Good Things Came to a Room That Waited: Modern Cottage Living Room Design, Wilton CT
Updated: Aug 24
Fairfield County Modern Cottage Living Room Design,
Before & After | B3 Design
It's a familiar story... many of our clients sit on indecision for far longer than they mean to. Weeks turn into months, months turn into years, and suddenly one child has left for college and the room is still unfurnished, or furnished in a way that quietly frustrates rather than fortifies. That was where this sophisticated family found themselves: incredible personal style, a fantastic art collection sitting in storage, and years of memories that simply weren't happening in this room the way they could have been.
The Bones
How to remodel an added-on antique room? The living room was a 1920s addition to an historic 1880s home in Wilton. The scale was lovely, the light was good, and the original fireplace wall had real potential. It just needed a plan.
The Brief
The husband is an accomplished Ironman triathlete; the wife is petite. Two very different sized people, with very distinct design opinions, needed to be equally comfortable on the same sofas. Add a rambunctious dog, festive groups of teens and twenty-somethings, holiday gatherings, and team hockey dinners, and the brief needed to answer a tough question:
How do you make this room unique, comfortable, personal and close to indestructible, while still feeling like a considered, elevated entertainment lounge?
The Work
How do we create functional cohesion in a quirky room? We gave the fireplace wall a complete redo, prepping it for a Samsung Frame television with a custom, minimalist brass frame so the screen could disappear into the room as another piece of art when it wasn't in use. The existing built-ins were extended and turned into full storage drawers to corral everyday clutter, with performance cushions on top for guest overflow seating. Every detail was carefully selected for cohesion: custom brass grilles for the existing radiators and coordinating hardware throughout.
The fireplace itself was completely refaced with a new marble surround, a warm and inviting gas unit, and brand-new millwork details built by the very talented Steve Shoals Contracting. Those details are especially meaningful to us because we designed them to echo the very unique original door casing details found in the home's 1880's dining room. The new work speaks the same language as the historic parts of the home.
Ambient, integrated millwork lighting was added to a bookshelf wall whose backs, sides and edges were color-drenched in Farrow & Ball Douter. The natural wood tone of the shelf tops was kept for organic texture and warmth. As part of the plan, the lights were intentionally put on Antique Brass Corston rotary dimmers. So the room wouldn't light up like a stadium, we made them a lower light output than standard, so they could emit soft sophisticated light in this very moody room.
A two-tiered Julian Chichester Garcon Coffee Table with vellum plinth base anchors the room. The custom leather sofas with brass plinth bases were a labor of love with our friends at Apollonian House in Wilton, built to be comfortable for two very different sets of dimensions without ever looking like a compromise. Periodic visits to the workroom mid-production ensured dimensions, angles and cushion filling were just right for husband and wife.
Color was where the client's personality really came through. We color-drenched the room in one of Farrow & Ball's new colors, Douter, to satisfy a genuine love of green, without veering too traditional or too expected. The low ceiling was painted Benjamin Moore Chelsea Gray, giving the family the enveloped, cozy feeling they wanted rather than a stark white slab overhead.
The Details
This is the part of the process we love most, the very personalized layer of vintage and custom pieces that give a room its soul.
A stunning 1970s walnut console table found on 1stDibs got a second life when we had its chrome edging sprayed in glossy black automotive paint by Brennan and his team at Classic Refinishers of New Milford. We wanted it to melt into the room and catch the light of the lamps above it rather than compete with them. Custom gold-lined black shades from The Accessory Store in Stamford finished off a pair of 1980s Brutalist table lamps, another 1stDibs find, sitting atop the console.
The client wanted to build on an existing vinyl collection, so we found and customized a one-of-a-kind vintage Kent Coffee walnut and rosewood cabinet through the wonderful team at Stamford Modern of Westport, CT. We removed the lower cabinet drawers, installed doors with speaker mesh, and built in venting and cord control, all so Radek Nesnidal of Advanced Home Media could work his magic and get the piece functioning as real, everyday audio equipment while still looking like a museum find.
Moody, layered art grounds the whole space and ties every detail together. Even the finishing touches were considered: custom finials throughout, and standard light switches, plates and outlets swapped for antique brass Corston plates and rotary switches, small details that better represent the age and character of this beautiful home.
The Takeaway
If there's one thing this project reminds us, it's that a well-loved home doesn't need to start over, it needs a plan, a point of view, bespoke personal details, and the right hands to execute it. This family had incredible taste and a storied collection of art and objects all along. What they needed was a room built to hold all of it, and them.
Have a room that's been waiting too long? Click here to discover what it could become.
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