" What would you do to lighten up this room? "

What room?

Remove the art over sofa..add a light color throw blanket and pillows...pull sofa away from wall and be sure the front legs of all furniture are on the rug. dont hang anything over sofa until you can find something new and bigger for that wall..I would look for a vertical instead of horizontal piece of art..canvas with light background.

Get a floor lamp for the corner next to the wall cut-out. Without seeing the rest of the room I can't say much more beyond that. The art over the sofa is too small and hung too high. I don't think reframing it would help. It's nice - it just doesn't belong there. Reframing is surprisingly expensive. I think you would be better off using it in a different room and getting something new for over the sofa.

Tiburon Spectacular Views · More Info

McLean Glamour · More Info

Paint the walls white to lighten the room. I wouldn’t do gray with brown floors and brown furniture.

Your paint color is a big part of the problem and I don't think grey owl is going to help matters. Will share a photo of the room during the day and also share photos of the adjoining rooms that are already painted grey owl?

A couple more lamps will help and I would consider a brighter rug with some color.

Put a table lamp in the corner where the sofas meet. Spread a colorful throw on the back of each sofa. Look at sofa slipcovers.

Test new paint colors by painting a very large sample on foamcore board- 24 by 36 inches would be good. Two-story rooms are expensive to paint, so it's worth spending on paint samples.

Agree with larger and lower for the art, as shown in kandrewspa’s examples.

Gray paint is not longer trending. Beige is trending big time and I think it would look great with your dark brown furniture and floors. A pale beige.

Warm white walls and a lighter rug will make a big difference.

Your room requires some fine-tuning. See the layout supplied with the altered photo.

• Move the seating at least 5" away from the walls
• Place the seating so that the front legs are located on the area rug
• Move the end table you have in the corner to the other side of the chair
• Add a tall plant in the corner with an LED uplight placed in the base.
• Select much larger colorful art for over the sofa
• Select an accent color for your pillows.

There's nothing wrong with the paint color on your walls.

If you think the room needs more light then consider a picture light over the wall canvas. Getting the seating placed on top of the rug would go a long way to helping the lighting situation. Right now your brown seating fades into the brown floor.

How about linen colored slipcovers for your couches?

Thank you everyone I love all of your ideas. The reason I am saying gray owl is because we just painted and redid our kitchen and family room that color which actually looks more like a light blue/ green with day light. I will send pictures of the adjoining rooms and also the room with light. I love the idea of the big plant in the corner! I’m ready to move the painting above which was painted by a family friend! I like the idea of all covers.

Sofa covers?

Thank you for clearing that up about the Gray Owl. Bev is right, there is nothing wrong with it. Follow all of her ideas exactly and incorporate some of the others. These people know what they are talking about.

For the art over the sofa, get another matte for it, the gold does not go with the gray owl...and I do agree wrong scale there. Have fun!