Great to hear that you have decided not to paint the brickwork. Can I offer my opinion - I'd suggest painting the garage door and surrounding frame and the adjacent beam and column (currently white) in a dark charcoal/brown to match the ground floor brickwork try Dulux Namandji or Mali. I would redo the retaining wall with large boulders in a more freestyle layout than the current straight line and take up some of the concrete drive near the retaining wall to create a garden on the lower level, curved to still provide access to all of the undercroft unless you wish to enclose part of it with a large full height window. I'd love to see the wrought iron balustrade painted black. My home in the mid sixties had salmon coloured bricks, white window frames and fabulous turquoise gutters! The downpipes were painted to match the bricks thankfully - turquoise might have been a bit over the top! Good luck with your project, would love to see your progress. W

Hi jdublya, happy new year and sorry about the late reply! I ended up doing the safe / lazy thing... left the floor untouched and painted a feature wall deep grey, as well as having two-toned grey curtains to both the sliding doors, and a dark grey area rug. The open plan living / dining gets lots of light, so it's still bright even with all the dark greys. We've paired it with mismatched sofas in light grey and brown, and sage green throws. Overall, it's still a "warm" look and not the cool Scandi look I would have preferred, but it's cozy and the greys have really calmed down the red. It's a lot more to my taste now than the show room furniture was. Bits of the floor finish are coming off though, I think (where the kitchen island stools have been dragged over the years by the past occupant), so in time I will get the opportunity to re-do the floor and it'll no longer be red!

First ,is removing excess furniture an option? Second, why bar fridge in the dining area, that really ruins the look. Seems that you can not move dining table closer to the kitchen because you have light pendant above the table, so can you move piano where your black couch is and couch on the other side of the room instead of creamy colour sofa . I notice the luck of coffee tables and side tables,that's probably why you like to sit around dining table, it is not visitors friendly and doesn't encourage conversation or interaction. I will come back to it have to study photos more. Are the arm chain the other room similar colour to the couch in the dining area?

Thanks for all your feedback. Got the flying saucer shape for over the lowered servery part of kitchen bench. For various reasons including cost did not get other Moroccan lights for over dining table. Have a few options for these 2-3 lights over dining table in the same room and would love any feedback... https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Kitchen-Pendant-Light-Bedroom-Ceiling-Lights-Bar-Lamp-Modern-Chandelier-Lighting-/322886642927 these three colours in a row, but they are only 26.5 Cm diameter and over 2.6m table https://www.beaconlighting.com.au/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/040ec09b1e35df139433887a97daa66f/w/1/w15_croft_v2_1.jpg 34cm diameter, again 3 colours https://www.micalighting.com.au/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/eae3df698e7e4b8becac3bc1de94dd42/l/i/lita40-bamboo-pendant-light-natural.jpg 2 of these larger 40cm lights We are really going for a relaxed warm welcoming look, perhaps a little quirky/fun/bohemian Look forward to feedback!