Hello everyone! Now that the long winter months are behind us, let’s embrace the warm weather and freshen up our surroundings! After all, what feels better than organizing and re-decorating a familiar space? So if your living room makes you yawn, maybe there’s something you can do to make it more fabulous!

I recently designed a room that was in need of some TLC. I’m used to designing spaces with graphics, signage, and murals, but actually designing an entire room including furniture selection and placement is a whole other ballgame.

My first step was to create an inspiration board. Have you ever done one of these? I would love to see it! I created mine by collecting images and laying them out in CorelDRAW X6. It was great to use CorelDRAW X6 because I could eyedrop the colors and create a color palette. Here is what my inspiration board looked like:

My next step was to source Ikea furniture online and lay it out as a room plan. Again, I turned to CorelDRAW for help. I measured the room and created a diagram where one inch was equal to one foot. This way I could place the furniture to the correct size and ensure it would fit. Here’s how my diagram turned out:

After this, I took a quick trip to Ikea to find the furniture. Four hours later I left with a single cushion! I guess I’m exaggerating a little… after the endless rows of incorrectly labelled merchandise, I did manage to find most of the items I needed within my budget.

With help from friends, the furniture was moved in and set-up with very few feuds and no burning of Ikea instruction manuals. The room is now a fun, creative place to hang-out and it was a great challenge to re-create a space.

Have you redecorated a room recently or found some new décor inspiration? Maybe a hot new paint color? Let me know, I always enjoy hearing the latest! Cheers.