I just finished installing carpet in our house and the finished job looks
great. We were able to avoid any seams in the rooms themselves, except for
two seams in the doorways between rooms.

The "grain" of the carpet is the same in the rooms, but the seams are quite
noticeable. We have tried vacuuming and working the fibers over and over to
get the seam to blend, but they are still quite obvious. Clear indicator
that the carpet was installed by an amateur.

When I installed the carpet, I left a few inches extra overhanging into the
doorways. I then flipped the extra flap upside down and used a straightedge
to make a nice straight cut on the first piece. I then used that edge to
cut the second piece of carpet with a carpet seam cutter. The two pieces
fit together nicely.

Because we only had the two doorway seams, I used self adhesive carpet
seaming tape instead of the iron melting type. It seems to hold the carpet
together tightly.

Our carpet is a light tan colored plush carpet.

Short of installing some kind of transition strip to cover the seams (which
would look even more obvious), is there anything I can do to better hide
the seams?

Would sewing the seams produce a better finished result?

And yes, I know a pro could probably come in and fix this right up, but
it's important to me to do it myself.

Anthony