Earthy Living and Dining Room

Host Lee Snijders tours Thomas's multipurpose space to determine the design direction. The issues in the space include: an awkward furniture placement, lack of a focal point and no definitive design style. Once he meets with design coordinators Summer Baltzer and Chalres Burbridge, they decide to create a contemporary Old World look by combining the homeowner's dark-stained pieces with new furniture and clean-lined accessories.

The design team succeeds in creating a comfortable living and dining room--here's how they do it:

• The walls are painted one shade darker than the existing taupe color to add just a bit more depth.

• The furniture is repositioned to take advantage of the open space. The sofa is set against the wall of windows and the TV is placed on an adjacent wall. Two new dark-stained bookcases add storage to either end of the sofa. Two new floor lamps add ambiant lighting and help create a cozy, well-defined seating area.

• Snijders finds a dining set at an estate sale and updates the seats with dark vinyl coverings to tie them in with the other dark-stained furniture pieces. After he unscrews the seats, he drills a few holes into the center to allow the vinyl to breath. He then cuts foam to size, places it on top of the seat and wraps the two with the vinyl.

• Baltzer hand-paints a jute rug with a contemporary geometric design to fulfill the "earthy meets modern" look they're going for. The rug adds color to the floor and helps to delineate the living and dining spaces. To ensure the design is evenly spaced, she starts in the center, marking and taping off squares until she reaches the edges.