I’m apartment shopping. My lease is about to expire, and I want to economize, so I’m leaving my fabulous apartment. It’s sad, I really love this place. I’m trying to find something more reasonably priced, and possibly smaller.

And of course I can’t find anything I Iike. One bedroom apartments are rare in this town, and the cheaper two bedrooms aren’t all that appealing. I’m broadening my search to include smaller homes, and in the process I found a house with lots of curb appeal, but sad interiors like this one.

I thought about what I could do to make it a happier space, and of course I fell in love with my plan, which is completely stupid because it’s a rental — I’d never be able to make the kind of alterations the space needs.  Plus it’s out of my price range. I wouldn’t save anything at all moving into this place.

Oh, but it would be so much fun to make this space over. The listing said this was a TV room, but I think it could also function as a space for crafts. (Plus I don’t think my TV would fit in that built-in.)

At first I thought about keeping the paneling, but that white vent cover was a deal-breaker. I’d have to paint it all cream or white. That would also help disguise the weird panel triangle over the built-in, and the paneling strips above and below the windows.

I’d also get some of the faux wood beams, the new ones made of foam, and put a few of them on the white ceiling to add a little more architectural interest to the white-on-white space.

The built-ins merit closer examination. At the very least they need a hardware upgrade, and some decorative moldings. The bifold doors need to go, too. If we keep the room’s original purpose I’d either transform this into a mudroom space, something like this

or make it into a bookshelf or display shelf.

The drawers at the bottom bother me — they look like they’re too small to be useful, and they look hard to pull out, like they would get caught on the carpet all the time. (I bet the drawers were designed to hold the family’s collection of VHS tapes.) It wouldn’t be too hard to remove the drawers and store shoes. Or if this becomes a crafts room, store baskets and bins with infrequently-used supplies.

If we repurposed the built-in for display it might be nice to get glass shelves, and put gold chevron paper behind the shelves.

Now on to the floor, my favorite design element. I think all this boring white needs a HUGE shot of contemporary color, so let’s pull up the old carpet, then stain the concrete a modern neutral blue.  Something reflective, dark, almost gray, kind of like this:

Now the conservative, classic white woodwork has this modernist beauty for contrast. Much better!!

If it were really my place and I kept it as a TV room I’d probably mount the TV on the wood wall, and add room-darkening roller shades to the windows, along with sheers on rods. Use the sheers most of the time, but pull down the shades with there is a glare on the TV.

This space needs a punch of loud color. How about this sofa? It’s inspired by Lingne Rosset’s famous Togo.  Orange and blue are complimentary colors, so the pop between the two will keep anyone from focusing on our conservative white interior.

It needs an area rug. Originally I was thinking a super bright rug, but I want to keep the focus on the sofa and the floor, so ultimately I decided on a round gray rug. This 6 foot rug is a mere $67 on overstock.com.

For lighting, I’d probably keep it simple and get paper lantern floor lamps. I had a great pair made by Adesso once. They each held two 200-watt bulbs, and the lanterns were about two feet across. The photo below doesn’t really do them justice, but it’s the best I have. When I moved into a 600-foot apartment in Maryland the oversized lamps had to go.  Yet another thing from my former house I miss. The lamps don’t seem to be sold any longer, sadly, so to replicate the look you’d probably have to go with an original Noguchi, at over four times the price.

That’s about it, excepting a low cabinet under the TV to hold the VCR and game console. Since the sofa is low to the ground it’s important to bring the TV stand lower, too, so the TV stays on eye level. There are some sexy options on overstock.com, but seeing how I blew the imaginary budget on the sofa and Noguchi lamps I’d probably have to go with the Ikea Lack, weighing in at 50 minimalist dollars.

I’m still not sure how I’d tackle the faux room “entryways” with the turned wood columns. Maybe I could build floor-to-ceiling boxes to hide the mess? Or, since this is a dream anyway, let’s dismantle those.

Most of this is for a TV room. If I went with a craft room it would be different, especially as I’m renting and would need to move my craft space in a few years.  Maybe I’ll think through that space in a few days. Right now I’m still enamoured with this imaginary room, and I’m not ready to give up that vision for a competing vision.