White rugs and dogs don’t mix. Despite my best efforts to keep our once pure white living room rug looking pristine, it only took a few of James’ catch-me-if-you-can jaunts around the coffee table with dirty feet to seal the rug’s ill-fated deal. We held out as long as we could, but when I found this oversized rug on sale (admittedly via Instagram) I couldn’t it pass up.
The new rug ultimately led to an entire room refresh. (I can’t claim to know how to pull off a printed pastel rug with the black, cream, and emerald color scheme we had going before and honestly, I jumped at the chance to switch things up a bit.) First (major) modification: replacing our black and cream barrel chairs with a second sofa. I dreaded what I thought would be an extensive search for a sofa, but I found one that checked all my boxes almost immediately. Simple, cream, backless, comfortable, and well under $1,000, this sofa bed (cool concept, eh?!) checked every box on my list. As if that weren’t enough, we ended up finding the exact same model for $100 less at The Dump a couple days later. Sold. (Side note, The Dump sounds like a complete disaster of a store but we’ve actually had some luck here.)
With that purchase tackled, I ransacked Homegoods for new pillows, throws, and the odd tchotchke or two. Fun and games aside, the problem solver in me still had two challenges to face in our ‘new’ living room: 1) finding some sort of end table that wasn’t made for a little person (why do they make them so short?!) and the real kicker, 2) covering up that big black hole of a TV on our wall.
Spoiler alert: both of these challenges ended up being DIY projects.
Let’s start with the end table to wedge between our growing family of sofas. As I mentioned, most end and side tables run 20-25″ in height, which look puny next to our tall Chesterfield sofa. Somewhere along the way in my search, I switched to looking at smaller console tables (which gave me a lot more options to choose from) and found a line of unfinished tables that looked promising. I ended up with this one, which despite its inexpensive $100 price tag, is really sturdy and has loads of potential given that its finish can be customized. To offset the wood’s peachy tones, we chose to go with this weathered oak stain, and just one really light, quick coat did it. (And I’m no expert – this was my first time staining furniture and I did it outside, in the dark, in about 30 minutes and was surprisingly really pleased with my work.)
Easy. My prouder moment (mostly because I defied all of Jake’s doubts, fears, and negative expectations) came with hiding that blasted TV. While I argued we could do without it completely (that wall is really meant for art), I guess that’s just not standard American culture and one of these days, we just may learn to watch our Bravo and true crime shows outside of the most comfortable bed in the world. (Ours.)
I thought I had found my answer in Samsung’s The Frame TV. Hallelujah, some tech geniuses actually created a TV that looks like art. Now let me say, this modern marvel does not come cheap, and I was having a hard time convincing Jake that we needed to make this $3K so-called investment. So I did what I had to do — supplemental income, in the form of selling old stuff around the house. I got to work selling leftover home decor, an unused rug, old clothes and purses, outdated iPhones… anything we didn’t use anymore went straight onto Facebook Marketplace. (Which is awesome by the way, as is nextdoor.com.) When I had scrimped and saved enough to show that I was serious, we decided it was time to check out my inspiration in person, if only to give me fuel to continue on with my very tedious endeavor.
That visit to Best Buy put an end to my selling escapades. The Frame is not a bad TV – I think we just went in with unrealistic expectations. Jake was looking for the display quality you’d expect at that price point; I was looking for the stunning work of art the ads and Instagram photos had made it out to be. It didn’t hit either mark in our humble opinions. (Or that of the sales guy either, which only further ramped up Jake’s defense… or is it offense?) There were also some flaws in how we would have to set it up that would complicate things. Defeated, I left there ready to give up on the idea of this particular TV… but not on the concept of somehow concealing the eyesore in the middle of my living room wall.
Pinterest to the rescue. Shockingly, there aren’t that many crazies out there looking to hide their TVs, but eventually I did find my match- a woman who tested out multiple solutions before finding the right answer, here. And with that inspiration, I hatched my plan. It was dependent on finding just the right piece of art to begin with – and lucky me, I found the ideal sized, colored, and priced piece just days later at Homegoods. (As if my love for the store wasn’t strong enough.) I was confident my TV-turned-art plan would work and you know what? IT DID. Pics below (can you tell there’s a TV under there?), as well as a full set of instructions on how we did it. (Because we will be doing this again!)
And for my own memory as much as anything else, here’s where we bought most of these pieces:
Mirror: CB2 | Rug: Overstock | Daybed Sofa: Living Spaces, but actually purchased at The Dump| Side Table: Home Depot | Coffee Table: Restoration Hardware Outlet, in stores here | Chesterfield Sofa: Huntington House
MY DIY VERSION OF THE FRAME TV – HOW TO:
1) Measure your canvas art piece. For reference, ours was 50×50 inches.
2) Measure the space from the wall to the front of your TV. (Essentially, find out how much the TV sticks out from the wall given the mount, cords, etc.) You’ll want to allow for just a bit extra so the canvas doesn’t wind up pressed against the TV screen. I should add here that you want as little space as possible between the TV and the wall so you don’t wind up with a noticeably deep box behind your canvas. We were able to reduce the amount of space a bit by reorganizing some of our cords and devices that were directly behind our TV. Again for reference, our measurement was about 4 inches.
3) Go on the hunt for lumber! We only had to hit Home Depot, but I had fully expected to also have to visit Lowe’s in search of lumber that was the appropriate size. The length and depth shouldn’t be an issue; it’s the width that can be tricky, as you’ll want it to be just right to get as close to your measurement in the previous step. After nearly giving up, we managed to find one type of lumber that was 4.5 inches wide, giving us just enough extra space to keep the TV tucked a little bit back from the lip of the box. Note, our lumber was 3/4″ thick and we had each of our four pieces cut to 49.25″ long. Why that length instead of 50″ to match the canvas? We decided to keep things simple and butt the edges together (see the pattern below), so you have to account for the thickness of the lumber as that will add to the overall length of the frame.
4) Fasten your frame together. As mentioned above, we opted to do a ‘basic butt’ edge versus something fancier like a mitered edge. We basically arranged the four pieces on the floor to create the frame, and attached them by drilling long L-shaped brackets into each corner.
5) Paint the frame. We decided to paint ours the same color as our walls to make it less conspicuous.
6) Attach two pieces of lumber to the back of the frame. You’ll use these to mount the whole frame to the wall. We used some of the scrap wood we brought home with us from the Depot, as it fit well – it should span most of the width of the frame. You’ll attach one piece along the top of the frame, and one along the bottom. We just drilled 3-4 screws from the back top edge of the frame straight into the new piece of wood, and then flipped it over 180 degrees and did the same to the other end.
7) Attach metal plates to the top of the frame. We wanted to be able to easily lift off the canvas and place it aside when we want to watch TV, so we figured the easiest way to do so was to install some sturdy metal plates that would jut out from the underside of the top of the frame. That way, we could lift the canvas up and rest it on the plates to keep it in place. Important – this only works if the thickness of your frame is the same as the thickness of the frame of the canvas – otherwise the canvas won’t sit level with the frame. Luckily in our case, the thickness of both frames was 3/4″.
8) Attach the frame to the wall. We used a stud finder to find the optimal spots to drive our screws through the 2 mounting panels (top and bottom) into the wall, and voila!
