Check your phone book for a redesign expert. They take your present furniture and help with room placement and colors.
They have a hourly rate and can give ideas for colors and draperies
Probably tho only in larger areas

It depends upon your location what fees are, but designers have a couple fee structures: set price for the project, straight hourly rate, markup on goods and services that you purchase, or combinations of these. If you wish to keep most of your furniture and work with that you may want an hourly rate. You can also call your regional chapter of the ASID for referrals and more information.

We just met with a designer to help with our family room b/c DH and I couldn't agree on anything and the room really needed to be done. She charges $65/hour plus 30% mark up on goods. With her designer discount- you still end up saving quite a bit on the pieces. She gave us an estimate of 6 hours of her time to do the project.

Just to get an idea on the scope of the project, we doing the room top to bottom, the only thing we have is a rug, art work and 2 lamps. We need all new furniture, window treatments, paint/wall paper, accent tables, and accessories.

We also had a quite a little questions that she was able to answer at our initial meeting- furniture arrangment on our patio, where to hang a painting, where to put a set of corbels I had bought, etc. I bet you can get a lot done in 1-2 hours. The only thing I'm hesitant on is that I like to find pieces from antique shops or craigslist. I don't want to order the entire room from a catolog. I'm not sure how that works with a designer. If you already have peices, they could help you choose fabrics. I think I will just let her know that I will be finding my own accent tables.

We just started, so I will let you know how our project goes.