Weekend Hallway Makeover

While I do love really impactful home improvement projects, a quick weekend improvement project can be very satisfying. Recently, we completed a weekend makeover in the main hallway of our house. Hallways are often an overlooked area, but they connect the different rooms of your home and improving them can make a big impact on the overall feeling of your home.

Since moving into our home, we have been working on so many different home improvement projects that I completely forgot that I had plans and ideas for the hallway! Fortunately, I told my ideas to my husband over two years ago and he randomly brought them up the other day. I am so glad that he remembered my plans because I love how our little hallway makeover turned out.

This is how the hallway looked when we moved in.

When we bought it, our home had a bad case of the worst 80s trends and some holdovers from the 70s. Bright teal carpet as far as the eye could see and popcorn ceilings. Right away we changed out the overly large, and much too bright, gold sconces and took down the dried floral arrangement over the mirror.

Hallway sconces before.

Hallway sconces after.

I hung some pictures and was very happy with these simple changes. We had future plans to replace the carpet with wood flooring, and even farther into the future plans to possibly remove the popcorn texture off of the ceilings. We moved into our home in May of 2018. Then, the following February of 2019 this hallway flooded…

This was the hallway, partially gutted, after the flood.

I came home from work and it was raining from the hallway ceiling. The previous owner had repaired a small copper tube in our attic and left it laying on top of the insulation. It froze and burst. The drywall on the walls and ceiling had to be replaced, along with the flooring throughout the entire house. We also had to redo one of our bathrooms that was effected in the flood. While this work was being done, I was also working a very demanding full time job and planning a wedding. I wanted a quick, clean repair for the hallway and did not give it much thought. We were able to keep the sconces that we had installed. I decided to go with a smooth ceiling and bamboo flooring. I painted everything white, rehung my pictures and was happy to have it whole. It did not feel finished to me, but was definitely not on the top of my list.

Two years later when my husband mentioned the plans I had told him about, it was the perfect timing! I was already working on painting trim and touching up the walls in this hallway. We only needed a few supplies for the makeover and I started the same weekend.

Here was the plan:

1. Paint the ceiling black and possibly the back wall (maybe wallpaper).

2. Keep the mirror and make a frame for it.

3. Paint the frame black.

4. Upgrade the ceiling vent.

5. Add a plant in the corner.

I almost forgot to take before pictures, but here is how the hallway looked when I got started.

Our house is mostly painted white, with tall, vaulted ceilings. This hallway is one of the only areas that has a lower ceiling, and it is lower than standard at only 80” high. The main room that leads to this hallway has a large media area that is painted black. These features are why I wanted to add some black to the hallway. Also, dark colors recede so black helps to make the hallway feel larger and more open. Pretty quickly I decided against wallpaper for the back wall and painted it the same black as the ceiling. Instead, I planned to hand draw a pattern on the wall with Sharpie paint markers. (I previously did this in another room and wrote a post about it). This time I decided to use gold markers on the black and to do a vintage/modern, geometric design based on connecting circles.

This is the design in progress.

Once the wall design was complete, my husband used trim pieces to make a floating frame for the mirror. I found a plant that I like and a pot that fits the style of our house. I already had a rug that I like and kept it.

Here is the completed hallway. I love how it turned out! Funnily, one of the things I like the most is the upgraded ceiling vent. The simple changes made a huge difference and ties this previously boring hallway in with the rest of our house.

More detailed pictures below. What do you think - are hallways worth decorating? Let me know in the comments.

As always, thanks for following along!