How do I make over our hideous new front room?

[Cara]

We're moving house, just across the pasture to a bigger house on the ranch. Our new front room is entirely panelled with ugly 70s imitation wood with a shiny finish and no grain. We still want it to look like a ranch house, but not like John Denver's vacation home. Is there anything I can do to improve it, as it looks very dark. We have dark brown leather furniture and there's only one window in there. The walls are adobe underneath, but I don't know what condition they are in as the house was built in the early 1900s. It would probably be a bad idea to remove the panelling. My husband was thinking it might be cool to panel it with barnwood over the top, then realised finding that much barnwood that all matched would be pretty much impossible as most buildings are rock out here.

 

[MissPrissy]

Paint it and put up molding. You can almost fool the eye into thinking it is a type of wainscoting. We did it to a bedroom amd my in-laws did it to their den.

 

[cjeanean]

My husband has been a painter for about ten years, and when I asked him about this he gave me a few options. I'd like to explain it to him in more detail, can you post a few pics???? I know we can help u with this, we've done so many remodels and new construction houses it's not even funny!!!

 

[equine chick]

When we moved into our house it was covered in paneling. There are a few options. You could paint it, a white or ivory color, walpaper in those textured patterns that are meant to cover paneling with or cover with a paneling that looks more like real wood. There are a lot of nice ones out there at your home iimprovement stores.

 

[mamaboyd]

Too bad you couldn't find enough barn board, we used some from our old shed when we made our daughter's room, we used it halfway up the wal. like wainscotting. We also have panelling in our kitchen and livingroom, our house was built in the 1850's and likely remodelled sometime in the 1950's, we painted the panelling so it looks much better than the yucky brown stuff that was on it. You can also buy sheets of tin looking wallpaper and it is textured so that you can paint it as well. Home Depot sells it. It comes in silver and a goldish tinge.

 

[Parson's Wife]

If you paint....lightly sand & prime...
You can also mud the cracks, sand, prime, and paint. Add wide trim and it will look like sheet rock.

 

[Dixiedoodle]

I have done both painting and putting real wood over the paneling. I did the prime and paint and then we collected enough real wood to redo the paneling. It worked and it was something that I could live with until we had enough wood! Our office is still painted paneling and it's a nice tan with black trim and I did the black and tan tiles. It looks really good!

 

[tx_dane_mom]

Yea, you can paint it easy enough, but after painting paneling myself, i'd recommend filling in the cracks & primering the paneling before you paint...just some notes after the fact of error on my part

 

[Cara]

Wow you're all full of ideas. I'll see if I can get some pictures of it in its current state. It's all in good shape, but the colour is ugly and there is just too much of it. Maybe if we paint two walls and leave two it might lessen the effect.

 

[CarriBrown]

A coat of paint goes a long way. It's cheap and can really change a room. Maybe you can find a nice rug, too.
Yes, post some pictures so we can take a look at it! I'd be tempted to tear all of that panel down. Could you tear it off of only one wall to see what you are dealing with?
Only one time have I torn something out and (sort of) regretted it. In our last house, there was a book case that stuck out from the wall. It was totally gross and made the small living room look even smaller. I had a bad day at work, came home, and decided to beat the carp out of the bookcase and just rip it out. Whoops... turns out that the people before us carpeted AROUND the bookcase

.
But hey, I felt better and the room looked bigger.
I say rip it out.