Farmhouse Renovation: Checking out the barb sofas in our living room (game changer)

Y’all. What started as “Let’s shoot the barb sofas here to give them some marketing love” was answered with “oh dear!” (in a good way). A few weeks ago, I showed you the Alice sofas here, which I designed for this room. Remember all the limited issues and tones we discussed? They seemed to be settled here. I still love alice sofas, but I’m shocked to say that I love this job much better here!!! But you may not agree … (Social media was included in the vote). Here it is:

Going back and on the slide, it’s just a lot more different. The green color has a rich feeling, a very big impact, added to the “plan” in such a way that at one stage I felt that some things needed to change – the fireplace, the curtains, the color. The balance of this intensity in the matching sofas makes the whole room feel timeless (many of you had good suggestions about neutral tones and more fabrics, etc.). But the second I found these two colors here, in an uneven composition, the room gave a whole new beautiful vibe. One that shouted an invitation, and unity, not to mention a better measure and balance.

The tones, the warmth, the intensity of the vibe … The openness of the structure !! The lack of a range of contrasts was really used in a way that he should have known, but didn’t think it would work so well in Oregon (that airy Scandi vibe worked well in Lal, but here I didn’t think of it!). Surprisingly, the room feels warm, even though it is light? I might need a Color Scientist to measure why that is. And I didn’t buy anything new for this, so I can still make it better (like the easy times the colorful ones put on the Nook food?).

I think it’s because all the soft colors play in this airs vibe, and the deep colors would work better with the dark walls (something I know, but was just trying to do).

In this setup, I don’t even want to paint the fire or install a wallpaper. It feels just calm and cozy, with depth but not too much difference. I mean, every development progress (again, I just got pulled from my event and took like 3 hours to the living room), but I go into this room on the weekend more and more, I love it “OMG I love it” in me.

With grass, it draws you in with energy, and with blue / pink, it invites you to relax. Brian and I both agreed that I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed, which is more for us. Also, I think that the traditional, big scale – with big arms and a big back and a big base, just works in this big room. Is it possible for me to model it in a relaxing way? No. It’s really the colors and the layout.

I loved sitting at the Blue Barb looking at the kitchen. I love that the blue / gray cabinet now looks blue (grey gray).

But wait, can’t dogs sit on top of cushions too?

No!! I mean, I didn’t put bars here at first – I thought a lot about our dogs going upstairs and making themselves at home. And they did … but it was a week beyond the setup, and they sat on the sofa bench, but not the top cushions. I think they’re too high, and maybe the amount of foam (absolute, BTW) doesn’t mean it’s down enough for the sofa’s feathers?

My only fear is…

Go with me on this one. You know women who wear the same hairstyle they did when they were in their 20s/30s, that looks/feels now? Yes, my opinion is that they keep the hair the same when it feels fresh, beautiful, and young. I mean, I do that (I rarely stray from long blonde, wavy hair). This Color Palette is almost the same one we had in our Glendale house before we moved out. Do you see?

I actually still love that room, even though it has had something done to it (10 years ago now). We looked at it and agreed that maybe it was something like a rug, maybe a type of pictures (all white, flowery / bright, which was so in 2014), maybe a pouf? So my fear is that I’m going back to something done, from a time when I felt like I was on top of my game. I know warm Scandinavian design isn’t as bad as it was back then, but it’s been in my sights for a while (with a dose of Old-World Victoria Flair). But another way you can look at it is that these are my comfort colors and myself, even if they are just abstract practices, Old World colors, Moody colors, and European Maximalism).

So, what will you end up with?

At the moment, we have a pink sofa and a broken blue barb to face our tree in the middle (as opposed to the fireplace), and I don’t like it very much (because it doesn’t do anything, it’s me that doesn’t match, which kinda bothers me). But color, vibe-wise, tonally… I love this.

But why not design alice sofas in your living room?

You sure did. And yes, I feel dumb not to stop here. Would I like alice in these colors instead? Yes! But I think what works is also the structure, which we have before; I didn’t like it very much.

But there is one thing I don’t like so much…

Brian brought it up, and I had seen it; Seeing into the living room from the kitchen feels confusing without being really well put together. This can be because we throw more pillows that the dogs throw on the ground or smoosh on the floor, and they look dirty. But the synchronization of two sofas facing each other is just another really clean look to make your eye sensitive. I still like it a lot, but since it’s so good and so unnecessary we’ll have to keep things in their place.

What’s next is what’s coming. We also shot this room in stages, and got this – we got to shoot our house decorated for the holidays two different ways. The first one this year is a blog and the other is a magazine that comes out in October 2026. To make them look different, we are shooting green sofas in a magazine, which I think will be very interesting.

The truth is, I like them a lot, but the pink / blue color flows better and calms the need to “fix” all the balance issues (like paint the fire, paint the fire walls, change the rug). But I really want to know what you think. I am close to it and my judgment is very clouded, yes, my opinion and my preferences 🙂 I do not say that I will go along with what I should be able to follow what you vote for (as it is) or you can combine it.

* Photos by Kaitlin Green