The house looks from the pictures to be a period property or period house styling, the front door style and the fact that you have a dado rail. Keeping that in mind you can go for a more contemporary colour scheme the grey you mentioned, using a two colour scheme as you have the dado rail and as was popular in that era. A slightly darker shade at the bottom a shade lighter on top. By using either Farrow and Ball for example skimming stone at the top and then Elphants breath at the bottom. Or you have Sanderson mist flower and smoke tree, Little Greene also have a great range shallows and Inox. You will need to get their colour charts and check the colours for your hall as light and position will effect the colours. I would agree if you go with the grey then a striped carpet incorporating greys would look lovely but if possible have it as a runner with rod, they come in chrome. This combines the house era with a contemporary touch. You can either keep the striped carpet throughout the hall or go for tiles. You have a dog so wood would get marked and scratched. As for the curtains not really great for a hallway maybe see if yo can use them elsewhere i the house. Plenty of fabric to make a bed runner and cushions. I've added a couple of images to help visuaise. hope this helps

Hi. Many interior designers, like us, offer free consultations to give you an idea of prices and the sort of thing they can help with. I would first look at the sort of people you want to work with (check out portfolios, websites etc) and obviously work with your location and then book a few to work out what you need. This should give you a good idea of what's required and how much you will need to spend - without costing a penny upfront.

Hello Sarah. Ref your skirting, the Ogee and Chamfered are lovely but it may be helpful to consider the ceiling height in relation to the depth of the skirting. We are in a 1970s townhouse - VERY plain architecture - and the ceilings are not high. The skirting is very simple - around 4” and just a slight slope in to the wall along the top edge - so it’s recessive to the eye and gives a lot of wall space (i need space for art on the wall so this is good for me). The other thing I would consider is how much dust they might collect (boring but in my case, the easier to clean the better).

If there is a courtyard outside - then still I’d suggest replacing radiators with tall ones and then adding two steps right across the widest part of the under window - with space for plants or books on either sides of the steps and maybe a cushion for a window seat type effect perhaps ?