Decorating & Furniture/problem dinning room

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Expert: - 4/1/2009


Question

the problem
I have a dinning room with 7ft 3in ceilings with pull down attic door in the middle in a room that is 9 and 1/2 ft wide and 20 1/2 ft long with a bank of windows 163 inches long in the center of the long wall and a regular size entry door on the right side of one of the short walls how can i make the room look taller (without to many stripes please). I will be using floor to ceiling curtains but don't want those to look like blob in the middle of the wall. We have 1930s style of dinning room furniture (Dark) and warm colors. the windows on the end of the room in the attached picture will be located on either side of center windows after renovations are comeplete and the color was not one of our choices. and the furniture will be relocated.

Answer
Les,

Thanks for the photo and description of your current situation.  To make the room feel "taller", you could paint the ceiling in the same color as the wall (or a slightly lighter shade of the wall color), use floor to ceiling drapes hung outside the windows which allows more light in and makes the windows (in the photo) look wider.  The only other paint trick (other than vertical stripes) is to add a chair rail and paint it a darker shade than the area above it (and the ceiling).  

Lastly, because you have a very large space considering length and width, arrange your furniture away from the walls.  When you place large furniture - particularly tall pieces - on the wall, you're exaggerating the lack of height in the space.  

Hope this helps you!
Regards,
Jenny
    Questioner's Rating
    Rating(1-10)Knowledgeability = 10Clarity of Response = 10Politeness = 10
    Commentthanks for you help and responding so quickly. pray for warm weather to come soon so i can get this project on the road! lol thanks again


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Jennifer Taylor Wojcik

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