Modern living room remodel
Flat fronts, long lines, and nothing applied that does not do a job. What that means for a living room remodel — what changes, the palette, the dimensions that still have to hold — and how to try it on a photo of your own room.
What the work actually covers
Living rooms are remodelled for three reasons: the fireplace is dated, the floor is tired, or the lighting is a single fitting in the middle of the ceiling. Address those and the furniture arrangement usually sorts itself out, because it was the room fighting back, not the sofa. Taken in Modern, the elements on the list — fireplace and surround, flooring, lighting and switching, built-in joinery — are the ones carrying the look, and cabinet fronts and the junction between materials. modern lives or dies on how surfaces meet, so the reveals and shadow gaps matter more than the finishes themselves.
Making a living room remodel read as Modern
Modern is the easiest style to reach in a remodel because it is mostly subtraction: handleless doors, a continuous counter, trim reduced to a shadow gap. The discipline is holding the line once the work is done, since every added object reads loudly against it. Against a living room remodel that means the pieces doing the visible work are low-slung modular sofa, flat-panel storage wall, glass or steel-frame coffee table, sitting inside whatever the layout already demands.
Palette and materials
Modern holds a narrow range: Gallery White, Pale Ash, Concrete, Slate, Graphite, with materials running to matte lacquer, brushed steel, pale oak veneer, tempered glass. On a living room remodel the discipline matters most wherever the largest uninterrupted surface is — keep that inside the range and every smaller decision gets easier.
Dimensions that do not move
A style choice never overrides the geometry. Whatever the finishes, the work still has to hold: Keep seating within 8ft of each other or the room stops holding a conversation. Build joinery to 18in deep flanking a chimney breast — deeper and it projects past the breast awkwardly. Leave a 32in route through the room that does not pass between the seating and the fire.
Lighting
Recessed and linear, positioned so the fittings disappear and only the light is visible. Warm enough to stop the flat surfaces reading cold. The single most common living room fault is one central pendant. Replace it with four or five low-output sources at different heights — a floor lamp by each seat, a picture light, something on a shelf — and put the lot on one dimmed circuit.
Where it usually goes wrong
The style breaks on ornate mouldings and carved detail, busy florals, visible clutter on open surfaces. Independent of any style, this project is most often let down by a television mounted above the fire, too high to watch comfortably. joinery built deeper than the chimney breast so the wall reads as lumpy.
If the space is tight
Removing a chimney breast is the one structural move that reliably transforms a small living room, because it returns two alcoves' worth of wall and lets furniture sit flat. It is also the one people regret skipping. Cabinet fronts and the junction between materials. Modern lives or dies on how surfaces meet, so the reveals and shadow gaps matter more than the finishes themselves.
Questions
- Does Modern work for a small living room?
- Removing a chimney breast is the one structural move that reliably transforms a small living room, because it returns two alcoves' worth of wall and lets furniture sit flat. It is also the one people regret skipping. Modern is helped by that, since flat fronts, long lines, and nothing applied that does not do a job.
- Which surface matters most in a modern living room?
- Cabinet fronts and the junction between materials. Modern lives or dies on how surfaces meet, so the reveals and shadow gaps matter more than the finishes themselves.
- Can I see this on my own living room?
- Yes. Upload a photo and the Studio remodels it in Modern while holding your walls, windows and camera angle exactly where they are. New accounts get 4 credits and a Standard run costs 4, so there is a full render before anything is paid for.
- What ruins a modern scheme?
- Usually ornate mouldings and carved detail and busy florals.