Personally I would always go for a consistent style throughout the house if at all possible. Expensive if you have to make a lot of changes to achieve it. I guess it comes down to how much it bothers you.

I love the drama of the brick wall and it is a major design feature of the house... however, there is a LOT of exposed brick with the fireplace surround also being exposed and you have mentioned you dont like the colour. Have you thought about covering up the other walls rather than this one, to tone down the brick work? I just wonder if you hate the amount of brick and you are taking it out on this wall because that's where it is concentrated while overlooking the rest of the house? Just food for thought... more food for thought. BTW I love the idea of hanging plants (though watering them might be a pain), I love the idea of a dramatic feature pendant and I also love the idea of the rug, all will soften or harmonise the drama. www.billyhoostudio.com

Hi Stan, thanks for your comments. Yeah I always put the outcome on my posts, I think is the least I can do as a thank you. The advice everyone gives is priceless. In another one of my posts I was prevented from making a big and costly mistake with my outdoor kitchen thanks to people’s suggestions so I am really thankful everyone’s input. I would have executed some other ideas here but given my budget and time constraints (we have a big get together next week and wanted to have it done prior) I decided to go with the easiest one for now. This will buy me some time to look for the perfect look (for me) whilst still having somebody of wall decoration in place. Re the corridor , is on the plan to add a skylight in the future. You know the worst part? This is a newly built home and I had asked for the skylight to be in the corridor but they misplaced and put it right in front of a big window, where no light is needed at all - and we didn’t pick up the mistake in the plants :(. Anyway, we will fiz it later when budget allows :). Would love to see the after picture on your corridor - only the before one was posted. Cheers

Before choosing any surface, do the finger test, unless you are house clean slave. The finger test is see what marks show with a slightly greasy(hand lotion) fingers. Most blacks show finger marks big time. Same with counter tops. Best test is scatter with bread crumbs, if that disturbs you forget it, otherwise you will be kitchen cleaning all day. The same goes for concealed handles, they quickly get full of crusted much and chip easy. A working kitchen needs to be practical, easy to clean and totally family proof.