Mantle Refresh

Did I mention that I’ve been revamping our living room a bit and trying to change up the accessories? In our former living room, this painting was really the jumping off point for most of the room's décor:

                           

In our new house, that painting now lives in the dining room, so it was time for our living room to establish it’s own new personality. The first order of business was the mantle, since that area is such a focal point for the room. Here what it looked like a few weeks ago:

I knew what I wanted to move - the magenta photgraph, the white candles, the oldtime family photo - but I wasn't sure what I wanted to replace them with. I thought about a mirror, but that seemed potentially expensive for one large enough, so then I thought about a holiday-related decoration, like the black feathered wreath I’ve had my eye on, but that seemed like too much work, since I would want to change it out with each new holiday/season.

It wasn’t until I was unpacking some pictures a few days ago - botanical sketches scored on sale from West Elm a couple of years ago - that I thought about them as mantle-material. I had originally earmarked them for another wall in the living room and planned to hang them in a grid pattern, but then I realized how nice they could look hung four across and how perfectly they would fit above the mantle. After a few juggling acts where we tried to hold and envision them up there, we decided to take the plunge.

From there, the rest was pretty easy. As usual, I wanted to work with what we already had, which included my Grandma’s candlesticks (white candles were replaced with black), a couple of small books in the right colors, a deliciously aromatic Voluspa candle, and the black vase I snagged at Target a few weeks back (for $2.99!) filled with some deep red flowers from Trader Joe's for $3.99 (they actually came as a two-fer with another small bunch of white roses.) Then I added in a little seasonal fare with a glass vase filled with my black glittered skulls (which I'll probably trade out for pinecones after Halloween and then ornaments after that.)

So, here’s the final product:

 

What do you think?