Screen Porch & Outdoor Living Room Makeover

I am so happy to finally invite you to have a look around our screened porch & outdoor living room makeover.

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Like most of the spaces that have been refreshed at #theTrailHouseReno, it’s a bit of an understatement to say it has been made over.

Because honestly, the only part of the porch that wasn’t touched was the ceiling.

We replaced the screens, rebuilt the railing and refinished the porch floor with a solid stain. But all of this couldn’t happen until the whole facade of the back of the house was removed and replaced. (Clearly, there’s a long story associated with that and I’ll refer you to this post.)

So, to finally have a screen porch to enjoy and be mosquito free is a very big deal.

For the overall design plan, I wanted to use many of the existing pieces of outdoor furniture from our last porch. I just wanted to give the very traditional furnishings a fresh look with a bohemian flair. The intention was to consistently use the bold black and white patterns to give the room a very cohesive look, and yet feel collected and a bit whimsical.

That “collected” look is not something that happens very quickly.  It requires a bit more diligence but I always enjoy the room much more in the end.

The black and white color scheme was also inspired by the kitchen which is just inside these windows.

To give you a more visual reference of where we started, here is a look at the before.

Clearly the porch floor boards needed refinishing and the railing was completely unrelated in design to the rest of the house.  It had to go.

But, the porch had a few challenges beyond just the esthetics. To work with the long and narrow configuration I created separate zones, incorporating the main seating area right off the door of the living room and kitchen.

On the far side by the stairs, I took advantage of the little nook created by the backside of the fireplace.  A cozy little spot for breakfast and a cup of tea seemed like a great use of the space.

For now, oppsite this corner I added a collection of plants and a vintage bar cart.

I’ll be breaking down all of the steps from rebuilding the railing and refinishing the deck boards in following posts, but one of the easiest ways to transform any outdoor space is with vintage inspired outdoor lights.

The new brighter colors of the Hardi Plank on the exterior as well as the soft taupy grey of the deck and railings feel fresh and inviting.  Keeping the beauiful boards of the ceiling natural give the “room” a depth and warmth that would have been lost if we had painted it.

Admittedly, we probably won’t take full advantage of our new outdoor living room until it cools off a bit.  We do live in Alabama and it has been remarkably hot and humid. There is really only so much two ceiling fans can do with heat like that. (It’s so hot, not even our GoldenDoodle, Tucker wanted to photo bomb my photography of the porch.)

I look forward to walking you through all of the steps we took to transform this space and share what we learned along the way.  For instance, I think we were surprised how easy it was to replace the railings and of course, paint, or solid stain in this case, are always huge game changers.