on with all of you! You can find a Structube store near you here and also browse their entire collection here.

Here’s to finally reaching our goals, building the spaces that inspire us, and most of all, loving where we live!

mel inspired