Beautiful Living Room Decorating Ideas for Ordinary Small Apartments
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Need some living room decorating ideas that will take your small space from bland to beautiful?
I get it, because new apartment buildings these days don’t exactly have sparkling personalities… But just because you live in a plain Jane apartment doesn’t mean you can’t transform it into a stylish, dramatic sanctuary that showcases your unique personality!
I know this from experience; I live in a new-build apartment building in Seattle. And while I love living here, it’s definitely lacking the charm and character that a lot of old buildings have. And If you’ve been keeping up with my YouTube channel for the past year, you’ve seen the various phases my plain beige box of an apartment has gone through, especially with my living room decor. It’s been quite a journey!
And now I can confidently say that I’ve transformed my boring, builder-grade apartment living room into a dramatic and cozy oasis that feels like home.
So in this post, I'm showing you the little styling details I've added and tweaked since my last living room styling update. And of course, I’m giving you my styling tips based on my own learnings from this phase of my decorating process so that you can walk away with some inspiration for you own space!
If you want to give your plain small apartment some character and charm, read on to get some ideas!
Would you rather watch than read? Here’s the video! ↓
So here are the new pieces of decor I’ve acquired that have added some nice touches of character and personality to my simple living room!
1. Vintage Style Floral Throw Pillow
First, there's this little throw pillow I found on Etsy! I actually featured it in my Dark Academia video, and as a result, I ended up buying it for myself. Are my videos just ploy for me to have a seemingly noble reason to spend hours online shopping for decor in the name of giving you styling inspiration…? Maybe. 🙃
And just the simple addition of this floral pillow has added so much to the overall look of the living room. Before, with my pillow situation being a bit of a stark black and white palette, I realized that things were feeling a bit too severe. Something about the strict black and white felt harsh, which was an unexpected effect for me. Because I come from the mindset of “give me black upon black upon black”. There's no such thing as too much black.
And yes, I realize that this is yet another black pillow. But remember, it's all about the little details making a big impact. And in this case, the simple addition of the warm, golden brown floral pattern softened things up just enough to take the edge off.
It also echoes my wallpaper, with both having a similar vintage floral story. So now the relationship between my couch and the wall behind it feels more cohesive.
So the key takeaways from my little throw pillow sidequest are:
Tiny details can make a big impact, so don't underestimate them.
Black and white, as much as I love them, can give off a bit too much of a severe vibe in certain situations. But you can soften things up when you add something like a subtle floral pattern and/or warm colors like brown and gold.
No matter how eclectic you want to get with your styling, there needs to be some kind of visual dialogue happening between the various areas in a room, some kind of visual through line that makes things feel cohesive. In this case, it's the repetition of vintage floral patterns between the new pillow and the wallpaper.
All in all, attention to the tiny details while also focusing on creating cohesiveness will help you inject your personality into a room in a way that feels stylish and elevated in even the most boring, basic apartment buildings.
2. Dark & Groovy Media Console
This new media console is a pretty big change for my living room! And I’m really loving it. I really wasn't into the one I initially had in here… I mean, I liked it, just not for my living room. Instead, it works much better as a hallway storage solution! ↓
I think something as plain as this first media console needs some serious styling in order to look its best. Having a TV be almost the only thing on it wasn't doing it any favors. But now it's adorned with pretty things! Plus, since the styling has the kind of witchy vibe that I love, it's adding a much needed edge to this otherwise vanilla piece. And in this vanilla, average, builder grade apartment the last thing it needs is more blandness.
My new media console, on the other hand, is the exact opposite of the old one. It's a style statement in and of itself, with its ornate dramatic doors and its general sense of grooviness… It feels so much more my style, which tends to be pretty dark, moody, and dramatic.
And when it comes to something as large as this in a living room, it's going to bother you if it’s not your style. It will possibly even detract from the style story you're trying to tell in a room. My old media console is a light romantic comedy, and I'm trying to tell a spooky vampire story in here. It just didn't fit with what I'm trying to achieve.
So the tips I have for you that you can apply to your own styling are:
Stay true to your personal style, especially when it comes to something that takes up a lot of visual real estate in the room, like a media console.
Generally, you want to get something that really fits with the style story that you're trying to tell in the room. That's not to say don't experiment and try unexpected things, but I think big pieces of furniture are frankly too expensive to take the risk with. Maybe save the unexpected moments for the smaller, less expensive decor pieces.
I wanted to try something a little different for myself when I ordered the first media console, and it just didn't work for me or for the style I'm going for in this living room. Luckily, it worked as a hallway piece, but that was luck. Best to stay true to your personal style and don't spend the big money on experiments!
3. Soft, Ornate Area Rug
If you've been keeping up with my videos since I moved into this apartment a year ago, then you know that my search for an area rug has been… a journey. Basically, I wanted a dark gray rug, but every dark gray rug I tried ended up looking blue in my living room’s natural lighting. Blue is my least favorite color, and it definitely doesn't go with the vibe in here, so this conundrum was kind of driving me insane.
And if it wasn't the blue issue, it was a sizing issue. The rugs I tried were always either too big or too small. There was always something.
My area rug search made me feel like I was like Prince Charming trying to find the needle-in-a-haystack foot to fit into the glass slipper that is my living room. And I finally found my Cinderella rug! She's the right size, she's the kind of gray that doesn't turn blue, and she has the ornate, vintagey pattern that I wanted.
I think the second I let go of the need for dark gray and went with a light gray instead (I'm so adventurous, I know) was when the puzzle of the blueness was solved.
And it's nice because it turns out the light gray really softened things up in here. That's really one of the key things this living room needed overall: some softness, some calm colors to temper the boldness of the bright couch and the dramatic wallpaper.
As I was styling, I was so focused on drama and boldness and darkness that it started to feel a little aggressive. This light gray rug feels so much more pretty and peaceful, and it doesn't weigh the space down like the other rugs tended to do.
So the takeaways here are:
Open your mind a bit if something isn't working. If dark gray keeps turning blue in your space, for example, try something else.
Sometimes you just need to soften things up a bit, depending on how you want the room to make you feel.
Even if you're going for a bold and dramatic look, having moments of calm and softness can actually strengthen the style statement you're making while, also just chilling things out a little bit.
I ultimately want to feel chilled out in my living room, so visual chaos can't jusr run amok in here. Sometimes it needs to be calmed down by more relaxing colors. Maybe dark gray should be light gray sometimes. 🙃
4. Luxurious Velvet Throw
Speaking of softening things up a little bit, my next new addition to my living room is this silky velvet throw. Keeping with the theme of softening up my otherwise aggressively bold living room, this throw adds such a soft, romantic, feminine vibe in here.
I really wanted to make this living room feel more cozy, sensual, and luxurious. And this throw makes me think of a French boudoir in the 1920’s… Like a flapper just tossed her shawl on the sofa after getting home from a night on the town, then poured herself and her man du jour a night cap, relishing and freedom and femininity…
All of that is contained in this throw. 😉
I always preach in my videos that the second a big, grand like that plays out in your mind, that's a good indicator that it is a good piece of decor for you.
And strictly visually speaking, the soft femininity of the velvet pattern, the fringe, and the way the fabric moves helps achieve the softness that I was seeking out for my living room.
I've also found that the addition of a few green moments in here have brought a sense of calm to the space. Green tends to have that effect. If you ever want to add some peace and calm to a space, try adding a few soft sage green elements.
So the main tips I have for you from this is this:
When it comes to adding personality and character to an otherwise plain living room, really think about the stories you want the space to tell, and think about how you want the space to make you feel.
Green is generally a relaxing color, so if you ever want to add a sense of calm to a room, try adding some green!
In my case, I wanted to have some more soft, romantic, feminine style stories in here, and I wanted the space to feel more calm. Recognizing these desires guided me to buy this throw and the other new things that support those desires.
5. Styling My Cat’s Armchair
The final significant change in here that I finally settling on a spot for my cat Helo’s armchair, which I go from Pier 1 years ago.
This damn chair has been Helo’s go-to spot since our studio apartment days. She loves this thing. She spends about 90% of her time on my lap, but that other 10%? It's on this chair.
But the problem is this chair is so big. It just didn’t seem to belong anywhere. So for a couple weeks recently, I actually stored it away in my walk-in closet.
But of course, cat mother that I am, after 2 weeks I decided that Helo needed her chair back. She just didn't seem the same without it. And boy, the the way Helo jumped on it immediately before I even had it all the way out of the closet and rode it all the way as I pushed it back into the living room… this clearly was the necessary choice.
So being faced with my inability to deprive my cat of anything, I had to get creative. How do I make this big ass chair look as good as it possibly can in my small living room?
And the answer, as is often the case with styling, was simply context. Contextualize the chair.
The only spot it could go without jamming up against anything else in the room was where I have it now. And of course, this chair looked bad by itself right there. It had no context. With nothing around it, it just was kind of floating there, random and not thoughtful.
So the simple addition of a side table with some styling, a throw pillow, and Fiona Apple dutifully watching over it all made this feel like an intentional visual choice, rather than a case of “I have nowhere else to put my cat's big ass chair so I'll just throw it over here”, you know?
It's still a bit too big for this space, but I actually think it ended up being a nice little cozy spot that makes the living room feel more homey. So I'm into it. And Princess Helo gets her throne. So we're all happy.
I learned from this that when a piece of furniture or decor isn't working in a room, just add some shit around it. That often works wonders. 👌
So this is the state of my living room right now! I think it really goes to show that even the most basic, bland, new-build apartments can be transformed into personality-filled sanctuaries. It just takes a lot of effort.
But if you enjoy decorating like I do, and it's important for you to make your apartment feel like home, then it's a fun kind of effort!
If you want to see the whole styling process unfold starting from the moment I moved into this apartment when it was empty, check out this playlist and binge my whole styling journey thus far!
