I Made My Apartment Living Room Into a Dark Boho + Maximalism Oasis
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Just because you live in a small rental apartment doesn't mean that your living room can't make a big, bold statement. And peel and stick wallpaper can be a beautiful way to do that!
Since I moved into my apartment a few months ago, my living room had been feeling kind of lackluster. Don't get me wrong, she looked good. But she wasn't living up to the potential I knew she possessed. She seemed a little shy. And it turns out that all my living room needed was some dark floral wallpaper to bring her out of her shell.
I'll stop personifying my living room now, but honestly, it kind of feels like a person who just discovered their identity.
So in the video below, I take you around my living room and show you what it looks like now that this stunning wallpaper is up. Then after my little living room tour, I talk about the process of styling it into a moody dark maximalism sanctuary, which you can also read about in this blog post!
My Living Room Styling Process
Now that my dramatic wallpaper is up, this is the closest I've gotten to this living room feeling complete-ish. There's still some things that I want to do, but it really is starting to feel like it's almost there.
And if you've put any effort into decorating any room in your apartment, I'm sure you can relate. It takes time before things start to feel like they're really coming together in the way you envisioned. And my vision for this living room back from the beginning was to create a dark moody maximalist vibe.
I basically wanted to feel consumed by prettiness the second I walk into my living room. I like my pretty to be a little aggressive.
Daydream About the Vision You Have For Your Space
After creating a Pinterest board that helped put the visual ideas into my head, I really started daydreaming about what my living room could look like in this specific apartment.
And that's a big tip I have for you if you are just starting your living room decor or if you're in the process of it: really have a strong vision in your head that you actively daydream about. You vision doesn't have to be exact, but it should be like a fantasy that you have in your head. I think a big part of the styling process for me is to literally just daydream about what the space could look like.
If you don't have a pretty clear vision of the overall style that you want to go for, that's a recipe for feeling like a chicken with its head cut off throughout your decorating process. And as you shop for decor, you're just a headless chicken. And in that state, you are less likely to buy the things that will actually make you happy in your space every day.
So once I had this general vision in my head of what I wanted the space to kind of look like, the styling process could begin.
Finding the Couch & Starting With a Strong Visual Statement
The starting point of my living room styling process was my couch. Once I decided to get this gold velvet sectional from Article, it was kind of the catalyst for the overall look of the living room. I mean, if you choose a couch like this in a bold color like gold, you're kind of making a commitment that there's gonna be some drama up in here.
So choosing this couch definitely set me in a certain direction in terms of what my living room was going to look like. And this commitment aligned with my vision, so it was a good commitment to make. It's a good partnership between me and this couch.
When beginning your decorating process in a room, sometimes all you need is a strong starting point, a strong visual that allows the rest of your styling to fall into place a bit more easily.
For a living room, this is often the couch because it's such a central piece, both functionally and visually. So it can definitely serve as that strong visual starting point.
If you take decorating one step at a time and find just one successful piece that you really love for your space, that one piece can help you make the upcoming decisions on how you style the rest of a room. That one piece can give you more clarity and start a domino effect of styling decisions.
The Interior Styling Process is Iterative
Speaking of the domino effect of styling decisions, my followup tip to that is: the styling process really is iterative. It happens in multiple stages over time. I've been in this apartment for seven months now, and this has definitely been a multi-phase process!
So the reality is that decorating an apartment takes time. It takes exploration and experimentation. It takes making mistakes and then trying other things. It’s a step by step process, and if you accept that, you can have more fun along the way.
The first iteration of my living room styling process looked like this. ↓ This was right after I moved in and it was a mix of things I already owned plus a few things that I ordered specifically for this new apartment.
The next phase for my living room styling process looked like this. ↓ I tackled both of these big walls, which was definitely a challenge. Big walls always are.
And it was with this phase that things started to feel like they were coming together. I started feeling like I was getting a little closer to that vision I had. But it still felt incomplete.
This is where I realized that I needed to do something big and bold in order for this living room to truly feel like it's mine. And that's where the wallpaper came in!
The Wallpaper
If you've been keeping up with my YouTube videos, you know that this wallpaper was originally going to go in the bedroom behind my bed. That's what I did in my previous apartment, and it looked so beautiful. I loved that bedroom so much, and the wallpaper was the star of the show in that room.
Since I had initially planned on staying in that apartment way longer than I ended up staying, I had thought that I would have more time with that beautiful wallpaper. Then my then boyfriend and I broke up, I moved out, and I no longer had the wallpaper that I so loved. So instead of cheating myself out of having the time with that beautiful wallpaper, I decided to just order it again! I highly recommend the Etsy shop who created this wallpaper, by the way. They're amazing, and the quality of their peel and stick wallpaper is amazing too.
So after I decided to order the wallpaper again, I discovered that, unfortunately, the wall in my current bedroom was too big for it. They would've had to either double up the image or stretch the image out, which that would lower the quality of the resolution. And I felt that having a double image of the design (pictured below) would've taken away from its visual impact.
So I decided to put the wallpaper up in the living room instead! And I am so glad it worked out like this, because I spend more time in my living room than I do in my bedroom anyway. And it makes a really beautiful first impression when I first walk into my apartment. So this all worked out!
Having this wallpaper up has reignited my vision for the living room. Like I was talking about earlier, sometimes all it takes is one single styling decision, and that be the catalyst for a whole bunch of other styling decisions. Now I have a clearer idea of what I wanna do next in my living room.
So I suppose the main takeaway here is to not be afraid to make bold statements that align with your initial vision and help you tell the visual story of your space.
This big, bold statement I’ve made with my wallpaper has had a huge impact in making my apartment finally feel like my home.
I moved into this apartment in a time of great turmoil, so it took little more time for me to settle in here than it has in past apartments. Therefore, the styling process has come together a bit more slowly than I would've liked. I've been going through a bit of an identity crisis and, like I've said so many times before, you have to get your head straight before you get your home straight. And my head not being the straightest it's ever been has definitely slowed down the styling process for me.
