Something seems very off about the positioning of the wainscoting. It's only in one short location and it ends before it even gets started. It doesn't travel up with your staircase. I can't tell from the distorted picture how your stair continues and if there is some type of opening in the wall.

I'd look to simplify everything in this foyer area.

Thank you for this! Our foyer is in a turret so it’s a circular room. I’ll try to post a better photo once it’s cleared up from another project

Better photo of the current situation

It seems odd that the pictures travel up and the wainscoting doesn't

Remove it!

I would agree with painting, as it would seem better with the floor color and match the remainder of house millwork. It is also easy then to add and/or remove profiles. I cannot figure out the stair finished end pieces though, I suspect there was carpet prior and you redid the stain to match the upstairs just where the carpet was?

- I also agree with the current height of the wainscot considering the rest of the house and lower Foyer floor. But it does look unfinished, so if you leave it, carry new wainscot the same height all the way around the room.

- If you redo the wainscot to follow the rise of the stair, it would require a matching top height on the other side of the opening behind the half-newel. Then it would still need to carry new wainscot at the low height all the way around the room to not look unfinished.

- As another option you can raise the height of all new wainscot to the exterior door height, all the way around the room.

- And of course remove it all, then you don't have to mess with curved walls.

With any wainscot configuration (or even if you remove all of it), it seems it should be combined with a cased opening and crown to match the rest of house as it appears to have both.

Painting the wainscot is a good idea. To make the room flow properly, I'd extend the wainscot around the downstairs room's walls. That way it's part of the room instead of staircase decoration.

I'd also change the positions of pictures so that the 2 on the back wall were positioned level with each other and at a height appropriate for the 2nd floor; the 2 on the side wall should also be level with each other, but positioned relative to the first floor.

Kind of like this. The red line marks the bottom of the lowest picture. The blue line, the bottom of the highest picture. (I didn't paint the wainscot, but I did install more ;) )

All of this has been incredibly helpful. The photo frames were thrown up just to get them off the floor when we moved in, I love all these ideas. Thank you all so much ❤️

Did you paint the floor yourself? I would remove the wainscot from the curved wall and strip and paint it under the railings. Paint it, the balusters and the baseboards the same white as your door trim, and change the stained posts and handrail to black. Every room can use a touch of black, so here's your opportunity!

Magnolia yes, I did paint the floor in the entryway. In my original post you can see how buys it is. I needed a temporary fix because it was driving me crazy. I painted my bathroom floors one time and if the process is done correctly, they will hold up! I have settled on definitely painting the wainscoting. But it think I’ll rip off whatever design they did and redo it possibly. Debating on black! It’s so trendy right now. We bought an English Tudor and trying to have something timeless.