I would remove the plant and replace it with a side table and lamp. Find a piece of art that is vertical and hang over the love seat and call it good.

I think the few comments are unanimous, I'll return the plant...

While small, it is a sweet living room, the windows and the door give it a lot of character. But just too much stuff in the little space. Replace the brown loveseat with a chair and side table.

Replace the entry table with a smaller one with legs.

A round glass coffee table will increase the airiness.

Yes paint the bricks white. it will open the room a little visually. I am not sure but it looks like a small wall with a space in it? on the other side of the opening near the chair. I wonder if down the road that could not be opened up a little more giving you a few inches for a pathway into the other room and allowing for a little more breathing room.

Do you need that much seating? If not Id lose the white couch and put the leather one by window. Then the room would be more open. Or lose the chair and float the smaller sofa in its place

I have a small living room too with the front door opening right into it, so I know the feeling. I think you've done a great job and I actually like the plant but agree it might be a bit large. Can it be trimmed back a bit? I like the height. If I were you I'd just put a big piece of art or a mirror behind the couch. I don't think you should remove a couch. putting only a bit of furniture in small rooms just makes them look dinky.

Is there space to do what Maureen suggested? I think this is a lovely room and just needs some little tweaks. Another option would be to put the love seat opposite the ivory sofa and pull both of them slightly onto the rug. Then put the armchair where the love seat is so you can keep your plant.

HI -- This is where the less is more needs to be. Can you use the love seat in the dining room as seating with the table . Then return the plant or use it elsewhere . Maybe just have some bookcase or wardrobe as a coat closet and closed storage beside the radiator . Have it all painted the color of the room. Possibly find a smaller coffee table that has a glass top . The other is too big and visually solid .

Thanks everyone!

Rawketgirl: I like your ideas, I can't switch the table in the entryway because it is actually a radiator.. but i agree glass and brass coffee table would be airier, will look into it. For the other brown/leather pieces, it is a compromise... my husband wanted even bulkier comfier ones, that's already the "light" version..

Maureen: great suggestion but my room is not wide enough :( I tried that configuration before, impossible.

Shiningautum: I tried a couple of months without the loveseat, just white couch and a chair on the other side. As Nor puts it it doesn't work, in a weird way the room looks indeed dingy and even smaller. And we found that we need the extra seating. My regret is that I should have been more resistant to the leather club chair. I think a smaller chair would have looked better. And picked a second chair instead of loveseat... oh well...

Nor: you present the more attractive option with the less changes ;) I also like the height of that plant and was surprised by how large it ended up looking in that corner (I know should have measured .. duh..). Originally I wanted a fiddle leaf tree ..

Thanks anthip, never thought about that, will check if that could fit.. (Maureen's option doesn't fit). It may look weird given how the room flows with dining room Behind but sometimes you get a surprise when you move things around...
As someone else mentioned previously we may open up the walls a bit more later.

Thanks lefty, the loveseat would be too low for dining room table plus it is actually a nice soft leather I really like, I would be afraid the kids would ruin it with food :). I considered closet space but ended up thinking it would be too bulky and I'd rather give up on mudroom than have my small living room facing up a mudroom. It looked great on a picture - I envisioned a nice long white closet with bench / bookcase some simple storage- but realistically it will end up being a pile of coats ...

Hi Anaisava, may I ask about your mask which is just right next to the door? Where did you get it from? Best, Marcin

I think it would work. You could do a nice reading nook in that corner then with the plant, club chair, side table and your magazine rack. I agree that a glass coffee table would be a good choice as the one you have is very large and has a huge visual presence. I would personally like to see a brass and glass coffee table. Or two even that you could move if needed. We have a pair of brass cubes with glass that we love. It does depend on how old your kids are...

You might swap the two tall plants around as well. Put the one by the window near the newly positioned club chair and the larger, bushier plant in the alcove by the fire place.

Some lessons I am taking from all of your comments though:
- I shouldn't have left my husband choose the furniture ... i made pre selections and in my long lists he always ended up taking the darkest, bulkiest options (the coffee table had to be wood and have a lower level storage, the couch had to be long enough so he could lay down, chair wide enough, no sharp angles or pin legs etc..)
- no more impulse shopping!! More time waiting for the perfect piece.
- more time waiting to get a clear vision of what all the pieces would look like together... I feel that whenever we buy a piece it blocks tons of other better options for the net missing piece of furniture ..

Hi Fengshui, it comes from Benin

Paint the fireplace, make sure it's the proper paint. The leather chair needs to face out more, plant looks squished. Can you remove door between dining room and kitchen, it will make a big difference.

I meant Marcin sorry... any bad feng shui having a mask next to the door ? (Serious question :))

Teejasward: any recommandation regarding proper paint for the fireplace ? I am asking a painter to do it (the brick looks very porous so I am pretty sure it would be a disaster If i try to DIY)

Teejaysward again: the squished looking plant behind the leather chair is actually just very lazy not squished ... it would have space to stand straight but when we got it (someone understandably wanted to throw it away ..) it was already fully grown at a perilous angle, it needs the wall...and I am completely unable to throw a plant away ..

Teejaysaward again : I am thinking not only about getting rid of the door between dining and kitchen but opening up the whole space more. I have been looking at kitchen reno plans.
When we moved it I thought it was an obvious choice, now that I live in it though I come to appreciate that door sometimes : for food smell and to reduce noise between kids bedroom and kitchen ..
Practically and esthetic don't always mix well..

Well it depends how you look at it. :) Sometimes this kind of decoration or protection may have some strange energy attached. In many cases after removing such things from the house the energy was changing and people were getting better. I discourage to have such decoration at home just in case. Are you coming from Benin? Or it was holiday gift?

Im curious, because I see no tv in here, so it this a non tv family or is this more of a sitting room rather than a tv room?

could you put the plant by the sofa, in the dining room under the mirror there, and then angle the chair to the corner more?

also i wouldnt paint the fireplace there is nothing wrong with it, it will still be there either way.
also have you tried angling the loveseat?

down by the river: non tv family. We have a screen for movies but it is in the basement. Thats the living room we use everyday. I go back and forth on the fireplace but after much much hesitation (don't like the idea of painting brick but mine is a very dull color) we decided to go for something like the pic attached. White fireplace and 2-3 reclaimed wood shelves under the windows (so not high like in the pic).

Down by the river again: yes we will move that lazy plant behind the chair in another room soon (when we redo the fireplace and add shelves on each side of the fireplace as per previous pic). The shelves will be shallow so we will be able to angle the chair more.
Impossible to angle the loveseat unfortunately, cuts the flow of the room and looks weird, the passage is too narrow.
Also I tried this morning the option listed by previous poster, loveseat in front of couch. And again the room is just a tiny bit too small for it to work - the back of the loveseat cuts the flow of the room into dining room too much

Just to add: if we end up enlarging the opening between LR and DR (getting rid as much as possible of the remaining walls in each side) then the configuration loveseat in front of couch, closer together on the rug becomes possible... just realized that it's the configuration of the crate and barrel pic I posted..

Could we have room measurements?

Hi Maureen, no worries I did get the lay out you suggest which is a great one but to work in my room it would require 3 things:
- most importantly no wall at all between LR and DR on the entry wall side, as it currently is, you end up bumping into it and having to "squeeze" a bit to enter the DR
- change the 3 seat white couch, the coffee table and the leather armchair, the 3 of them would be too big if you basically reduce the LR space. Instead I would need more dainty, feminine and light pieces to create a cute sitting room in front of fireplace.

To make that layout work I really think my room should be between 2-3 foot wider and either 2 ft longer or no walls between LR and DR..

what im getting here is we cant change the layout or any of the funishings. so back to the question at hand. no to the plant . yes to a small side table with a lamp!

I would get rid of white furniture which is next to the door, I think it is to wide for hat space and probably would get something more narrow, 3/4 of it and then moved brown sofa slightly to the left so its not so stuck to the plant. I like the plant where it is. I would replaced mirror with some artwork and changed the rug for big one which would occupy the nearly whole room. I would also remove the plant which is behind the armchair and put it at the entrance to your dining room and if its to weak I would change it with the other one. The current layout doesn't look good now because is divided into two spaces. Just moving the rug in the middle would change this feeling however I think it is to small for this layout. / Marcin

HI -- I am pretty sure the white furniture you are referring to is the radiator that is the heating system ... it cannot be moved.

Downplay the radiator by removing the mirror. It's pretty much hanging behind the door and really looks off there. Move mirror over sofa if you want to keep it in the room. Don't try to make the space behind the door your focal point.

Move some of the stuff on top of radiator to the coffee table that's crying out for something to go on top of it.

Your place is so cute...you have a knack for decorating.

Thanks everyone, so here are my final decisions following your advice:
- I will be moving the plant to dining room and replace by side table and lamp. I am thinking narrow glass and brass side table as some of you pictured above. For lamp I hesitate between floor lamp, lamp on table and sconce on the side wall..
- I'll buy a sisal rug to go under the current one and extend the LR zone so that the 2 couches and armchair are least partially on the rug
- I'll paint the fireplace white, add built in bookshelves and remove plant falling behind armchair
- I'll edit (remove) what's above fireplace and pictures in front of windows to replace by just art above fireplace
- I will add a throw on white couch in the middle, something to link the couch with the rest of the room
- if I end up able to enlarge the opening to the DR I'll switch the layout around, take brown couch off the wall and probably replace white couch with a smaller one...
- I am keeping my (numerous) African masks ;)

Voilà .. thanks again! and soon I will be posting on my bedroom which is a completely blank canvas with no furniture to deal with so much easier to follow advice :)

Great plan and that is just what you needed. PLEASE post progress as it gets done....we love to see even bits and pieces here and there. HINT HINT HINT

Sounds good. Please post some pictures when you have everything done..;)

Why don't you switch out the dinning room and the living room? I've seen homes that has the dining room in the front and it's nice. The dinning room looks bigger and you get the having the fireplace in the dining room makes it cozy.

A small update : still haven't moved the plant (waiting for the coffee table and floating bookshelf), or painted the fireplace but I tried the larger rug solution, thoughts?

Also: I saw online a nearby house for sale and it has the same original dimensions as mine (bungalow). And did what several of you recommended :
- replaced heaters by forced air to get rid of radiators (from experience I won't do it as the difference in terms of comfort is not worth it to me, but visually it is indeed better)
- get rid of half walls
- smaller piece of furniture in the living room

View from their dining room

And I probably would have put the couch across from the fireplace to create an entry and a chair on either side of the fireplace to open up that window space.

Hi Anaisava, it looks much better with the big carpet. I would remove the white small rug with zigzags, maybe you can find some space for it in your dining room...? I think you could also separate your brown sofa from the wall approx 10cm and hang some artwork above? How would it look?

Did you try angling the brown love seat up to the dr opening with the plant behind it?

i dont mind the plant now... the rug looks good.

the open walls wow, that makes an impact!

but either way, they dont have much more seating wise then you, so if anything yours looks great!

Can you hand the patterned rug on the wall above the leather seat?

Oops hang!

Hi everyone, as requested see small update, I added a bigger carpet and painted the fireplace white.

Still not done anything with the wall, still waiting for the proper art to put above the fireplace, and the bookshelves on each side of the fireplace..

LOVE updates like this. You have been busy and gosh, I hope you are happy with all you have done!!!

Painting the fireplace makes a huge difference visually! I love that you have pillows an the brown couch. They add interest.

It looks great, It was a good dea to paint fireplace. Can you post one more picture without white zig zag carpet? just to see how it looks..

Looks fab! Really much more open feeling