Living Room Makeover: Santa Barbara Style

Our living room is pretty much complete! I’m so excited to share how it all came out. Scroll down to see the before photo! When we moved into this house last October, there were a lot of mixed styles. A lot of it was pretty modern for our taste and we wanted to warm it up and make it more cozy and inviting. We are going with a mediterranean, santa barbara feel. Lot’s of bright white, warm wooden accents and pops. I love everything earthy right now. It is timeless and you can really play with your decor. I hope you guys love how it turned out as much as I do!

Mediterranean california style living room design

BEFORE

AFTER

chest: z gallerie (used to be the girls changing table!)

olive branches and pot: vintage begonia

book: amazon

vase: hobby lobby

frame: marshalls

art: homegoods

(I find a lot of decor at homegoods so it’s hard to link exacts!)

I have always wanted built-ins next to our fireplace and luckily we had the perfect space for that. We just took out the black drawers and had these cabinets built to fit the space. (The paint is white dove by benjamin moore.) Andrew’s request was to have lights put in to illuminate the shelves and he was right, it adds such a pretty glow at night. I also love that we can store so much down below. We have dvds, controllers, all our tv stuff and board games behind the cabinets.

Decorating shelves is one of my favorite things, but I’m such a perfectionist that it takes me a while to do. That’s why I took forever to put this post up! I was waiting until I had them done exactly how I had envisioned them. And then once I get them to a place where I’m satisfied, I’ll find something else I want to use and then end up rearranging practically every shelf. I’m insane.

We stuccoed the fireplace and I love how it turned out. The brick was too farmhouse for us so we did a smooth coat of crystal white stucco (la habra) and I am beyond in love. For the mantle, we took out the black one and had a wooden one put in with custom corbels that add so much character to the fireplace. And we did the stain to match other wooden accents throughout the house.