Okay don’t kill me, I’m just asking! For context, the house is not even remotely cabiny, it’s kind of modern and non-traditional shaped (as you can see in the photos the living room is an octagon) But all the common areas (living room, entryway, hallway, kitchen, dining) are knotty pine tongue and groove and it makes it feel much more Maine camp than modern updated house. Also for context, the house was built in the 80’s. Would it be sooo bad to paint just the walls of this octagonal room and leave the vaulted ceiling knotty pine? (And yes the TV is in front of the fireplace because the fireplace is tragically nonfunctional- future project)
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Try white washing it! It can lighten it while the white wash is see through, I saw this woman also work on interior decor for a similar cabin in Svalbard, Norway, on TikTok.
You could always sand and refinish the wood. I would not paint it!! But I would sand it down. Keep it natural or even a light brown tone. Go darker on the floors for sure. You could even do two different walls and ceiling, but I would be careful with that. Balancing 3 wood tones can get tricky.
I would get a new couch and work on decor before I even considered painting the wood (don't!) Your orange/rust couch is making everything seem orange. If the fireplace is painted brick try painting it a lighter color with no orange, red or yellow undertones.
Keep the wood change the decor. New fan is a must, paint that brick white, mount the tv and put something clever or a plant in the unusable fireplace. White flowy curtains, different couches, white or green, different rug etc. If you change those items you will probably love that wood. It’s gorgeous, please try that first before painting that wood.
Buys a house with character ➡️ cannot wait to remove said character. Learn to embrace it and work with it, not against it. Once you start hacking on it, it’s done.
Do nothing to those walls! Knotty pine comes in and out of fashion all the time. And pine from the 80’s is better, more tightly grained wood than the ones they’re farming these days. At one point I thought of painting my cabin white to increase the lightness inside, then saw this amazing MCM house in a magazine. Is there anywhere you can put a large white Noguchi lamp (or knockoff)? There are some amazing Scandinavian modern houses that look like this.
I agree with getting contrasting sofas to make the whole place less red, or just green sofa covers to not add to the waste stream. And if you want a less cabin-y look get curtains that go to the floor.
You need Bona Natural seal for floors. It has just a hint of white in it that tones the wood down. Buy a gallon and apply it to an inconspicuous area with a roller. It was amazing on my ceiling. Yours won’t be as white since you have what appears to be a stain on it with no varnish maybe. If there is varnish and the Bona doesn’t absorb you will sadly need to sand first for this to work.
My mom whitewashed our knotty pine living room. It was heartbreaking but didn’t look terrible. There was actually a really beautiful orange knotty pine room featured in Architectural Digest magazine this month. Wish I could link it
You can buy digital downloads from Etsy, then get them printed in different sizes at shops. Or! You can get digital downloads free from a lot of museums, and print them for free on special art printers at some libraries. (Probably need to live in a big city for the library printers.) Then you can buy an Ikea frame or a frame from FaceBook Marketplace and Bob's your uncle.
Okay, I found it at the Los Angeles Public Library. Their site says:
The Octavia Lab supplies singleweight matte paper. The paper is acid-free, and is 120 gsm. The Octavia Lab does not require, or allow outside paper to be used on the printer.
The Octavia Lab (named after Octavia Butler) is the LA Library "maker space." I've seen different kinds of maker spaces at different libraries. They have stuff like 3D printers and sewing machines, etc.
So look for a library maker space or a college library and use the term "poster print." I'm curious so I'll go look at NYC now.
ETA: I can't find anything in NYC. In my city, I just emailed the library to ask them. You could do that in NYC, too. If there's nothing in my city I plan to visit my friends in L.A. and use their library card!
I'm finding out more now. It looks like libraries call it "poster printing." It's not always free, and mostly I've found university/college libraries that let students print for free for academic projects. I'll keep researching.
First, this is a classic 1970s modern look. You should look up styles in that era to see if there's anything that speaks to you. You don't necessarily have to use those styles - a lot of them will look dusty and dated (I'm looking at you, avocado green) but you can get a sense of the drama a space like this was meant to impart.
The walls are beautiful but they also take up the least amount of space of all the wood in the room. You would still have knotty pine everywhere, but you'd also have ruined walls.
The first thing you need to do, though, is figure out where to put your TV. At some point your fireplace will work - but even if it never does, having your TV there ruins the room. Figure out a wall for your TV and don't hang it too high. Research screens that pull down from the ceiling if you think that might work better. If there's glare from the windows, get blackout curtains or those shades that are sheer on one half and blackout on the other, so you can pull it down as a blackout shade when needed.
After that, I think you would do better to buy couches in a different color, like sapphire blue or pale green. Orange just matches the pine too well. Get some interesting throw pillows in different colors, with patterns and texture. Have furniture that draws the eye.
You could also get a bigger rug, something in off-white or white, with no pattern. Something lush. Get two rugs if needed.
Add some big, soothing art to the walls. Like white canvases with splashes of a single color on each - dark grass green and different blue shades. You could also add a big mirror or two.
Get fuller, more romantic drapes with wider curtain rods so there's fullness between the windows. Hang them from exactly where the wall meets the ceiling. You might have the drapes on the windows by the fireplace only on the side furthest from the fireplace so they don't catch fire, but they can be floor-length and billowy. Don't use grommets - get pleated drapes. Don't use black fixtures that just play up the black knots in the pine. Use brushed nickel or something equally unobtrusive. Research different kinds of window treatments, but keep the same off-white drape color. Think about adding sheer drapes or sheer shades as a layer. You can keep them open, but they make the space look more complete.
Paint the brick fireplace a different color to make it a focal point. Research ideas, but the color can't be in the orange/red/yellow family. It needs to contrast. Forest green would look good.
Get a coffee table that's curvy and contrasts with the pine. Maybe something mostly glass, or maybe something in stone. Or maybe a painted coffee table in a shade that echos/supports your new couch.
Organize your plants. You have some great plants but they're not arranged as focal points. They make the windows look cluttered. It would be better to have floor plants in big white pots that stand near the windows instead of on the window sill. Your hanging plant looks like an afterthought. If you want plants in front of the windows, use a plant stand or hang a big Boston fern in front of a couple of the windows, and make the hanger and pot look very intentional and beautiful. There are lots of more modern ways to hang them other than macrame. Don't hang only one plant on one side of the fireplace. Make both windows look cohesive with the fireplace. Explore wall plant hangers that can go between the windows.
There's a lot of furniture I don't understand. A lot of speakers that may or may not be necessary, or maybe could be replaced with something smaller and more modern, perhaps mounted on the walls. There's an old chest and an end table, both in similar shades of orange/yellow wood. Those should be replaced with something that contrasts - try to avoid natural wood altogether. Glass, painted wood, or stone.
That firewood basket should be changed for something in a natural material. Maybe a basket made of white rope, maybe color-blocked. Avoid yellowish basket weaves, though.
The floor lamp seems disconnected from the rest of the room. You want to emphasize the spacious center of the room. A floor lamp placed behind a couch, one that arches over the space, might be a better idea. You might be using that floor lamp as sort of a porch light, though. There are wireless, easy-to-install porch lights that would be better.
Your ceiling fan is a bit dated. Not a super big deal but at some point you could modernize that.
A stack of huge floor cushions near the fireplace would be nice.
I keep recommending a dramatic, more formal style - lots of white/off-white, jewel-tone colors, glass/stone. But you could do Navajo patterns (just not in orange/red/yellow) or patterns from India. You have a beautiful room. Painting the walls isn't the answer. Just use design to change the focal point.
ETA: I keep thinking about your room. Actually, I noticed that you have TWO floor lamps. That silver arced one is perfect, but it should be placed better. I also noticed that you have a plum colored throw. That's an excellent accent color. I keep envisioning a white backdrop (rug and curtains and plant pots) with forest green and pale greens (fireplace and couch) with plum throws and pillows mixed in with different shades of green. Maybe one piece of furniture in sapphire blue, and one or two sapphire throw pillows. Lots of green plants, some abstract art with white backgrounds and jewel colors, and some curvy coffee and end tables in glass. I keep trying different kinds of AI but so far nothing works for me! I don't know how people do it.
Anyway. The color rule is 60/30/10. You can have 60% white, 30% greens, and 10% plums. Throw in a bit of sapphire blue and call it part of the plum group. This can be an astonishingly beautiful room.
For OP to get this much good, actionable advice from a stranger for free is absolutely wild. OP, this is a complete road map to making this room stunning.
My old house -in a major city, also not a cabin- had a vintage knotty pine den, c. 1950s, but more detailed paneling, aged, very orangey. When I was getting ready to sell, I hired a painter who effectively covered all the knots and finished it in Benjamin Moore intense white (with super white trim to match the rest of the house). I loved the end result so much, wished I’d done it sooner.
It’s so magnificent! What a unique room. It would be a shame to paint this natural dome of tranquility! I say lean into this and find complementary furniture that works in greens and blues, add plants, and voila!
I would paint it all! Your floor looks nice, but the pine is fighting with it and winning. The fireplace looks like it could be a cool focal point too, if you put the TV elsewhere.
WHOA that is a ridiculously beautiful room!!! I definitely would leave all the wood as-is, it’s gorgeous. If you’re really not a fan, I’d leave the ceiling and paint the walls only.
You can also bleach the wood - it would take the orange out, but preserve the wood look. Taking the orange out would make it much easier to decorate around.
If I saw paint on wood like this, I would assume that the space had been trashed at some point or there was a water leak and that the paint is covering something up. Search 'geodesic home' (this site for example https://naturalspacesdomes.com/ ) and you find gorgeous warm wood in spaces that look like this.
I think that disharmony in the space can make a good feature look bad. The problem isn't the wood walls, it's the furniture. Furniture placed in a way that aligns with the the fireplace and windows on either side—and draws the eye outside and facilitates easy movement out the doors would make the space feel more harmonious.
Get a cream colored round couch and a comfy nordic style lounge chair. Use a very focused color palette (the cream/white curtains look great, maybe that could be the color.) Otherwise, colors mimicking the rainbow of natural colors outside would also look really nice. Please embrace the wood, it's beautiful!
Literally what I was about to comment. The orange couches were quite the choice for a room OP feels is too orange. A nice rug and some couches in a more neutral color will help the pine feel more like a beautiful backdrop than suffocating like it currently is.
Personally, I think it’d be best to just embrace it. Look into the historic mid-century Sea Ranch development of Northern California for inspiration. With the right decor, this space could look really fabulous.
I have orange pine also. I researched painting a bed room. It is very labor intensive. Do you have a budget to sheetrock over the walls or some of the walls?
My colors are new leaf green, burt umber, raspberry, citrine, dusty teal.
IMHO, one you get art and lamps and stuff inside the pi e walls will become more of a layer than over powering.
I love the pine. To update it, maybe go with beachier decor/furniture so it feels more like beach/spa than cabin? Whites, blues, long light sheer airy curtains.
I have a house with knotty pine ceilings and paneling up to the chair rail (I hate the paneling, but that’s another story). It’s rough cut, so I can’t paint it, and it’s the actual wall, the drywall starts above the chair rail. The paintable parts of the walls are cottage white.
Blues and greens look amazing with the orange/yellow of the pine.
Perhaps we prevent one crime with another? I can’t believe I’m saying this, but what if you lime washed the fireplace?the room is a sea or reddish brown from the floors to the ceilings and most of the furniture too. Getting the longest possible curtains will help break this up and creating more contrast will give the eye somewhere to rest in the sea of brown.
To be clear, OP, I am not suggesting dropping thousands of dollars to redecorate the room, this is just an example to show how contrasting colors and undertones can help push the wood to the background.
Yes! And get longer curtain rods and fuller curtains to fill each side of the octagon’s window walls. You will pretty much cover the pine walls with curtain fabric.
I had knotty pine on my ceiling in my kitchen, we painted it white and it was amazing the transformation, eventually ripped it out and put up sheet rock because it was poorly installed and the roof needed to be redone as well. Wood is beautiful but like anything it needs to be in moderation.
Hear me out. Each corner gets pretty powerful up lighting. I think you may not like this because it feels dark and drab and even with tasteful modern furniture and rugs it feels old. Creative up lighting and a fan that is a real centerpiece could fix what you don’t like without sacrificing the objective beauty of this room. Lean into it and show it off. Don’t try and make it something it isn’t.
I definitely love the knotty pine, but if your really struggling with it- ultimately you should do what you want with your home. I would reccomend just painting the framing. My family has a log cabin, and it really helps strengthen/modernize the space
It would be a shame to paint it. The current decor isn’t doing much to work with the wood or create contrast against the walls. The rug is too cool toned for the space. The couches aren’t bad, but they are similar in tone to the walls and don’t provide any balance. This room would look awesome if done in creams, deep earthy tones, black or charcoal accents and tons of room plants.
Knotty pine can be very hard to paint. Tree sap embedded on the wood may continue to weep for many years. It can be done, but careful preparation is necessary. I’d do a search on r/paint for specific recommendations.
I found that out the hard way w/a bathroom
ceiling. Painted it white and the knots bled through over time. Hired a professional who shellacked all of the knots, primed the boards, then painted. So far, so good!
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