Subtle Changes

We are in the process of painting our dining room in hopes of transforming it from the dark, drab space that it was when we bought the house, to an inviting and elegant space to be used for eating and entertaining. The tedious, time-consuming part of this project is painting the dining room trim and curio cabinet in the corner. When we bought the house, the trim had a dark wood stain - which many would find lovely, but that didn't fit my style of decor for the dining room. So, we are painting all the woodwork in this room a crisp, clean white.

Today, we got the 3rd coat of white paint on the trim (only 1 more to go!) and painted something else as well. Something that brought a subtle change, yet gives the space a brand new feel.

Here is the room prior to any painting being done today. Pardon the green painters tape around the windows...

Here is a close-up of the crown molding in the room. Some patch-work has been done and it will get a fresh coat of white paint to finish it when we do our final coat of paint on the rest of the trim.

And here is the dining room after a coat of paint.

Do you see what the difference is?

Yes, we did put that 3rd coat of white paint on the trim, but we did something else... that's right, we gave the ceiling a coat of paint as well. And the paint is called "breath of blue".

In one of my recent posts, I debated the idea of painting the ceiling something other than white. In the end, I decided I wanted to be brave and go with my original gut instinct in this room, and paint this ceiling a very, very light blue. More like white with a blue tint. But it adds so much wow-factor to the space. And once the crown molding has a new coat of white paint on it, the "blue" ceiling will look even better. And the walls still have to painted too - this will bring it all together.

Here's another shot...can you see the blue?

Against the crown....

Like I said, it's very subtle. And it appears slightly lighter or darker depending on the lighting. Boy, I can't wait to finish this room! It's one of my favorites so far! Stay tuned to see the end results.

And as for the ugly, black chandelier hanging in the center of the ceiling... well, more to come on that.