It looks like a lovely room, even if it is lonnnnnng.

To make a room seem wider, you have to remove whatever is making it seem long.

In this case, unfortunately, it's your huge plants.

Your plants are beautiful and healthy, but anyone walking into the room is going to have to walk around them, which means that they have to walk in the center of the room, which makes the room seem even narrower.

Decorating a loooon room can be hard, and you've got the right idea to divide it up into different areas, like your DH's study, plus a conversation area. I think you have the right idea about using rugs to define spaces, but I think maybe you'd do better with two larger rugs for the two areas. One of the tricks they use with long narrow rooms is to have rugs with rounded corners, or in oval shapes to break up the angularity of the room.

I love your grouping of clocks on the wall. Very cute. But that bench doesn't look all that comfy or inviting. Can you put a plump stuffed chair or two in there instead?

You might want to try using a divider screen to visually break the room up. You might also try placing a rug or furniture on the diagonal if at all possible. If you use torchiers, it will put the lighting emphasis on the ceiling, and take it off the narrow walls. You may also want some up lighting on your lovely plants.

Try warm dark colors on the narrower end walls to bring them forward and lighter color on your long walls to make them recede. Put linear arrangements on the short walls to make them appear longer... you know, like shelves, or even painting on horizontal stripes. Mirrors on the long walls might make the room seem wider.

Wow! Thanks for all the ideas! Yes I do have some other rugs that I could try. I can also move one of the chairs back in place of the bench. It actually goes at the foot of our bed. The plants will need to stay. This is the only room they get enough light in. What do you think about the curio? Is that just adding to the long? I could move that to another spot also. Can't move the aquarium in the corner by the chairs though. Thanks again for the insight!

Unless your goal is to have someone sit at the entrance end of the room, I would take out the bench completely.

The clocks are nice there, though I think they need to be spaced just a bit more to show them off.

I would take the monster plants by the window in the middle of the room and try those where the round table is at the moment. A small console table or bookcase below the clocks would be nice, with a lamp to create a warm and welcoming feel at night.

I would move the round table down to in front of the window and try to tie that area into the seating I see further down. Since we don't have a complete picture of that area, hard to say what you might do there.

Finally, I would get rid of all those little rugs, and get one larger one for the entry area, perhaps even a round one to bring in some curves. visually widen that space and set it apart. Then another larger rug in the seating space.

Thanks Les! I will do some tweeking over the weekend and see if I can move things around. I do have an area rug rolled up downstairs that I could try in that area. I am posting another picture that might help alittle. The bench I had there so you could sit down and put my shoes on, but, it isn't absolutely necessary.
{{!gwi}}

Those runners are adding to the feeling of 'longness' in the room, too. I wonder if you could move at least some of the plants to the far wall(s) to bring in those ends a bit, as well. Perhaps move the two chairs to that far wall (the wall shown in your last pic) with 1 or 2 of the taller plants behind them. (I think this would mean you'd have to move the cabinet elsewhere.)

sueb20, that wall where the big window is, is our entrance. Looking at the last picture, you go to the left down 3 steps to the basement, garage and entrance doors. They are all located there.

so, it is like a family, sitting, plant...room?

I think you should pin down the real purpose of the room. Is it really used as a family room or as a sitting room? Or is it really a pass-through room where you keep plants? It looks like the place where furniture ends up when it doesn't fit elsewhere in the house.

This is one of those rooms where I would want to remove everything and then bring back only what makes sense. I would fill the short, windowed wall with plants - tall, short, on stands, hanging, etc. And a couple uplights in the corners for nighttime. That alone would shorten the room several feet. In front of the plants and centered between the long walls, I would put two white wicker chairs and a table (side or coffee). That would pretty much fill up that half of the room.

I can't visualize the rest of the room to give suggestions. The shiny drapes look too formal for the style of the room. My preference would be a breezy cottage-y look with white cotton panels on the existing rods, maybe painting the walls a sagey green to enhance the greenhouse look. It would also showcase your lovely hardwood floors, better than the beige is doing in the photos.

If you can't remove the curio cabinet from the room, maybe angle it in a corner? But do get it off the long wall.

graywings as I stated to sueb20 I cannot put anything in front of the big window at the end of the room. That is our entrance, if you look at picture #1. If I put something there it will be in the way as you come up the steps. The drapes and blinds help in the summer to keep the heat out. This room is facing the southeast. It gets pretty warm. I do use the room mostly as an entrance and plant room. I do have a fish aquarium and DH desk in there also, but, those things are out of the way.

So, you are saying there is a door behind the curio cabinet? If that is the case, then simply shift all the plants and the two chairs into an arc spread between the two windows. That should give you walking area, especially if the curio cabinet is moved.

But the rest of my comments remain the same. Basically, decorate this as a foyer, because that's its function.

If there is no other place in the house for an aquarium, curio cabinet, desk, and rocker, yet you don't want to get rid of them, then place them in that foyer room and make your peace with them. We all do it at one time or another. But if your question is how to make this room look great, then my response is to get rid of some portion of the various items that make it look disjointed.

Thanks for your honesty. I did a little moving around last nite. I took the biggest plant and the one by the curio out of the room. I moved the two chairs down by the window, with the round table and floral arrangement in between, as Les suggested. I put the palm tree in the corner by the clocks. I need to move the curio OR the aquarium. Any ideas on how either would look in the corner of the kitchen? Maybe in this corner?
{{!gwi}}

Your kitchen has nice clean contemporary lines. I think that placing either piece in there would detract from the room.

I'm a little confused by your last pic. Is that the same room?

Oceanna, no, that is our kitchen. I was thinking of moving the aquarium OR the curio to that corner behind the island.