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how to make a formal living room more useful? (1 Viewer)

Maik Jeaunz

Maik Jeaunz

Footballguy
growing up, it seems that most people have always had that formal living room in the front of the house that looks really nice, but nobody ever goes into it. do a Google image search for "formal living room" and you'll see a bunch of beautiful living rooms...that most people under 80 wouldn't be caught dead in. there might as well be tumbleweeds blowing through. most people end up doing most of their lounging & entertaining in a more casual "family room".

well, ### that. I don't want to use the biggest GD room in the house as just a furniture museum. I want it use it! I could always throw my big TV and a sectional couch in there and turn it into a super family room, but that lacks creativity.

anybody done anything interesting with a living room to make it more fun & useful? turn it into a lounge, game room, discotech, sweat shop...anything?

 
My mother had one of these rooms. Only time she ever sat in there was the weekend she started dying. Seriously

 
jamny said:
What's the difference between a living room and a family room?
Click to expand...
A family room is a living room that you actually want to live in. I'd suggest turning it into a ...."lounge, game room, discotech, sweat shop...anything..."

 
glumpy said:
jamny said:
What's the difference between a living room and a family room?
Click to expand...
A family room is a living room that you actually want to live in. I'd suggest turning it into a ...."lounge, game room, discotech, sweat shop...anything..."
Click to expand...
We always hang out in our living room. I have a home theater with my small recording space and sound booth in the basement. Also work out down there and my wife uses the computer when she works from home. I guess that's considered a family room, although we don't have kids. Not sure if that makes a difference.

 
jamny said:
What's the difference between a living room and a family room?
Click to expand...
I remember reading at one point that these formal, unused living rooms the OP is talking about came to be because people thought it wasn't classy to have people walk into your house and immediately see people watching TV, kids' toys, oversized couches, etc. So the solution to that was to put all your fancy tables, uncomfortable couches that are perfectly clean, etc in the front of your house.

Geniuses

 
Ours is our kids' play room. In other words, it's a huge mess filled with more toys than any two kids should actually have.

 
I am about to spend a bunch of time fixing up our formal living room. I am scrapping the popcorn ceilings this weekend and my wife is picking out paint. It has no overhead lighting so I am considering adding can lights - although I have no idea how to actually accomplish this. Looking forward to the time and effort so that we can buy new furniture that no one will use.

 
We put a real nice bar in ours and have four lounge like swivel chairs facing each other in a circle with a round table in the middle. The room looks great and we still almost never use it.

 
1/2 of my lower level is 1 big living room and dining room combo that gets used maybe 2 times a year. I'll go in there to talk on the phone once in a while b/c there's no TV or risk of sitting on a lego or barbie doll. My wife hates, it but any time we do use the space, I make a stupid joke about now the "cost per use average is down to $XXX"

I'd love to use the space better, but its the main entry into the house and I'd rather have it clean and uncluttered then the bomb aftermath that my family room/den is.

 
Good equestion. This is a really big mystery.

I think it's a woman/mom thing. My Mom had one of these rooms, it was always just "perfect" but we were rarely in there. Had a piano, some very nice books, nice rug, some extremely lovely furniture, it faced out on the front so it had a nice view. And we were rarely ever in there.

I came from a BIG family. I think my Mom viewed this as one place in the house that was quiet, perfect, lovely. Call it her 'man cave' because the rest of the house was our whole man/kid cave. My Dad had a "study/office" which we basically just took over and ruined.

I'd say - either:

- Knock down a wall and expand your kitchen, den or bedroom or whatever the next room over is.

- Make it your space, make it a place where you go to relax, if that's a tv, sports room, do that. Fill it with your bachelor stuff. Put a bar in it, a real bar, and a pool table and dart board, a ping pong table, that's probably what I would do.

 
We turned ours into our dining room. Our kitchen and dining room were side by side, with the family room in the front. Knocked out the wall between the kitchen and dining room, and now it's an open space and the old dining room is a small sitting room where people can sit and talk and kids do homework or draw while we make dinner.

Bought a big 12 person barnwood farm table off Craigslist for that family room, and that's now our dining room. Plenty of room to host big family dinners, and we eat in there almost every night.

 
Was always kind of a turn on to makeout on the formal living room sofa when the girlfriend's parents were away. :thumbup:

 
We have the same issue. The problem in houses built in the 60s-80s is that these "extra rooms" usually are right off the front door. I would love to use that space in our house for a kids game room, but I don't want people walking into the house directly into that room.

 
Install a waterslide, but insist that guests bring their own water if they want to partake. You aren't running a charity.

 
shuke said:
Ours is our kids' play room. In other words, it's a huge mess filled with more toys than any two kids should actually have.
Click to expand...
What ours is as well. Eventually we'll turn it into an office, but it works pretty well as a play room for the time being.

 
This has been mentioned now a couple times--knock out a wall. Thinking about this again I realized that is what I've done twice now, in both cases the wall between living room and kitchen/dining. Neither house was over large to have a full dining room so the open space ended up being a combination of all three: kitchen living and dining. Actually did the same thing first in a mobile home--the driving motive being for entertaining, so we can be part of the party while preparing any meals. It's an arrangement that for us has worked really well for years.

 
So weird to put all kinds of money into setting up a room that you never use. I didn't think people still do that.

 
glumpy said:
This has been mentioned now a couple times--knock out a wall. Thinking about this again I realized that is what I've done twice now, in both cases the wall between living room and kitchen/dining. Neither house was over large to have a full dining room so the open space ended up being a combination of all three: kitchen living and dining. Actually did the same thing first in a mobile home--the driving motive being for entertaining, so we can be part of the party while preparing any meals. It's an arrangement that for us has worked really well for years.
Click to expand...
We've been avoiding this in our high ranch. The "living room," dining room and kitchen come together to form the right half of our home-bedrooms to the left. Come up the half flight into our "living room"- go straight into the kitchen, or make a right into the "living room" which then flows into the dining room, ...through which you can access the other side of the kitchen.

We find that a good number of people congregate in our kitchen to chat while meals, etc are being prepared. Some spill into the dining room. Another group takes seats in the "living room" to b.s. or take in football when in season. In our minds- the overall decibel level would be unbearable were we to open all three rooms into one. Our "living room" leans towards the slightly less formal and it is where we spend most family time and it's where our large plasma resides. It dresses up nice. The downstairs den/family room is where the boys make use of the xBox, foosball table and our recently returned-from-storage-in-the-garage exercise equipment.

The living room doesn't have to be a plastic covered wasteland.

Edited to add: Full diclosure- our youngest is now 15 and we are in the midst of a year long purge of children's toys/clothes/stuff, etc which has enabled us to create the office we always wanted, etc... good luck with those little ones. :scared:

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Our living has evolve over the years. It started out as a play room for our kids. At first, just a bunch of toys, playhouse, mini-pool table, mini hockey. Now that my kids are 16 and 18, its a second family room with the computer and a couple of 10 ft mini basketball hoops so we can play in-door bball...

 
ChiefD said:
We turned ours into our dining room. Our kitchen and dining room were side by side, with the family room in the front. Knocked out the wall between the kitchen and dining room, and now it's an open space and the old dining room is a small sitting room where people can sit and talk and kids do homework or draw while we make dinner.

Bought a big 12 person barnwood farm table off Craigslist for that family room, and that's now our dining room. Plenty of room to host big family dinners, and we eat in there almost every night.
Click to expand...
We have a breakfast nook off the kitchen which we eat in. Our dining room is our den/office. The living room is across from the dining room and right in front of the front door. It has the open ceiling to the second floor. An odd open space really. Ultimately my wife would like a piano in there. Also maybe a couple small chairs, bookshelf, reading lamps.

 
we were interviewing an interior designer (or decorator - I don't remember so don't jump on this FFA losers) and she recommended turning our unused dining room into a wine lounge. I've never seen an example of someone doing this, but we were both intrigued but too cheap to hire someone, so we've done nothing with the idea.

 
Ours wasn't all that big, so we closed it off and turned it into an office. The first floor already had a "great room" combination of kitchen and 'family room.' We also have a fully finished basement, so we didn't lose much useable space.

 
Brony said:
we were interviewing an interior designer (or decorator - I don't remember so don't jump on this FFA losers) and she recommended turning our unused dining room into a wine lounge. I've never seen an example of someone doing this, but we were both intrigued but too cheap to hire someone, so we've done nothing with the idea.
Click to expand...
I doooonnnnnt waaaaaana sit in our diiiiiiinnnnnninnnnggg rooooooooooooooooom. waaaaaaaaaaah

 
some good ideas. the room itself is fairly large with wood floors, so I like the thought of making it a music room, game room or some kind of lounge with a bar. one issue is that even though it's pretty big, the fireplace is right in the middle of the wall, and I don't want to mount a TV over the fireplace so that limits where it can go.

and if I don't want to put a full size pool table, what about one of those bumper pool/game table things, like this: http://www.gametablesusa.com/catalog/images/26-561-new_191_detail.jpg. is that super lame?

 
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