And here's the after.

We don't have a lot of furniture to go in this room yet but we're moving in tomorrow and it will likely have two small brown leather chairs with a table and lamp between them until I find a small sofa to go in there instead. I also need to figure out what I'm going to hang over the ugly faux lava rock fireplace's mantel that's in the same room.

Just for fun, here's a picture of the fireplace I'll be working around.

Very nice. So cozy too!

Hard to believe what some people will do to their walls. It looks great now!

Maybe they were on an HGTV makeover and the designer was trying to glam it up....

Oh man, blast from the past...we had the same type of fireplace the house I grew up in. Loved that stupid fireplace, but then, I was just a kid.

Glitter! Oh my! Actually, that kinda reminds of when I thought that this was a great look for my walls:

Isn't it nice to have a neat, clean look instead? I love the change in your room. I hope you'll share photos when the room is finished/furnished!

Big difference! I love how you are transforming your new house!

Wow what a difference a coat of paint can make! It looks miles better. The fireplace makeover above looks like it would really work for yours too!

Olychick, I really like how that fireplace facelift looks! I've considered something like that but my goal is to hopefully have the fireplace completely redone with new stone in the future so I haven't decided if trying to paint it would be worth it in the interim. I haven't ruled it out though so I might have to keep the example you shared as an inspiration photo. :)

I love paint and your room is another example of why.

We had a brick fireplace that went up to the ceiling. We drywalled over the area above the mantle (which was almost exactly 8 ft wide by 4 ft high).

I liked it so much better once the brick was "toned down" to just being around the fireplace.