page 8

12/11/2012 2:27:17 PM

post the art work you like...need some stuff for my apartment (cant spend a lot of monies)

12/12/2012 10:41:51 AM

That's a really open-book question. Totally depends on the style. I like all different kinds depending on the space. (different styles and mediums).

Etsy has a lot of choices across all styles of course.

Also, These are some sites that have a fairly wide-array of different types of prints for reasonable costs (I got these from a blog awhile back and have used a couple of them):

http://www.20x200.com/
http://www.littlepaperplanes.com/
http://www.mammothandcompany.com/
http://society6.com/
http://www.thecalmgallery.com/

Consignment stores and thrift stores are also worth checking. 99% of the time the stuff there is crappy, but we have gotten lucky once or twice. Also, sometimes even though the art is horrendous, you can pick up art at a thrift store just for the frame and remember you can spray paint or add matting yourself to totally change the look of a frame and for a couple bucks sometimes it's a real cost saver vs buying a new frame.

Don't forget that lots of things can be framed as art too. We bought a vintage 1912 map of Costa Rica that came out of an incomplete Atlas someone found. We got it on etsy fairly cheap and have it framed in our dining room. It means something to us because we spent our honeymoon there and it looks much nicer than some modern print trying to look old. We've also framed some fabric with cool prints. In some cases the fabric stores gave us the fabric for free because it was small enough that they just counted it as a sample.

If you are into anything modern or abstract and are familiar with photoshop you can always make your own art and take it to Kinkos (oversized print costs are not severely expensive and if you are going to frame them behind glass or plexi they look plenty good enough). If you are interested in this, look around on etsy or vintage sites and get inspired to make something yourself.



[Edited on December 12, 2012 at 11:05 AM. Reason : ]

12/12/2012 10:57:06 AM

thanks for the advice....i will check out the websites and see how it goes

12/13/2012 10:46:31 AM

We bought two of those West Elm glass pendants I posted on the previous page last night when they were 20% off during one of their online flash sales. We also had $100 to West Elm so the total cost was like $100 for both pendants which is not bad because I haven't seen anything else I've liked as much that was cheaper.

Unfortunately we will have to wait for awhile to install them because if we lower the bar-height counter this spring it will lower the cord length to keep the pendants at the distance above the surface we like. Plus, there is a little electrical work involved since we do not have pendants in that area now (and this is on the 1st floor of a 2-story house so we don't have attic access to this space). It will be a little bit of a pain to install but I think it will be worth it. I hate the way our lighting is set up in our kitchen atm.

These are the pendants:




[Edited on December 18, 2012 at 1:31 PM. Reason : pic]

12/18/2012 1:12:20 PM

My wife and I went to an antique mall today on the way home from an errand. Normally we don't buy anything there because 99% of the stuff it is nowhere near our style, and the few things we have seen there that we like are either to expensive or we just don't need that piece.

We got extremely lucky today though. I LOVE 60's Selig chairs that came out of Denmark. In pairs they typically sell for >$2000 when reupholstered. We happened to see in a picture on their website that they had a chair that I thought was a Selig so we made it a point to stop in today.

It was indeed an authentic Selig designed by Kofod Larsen and in great condition other than the horrendous fabric. We were able to haggle and got it for $350 We will probably reupholster it ourselves for <$100. (I apologize for the crappy cell phone pics):



We will most likely reupholster it in a light grey or natural linen either with some simple button tufting or without like one of these two:




Totally geeking out over it tonight

[Edited on January 13, 2013 at 1:13 AM. Reason : ]

1/13/2013 1:13:12 AM

i want some advice or suggestions with my kitchen. I have to pick out granite tomorrow or friday and I need to decide on a stain for my floors by tomorrow. Flooring has been laid and they are waiting for me to decide.

I went with white oak floors

the cabinets are going to be white

walls will be tony taupe SW / satin finish:

here are a few pictures of the kitchen before renovations



In picture #2 there will be a granite extension that will make the counter top a few feet longer.
I am getting a stainless steel stove and stainless dishwasher.

My concerns for granite are these: i prefer the darker granites for contrast but darker granite can make a space look smaller if it is already small and I have no idea what color to stain the floors.


All i know is that I do not like the lighter, yellow or golden stains for the flooring and I dont want the granite to clash.

the ceiling fan is getting removed and we are putting in recessed lighting

[Edited on January 30, 2013 at 2:08 PM. Reason : sdf]

1/30/2013 2:07:41 PM

I tend to like the mid-tone wood colors for floors, especially if you go with white cabinets. I can really like the lighter colors too but if you go light, I stay way from the yellow look. Too dark can just be hard to keep clean and you lose some of the wood character and I am not always a fan of that.

Something in the walnut or teak family of colors and you can obviously stain an oak to look like that. We just did that with a birch. That color tends to work best on maple, birch, walnut, and a few others but oak can really look good with a really white range of stains.

But for example:

.

Not too dark, not too light and nice and brown without too much red or yellow. It is very forgiving to decorate around.

I also tend to like a lighter granite or quartz. Something in the greyish family looks great with white cabinets: better than black or a super dark in my opinion. Some grey quartz products are cheap enough to be competitive with granite and I personally prefer quartz, but you can definitely find some grayish granites. You can go grey and get it dark enough for contrast without it being black or too dark.

If you are going for something less "light" in the kitchen, or something that comes across as more masculine than neutral (like the counter and backsplash in the previous pictre) you can do something dramatic with the counter and backsplash like this:



^Darker grey granite or quartz (can't tell) with a simple black backsplash. Gives a little more urban feel. Couple that with some mid-tone floors like the previous picture and it would probably look pretty nice with the taupe walls.

I just happen to think something in the grey range goes better with white cabinets than dark/black.

See:



vs



The super dark on white in the 2nd picture is a little too stark a contrast to me.


If you are OK with a very sleek contemporary feel, going with a grey or taupe glass backsplash tile instead of a porcelain or ceramic or something can give another nice dimension as well.


[Edited on January 30, 2013 at 2:44 PM. Reason : ]

[Edited on January 30, 2013 at 2:44 PM. Reason : ]

1/30/2013 2:18:53 PM

thanks ... good advice.

i am kind of leaning that way myself. I love the color you and your wife picked for your floors but am afraid it might be just a shade dark. i really like the color of the flooring you posted above in pic 1.

i have an appt. at the stone yard in a couple of days and am dreading it. i know i will be overwhelmed.

1/30/2013 2:48:36 PM

No problem.

Thanks And yeah, if I had my choice I would have done a hair lighter myself, but the next lighter color in that series we picked (pre-finished) had a little bit of yellow to it and so we ended up going with the one we chose because we loved it overall still. If you are getting to truly custom stain, something like the first floors I just posted would look great probably.

Bring a sample of anything you have (even if all you have picked out at this point is the wall color). Do you have a drawer you can bring along? If not, since it's white, grab a scrap piece of wood and paint it white if you have any paint around. Bring that and the wall color or something if nothing else.

If you have any time, go to lowes or HD or some other flooring store if anyone has any free samples of their flooring. Pick out a free sample of something that has a stain in the general shade you like as well to use as a reference. Even if it's not the your own floor, it's better than nothing.

In my opinion, coordinating it with other elements plays a bigger role in the overall look than what counter you like completely on its own. Don't get something you don't like, but a piece you might like the best in isolation might not be the best choice when paired with the surrounding items.

[Edited on January 30, 2013 at 3:00 PM. Reason : ]

1/30/2013 2:57:04 PM

So, we may have to put off really working on our bonus room for awhile with some commitments coming up for me at work, but we've started to get the major pieces together for it to go with the design we laid out.

-30 year old sectional my parents were going to throw out that we are going to rip down to the frame and totally redo (got this for free and even after the total redo will be about 1/3 the cost of buying a similar sofa new)
-50+ year old lounge chair that we are going to reupholster (will end up being about 1/2 the cost of the new chairs we had on our list)
-50+ year old buffet that is going to be used as our media console. (Probably about 50% the cost of a high-quality solid wood one new today)

We have bits and pieces of vintage stuff all throughout our house because you can't beat the quality for the price and the uniqueness, but this is the only room where we are trying to source the majority of the pieces (and all of the major pieces) vintage. It's been frustrating sometimes but fun overall and it's just a bonus that it is going to end up being probably half the cost if we pulled off the design brand new.

[Edited on February 15, 2013 at 3:50 PM. Reason : ]

2/15/2013 3:49:34 PM

Figured I may as well put this here:

http://thecolorandshape.wordpress.com/

4/19/2013 11:12:14 AM

Getting ready to redo my son's room with bunk beds (sweeeeeet). I posted about bedding last week in the WAYTA thread and a few folks chimed in. This is what I've finally decided on, and wanted to get some feedback. Furniture is set as is--bunk beds were my brother's growing up (mom's a hoarder in the best way sometimes) although the picture has them side by side. I couldn't find a picture online of them bunked. The dresser is already in his current room and a nice piece. I know the stains don't match, but meh.

He's 2.5, and obviously doesn't have an opinion either way. I'm trying to pick out bedding that can grow with him for awhile. I still think I can get some time out of the robot sheets since he is so young, but once I got them on the board I wasn't so sure anymore. I really like the orange sheets though.

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/53128470577666355/

11/11/2013 3:07:48 PM

Different look--no robot sheets. Throw pillows instead http://www.pinterest.com/pin/53128470577666536/

(yes i know some people hate throw pillows but i happen to like ONE on a bed)

11/11/2013 3:25:18 PM

I will look at these when I get home (darn work blocking stuff). I'm not as good with kid's rooms though :/

11/12/2013 3:33:16 PM

I like the second one better.

11/12/2013 3:34:06 PM

Yeah I decided on second look the more I looked yesterday.

A suggestion on Facebook was to paint one wall a different color. Since I'm going with the gray striped sheets and we still have gray paint left over from the bathroom, I'm going to paint the wall with the window gray and the rest green. The window treatments will be bamboo blinds with black or white panel blackout curtains. The bamboo shade and panel curtain look is what I'm shooting for in the rest of the house, and we'll start with his room.

11/12/2013 6:39:14 PM

I like the idea of the orange sheets / second setup better as well. The key to kids' rooms is definitely to put something together that you can work with for a long time versus going "all-out" on some specific and current obsession or overly-kiddie thing and you've obviously thought about that


We have white blinds all over the house now (they were a disgusting beige when we moved in and we have painstakingly painted each wooden piece in every window haha) and only put curtains over a few of them. It didn't make sense for us to put curtains in every window but it definitely looks much nicer in a few areas! I know some people are afraid to put curtains over blinds or think you're not "supposed" to but it can look really nice and be very functional.

[Edited on November 12, 2013 at 8:42 PM. Reason : ]

11/12/2013 8:39:14 PM

Painting is done, bunk beds and his dresser are in, and window treatments up.

We decided to keep the window wall white, and went with gray curtains on a wooden rod to match his furniture. I'll post pics once it's all complete with the bedding.

Mattresses will arrive tomorrow for pick up, and bedding will arrive sometime this week.
I will need to paint his bookshelf. Right now it's a bright aqua blue. I'll probably just paint it white, but if I start sanding and see that it's not many paint layers down until wood, I will stain it to match his dresser.

I'll post pics when done. After that it will be turning his nursery in to a cozy guest room. The closet will hopefully be a nook for our desk. However as I started pulling all of the items out of his-now closet/former guest closet (ie, storage catch all, which had lots of shelves) I'm realizing we have a looooooot of crap. Many things I can purge/sell/goodwill.

No painting in that room. There will need to be some to create a dual functioning nook and closet, and a better way of storing other items elsewhere. That's my main goal for now.

[Edited on November 17, 2013 at 9:20 PM. Reason : ]

11/17/2013 9:18:36 PM

saw the pictures on facebook. Hope he liked it

We made two spontaneous furniture purchases this past weekend Anyone who knows us and our interior design methods knows that this is highly, highly irregular. We usually spend a very long time planning every item in the room, looking at fabric samples in the specific room and lighting conditions, and also hunting for vintage pieces that can be repurposed before every considering new, store-bought items etc.

We also never really go out on "Black Friday." However, we were running to Trader Joe's to pick up some beer in Charlotte and popped over to West Elm since it was walking distance. After looking around for awhile, I spotted a quirky settee that had caught my eye online but looked even better in person. We also saw a desk that both my wife and I have looked at previously and loved but decided we didn't need it. This time, they had a floor-model of the desk with a few scuffs on the top. In addition, they were having a tiered % off sale. We talked to an associate about buying the floor model and they didn't really want to because they had another desk in-stock in the back. Finally they talked to a manager and agreed to let us buy the desk for 20% off. It also qualified for 15% off with the tiered savings.

We waffled a bit on the 25%-off settee because we didn't want to pay shipping since it would have to be ordered. Right before checking out with the desk, the manager offered to waive shipping charges on the settee and by purchasing it, it also was going to kick the desk up to 25% off because of the tiered savings. Total wasn't cheap but we walked out saving around 40% / $650 off retail + shipping. Now to sell the room's current furniture on craigslist (we were planning to totally redo this room in February or so anyway, so it wasn't truly a splurge...it was just wasn't expected on Friday).

/blog

12/2/2013 9:49:32 AM

I needs a coffee table and some wall art.. I don't think I want a painting. I think I want a cluster of big ceramic plates that'd look cool together.

I might get the 19.99 Lack coffee table from IKEA in white. Cheap solution, not a huge commitment. It's a small condo.

[Edited on February 20, 2014 at 3:21 PM. Reason : TIA]

2/20/2014 3:20:28 PM

if you want to keep it cheap IKEA also has some decent (cheap) plates to display. Their trendig plate series is kinda cool if you're looking to display something:



Obviously you also have the thrift shop route. Or consider mixing in a couple nicer display plates from a West Elm or someone with some cheaper plates (IKEA, Old Time Pottery, etc.) if you're going for the plate grouping look.

For coffee tables, the lack stuff is definitely super cheap but not terrible looking for apartment living. When I was working out of town this past year, I got two of the smaller square ones and used them side by side. It was a little more "interesting" than just a longer rectangle like their actual coffee table. Also, I see lots of decent wooden coffee tables on craigslist and thrift stores and a wooden one would look great with the blue rug and the neutral sofa fabric setup you have.

[Edited on February 20, 2014 at 5:33 PM. Reason : ]

2/20/2014 5:32:05 PM

Finally got our living room project far enough along to take a bunch of pictures.

This is what the living room looked like when we toured the house:



We hated it but we saw potential.

Then this is what it looked like when we moved into the house:





Not very inspiring or personalized for us but we had a blank slate to work with.

We worked on this over the course of a few years (kept a strict budget and we are also working on other projects simultaneously) with a lot of detailed planning but we finally got it to a good stopping point recently and took a few pictures this weekend. I still want to remove the drywall around the stairs and put in an actual modern handrail but that will be much farther down the road probably.



















[Edited on April 15, 2014 at 9:45 PM. Reason : ]

4/15/2014 9:45:19 PM

Love how you redid the TV hole in to a beautiful shelving area. I like the wallpaper as well.

Where did you get the colorful geometric pillow?

[Edited on April 15, 2014 at 10:54 PM. Reason : ]

4/15/2014 10:53:18 PM

Thanks! We got the pillow on etsy. I can dig up the actual store if you want. Tons of cool pillows there though. Society 6 sells pillows now too and there are a ton of unique options going that route.

4/15/2014 10:56:37 PM

It looks great. Do you guys have pugs?

4/15/2014 11:46:48 PM

Thank you We do have 1 black pug. My wife's family has two pugs (both pretty old now) so she wanted to get one once we got a house. I was hesitant when we did it, but it's been about 4 years and I'm really glad my wife convinced me to adopt ours.

4/16/2014 7:49:15 AM

Haha, I looked at your pinterest photos of your living room yesterday without realizing it was you. I really like the blue accent wall. What color is that?

4/16/2014 1:30:48 PM

I love your modern style



p.s. I exhibit at Dwell on Design every year

4/16/2014 1:36:44 PM

^^haha

I am 99% sure it is Benjamin Moore's Vermont Slate. Our final choice was between that and one other BM blue color, but that is the name that sticks out in my mind as the one we chose. It ended up having the exact characteristics that I had in mind (kind of a chalky/grey blue with a tiny bit of green).

I can check when I get home.

[Edited on April 16, 2014 at 2:43 PM. Reason : ]

4/16/2014 2:43:14 PM

Quote :

"I love your modern style p.s. I exhibit at Dwell on Design every year "

thanks

And, sweet! What do you do?

4/16/2014 2:45:14 PM

Real Hardwoods or laminate?

Who'd you get to install that, and about how much did it cost? (if you don't mind my asking)

4/16/2014 3:33:06 PM

Real Birch, not laminate. Engineered though versus solid.

We don't live in Raleigh but our installer started with a base price of $1.45/ft² for installation and then they had adders for removing any existing flooring, installing any quarter-round or mouldings, removing and reinstalling toilets, moving appliances, etc. like most do. Our actual flooring material was around $4/ft²

4/16/2014 3:40:58 PM

That looks really great. Congrats! Decorating a living room can be a lot of hard work, but when it looks just right, it is totally worth it.

Did you install the shelving and trim above the fireplace? Great choice not to put the TV up there.

4/16/2014 3:52:46 PM

thank you. It was definitely worth it. We splurged a little on some items but saved on others and I think we struck the right balance without destroying the budget.

We did install the shelving, the wallpaper, and the moulding ourselves. The shelves are on a cleated system so that they can be removed easily. Then the wallpaper is actually adhered to 3 pieces of foamboard that were cut to fit into the opening snugly and pushed into place (the 2 seams are hidden behind the shelves so that the look is continuous with the shelves in place) to allow us to change it out in the future if we want to. For the curved top piece of trim, we ended up ordering flex trim from Home Depot. It was pretty easy to work with (a little gummy on the saw) and once it is painted it mates well with the two vertical pieces which are MDF.

Glad you agree about the TV placement. Even though the fireplace wall is more visible from the kitchen and breakfast area, we really did not like the ID of the TV being the entire focal point of the room like it would be over the fireplace. Now, the way it ended up, you really have to make it all the way into the room before you see the TV. Especially if you are coming from the front door/entryway of the house, it's just about the last thing you'd notice in the living room.

[Edited on April 16, 2014 at 4:09 PM. Reason : ]

4/16/2014 4:05:23 PM

CalledToArms, have you considered doing design consultation? If not, you should, and you should let my living room be your guinea pig. I'm going to post my dining room before and after soon, but I'm having a stumbling block with my living room.

4/22/2014 1:03:56 PM

I have definitely considered that and would actually really love to do it. A couple things that would be different for me though in working for other people versus myself: 1) getting used to working within other peoples' budgets 2) working within a stricter timeline (I'm used to being able to take my time and mull over different options) 3) reading other peoples' tastes and quirks and incorporating those into what my vision may have been if it were going to be my own space (iow designing for other people's tastes vs my own).

All of them are items that professional designers and architects work with on a daily basis of course, but I guess I would just have to get comfortable with them over time. I do know people who run blogs that have started charging for mood boards online and I have considered trying that first.

I'd love to see your before/after in your dining room and feel free to PM me about your living room if you want

4/22/2014 10:43:37 PM

gg CalledToArms

4/22/2014 10:51:05 PM

thanks dude

I'm glad so many people liked it. I got enough of a positive response that I decided to submit it to Apartment Therapy for their Before/After series this past week and they are featuring it today

4/26/2014 7:34:18 PM

Two quick before and afters to share.

1st is the reading room:






2nd is the dining room:

1/1/2016 9:21:31 PM

you got a large "random bullshit" allowance

1/1/2016 9:35:25 PM

Nice. A little staged looking for my taste, but cool. That chair you scored in your posts above is awesome.

We live outside of Boston in a house built in 1895 so we're trying to keep things original when possible, but will go with clean colors and trim and use the furniture/decor to "spice" things up. Our first room is going to be a TV/den room that used to be a dining room.

This is from our tour of the house when we were looking to buy it:


We removed the wainscoting (wasn't original or built well), sanded off textured paint, tons of plaster patching including redoing a bullnose corner, replaced crown molding, patched in base cap molding from elsewhere in the house, and relocated and refinished steam radiator


Sneak preview:


The color is BM Gray Mist with BM Chantilly Lace trim. A big chocolate brown leather sectional will go in there. More pics to come.

[Edited on January 1, 2016 at 9:56 PM. Reason : .]

1/1/2016 9:55:27 PM

^^ talking money to blow on pointless but pretty shit? I suppose.

^ nice. a friend of mine bought a house a couple years back built around that time outside of Boston as well. Some cool older houses there. Trim looks good.

And yea, those pictures are certainly staged. I mean, for the most part, that's how those spaces normally look. I like to keep stuff clean and organized. But there are some things 'borrowed' from other places in the house and re-arranged slightly to get the look I wanted through the lens (which is oddly different than what you see in the space sometimes) and also to kind of get the magazine look because I was taking practice shots for stuff to add to my portfolio today.

A great example of this is from the living room makeover I posted about in this thread. I'll give a 1:1 example. The first picture is the picture that appeared in this thread. That's exactly how the living room looks on a daily basis. The 2nd is one I spent a lot more time on tweaking and staging for a portfolio shot and even borrowed items from other parts of the house to get exactly the right looks I wanted all over the shot:



[Edited on January 1, 2016 at 10:15 PM. Reason : ]

1/1/2016 9:58:59 PM

Some pictures for reference:

http://imgur.com/a/2LI5d

I'm trying to do a pretty big shelving (books mostly but some other stuff) project in my condo.

I have kind of a modern industrial / French colonial (?) mix theme going on and I've already bought some rough sewn boards that have live edges on the front (uneven with the bark still on them). They're 2" thick and vary from about 8-12" deep depending on the front live edge.

I'm planning to move the NC State stuff to my bedroom or my office at work and use this wall for the shelves. Right now I have 3 shelves that I was going to put to the left of the window and they fit perfectly for that area. I was also going to get another 3 that are 6' or so and stagger them on the wall to the right of the window in a diagonal pattern.

The ceilings are 10'

I'm trying to figure out whether I should go with a floating shelf design (would cost $415 with shipping for the mounting brackets) or if I should go with these, which would cost $340 for 12 or I could just get 8 for $228 and use cheaper standard L-brackets for the top shelves that will be too high to see over anyway.



I was thinking I'd actually mount these on the top side of the shelves to feature them more.

[Edited on October 14, 2016 at 11:58 AM. Reason : img size]

[Edited on October 14, 2016 at 12:06 PM. Reason : .]

10/14/2016 11:56:25 AM

been a while since ive been able to post in here. In the home stretch of a lot of projects for the house we just bought in early April. The previous owners had done a lot of awesome stuff and we are just taking this house over the finish line in some ways. Most of our projects small (full Ring security setup, extra exterior lighting, added built-in clothes storage, new mailbox, new landscaping etc.) and others are larger (total to the studs and subfloor bathroom reno, new front porch post, new hvac, new garage door and lift). Trying to get as much done as we can before we move in next month.

Some of the progress though...

Spent the last few weekends taking the awesome store-front glass at the entrance and adding privacy, feature house numbers, a new wall-mounted mailbox, planters, and a ring doorbell:







Next up is replacing the iron post with a modern tripod style design.



Also the bathroom before vs fully demo'd (current state):



And just a shot of the kitchen from the night I was planning out the window film (no those are not the counter stools, they are the chairs for the table that I have not set up yet to leave room for the bathroom contractors):




[Edited on May 20, 2019 at 3:35 PM. Reason : ]

5/20/2019 3:28:36 PM

Wasn't CalledToArms in a metal band or punk band or something?

5/21/2019 9:07:50 AM

yep I was in Called To Arms for the 7 years or so that we were a band. But I did most of our t shirt designs, our website design, worked on concept art for the albums etc. so I've always enjoyed design of some form. And then I've worked for Architecture or AE firms my whole career, so it probably wasn't a big leap for me to take interest in architecture and interior design.

5/21/2019 9:46:48 AM

you can only ever be one thing, and it can only ever be the first thing people learned about you (or what your username is)

5/21/2019 9:52:02 AM

it's called profiling. try to keep up.

5/21/2019 5:37:33 PM

Little update from one night last week. Between me and the contractors, lots of work has gone on in this room and other parts of the house. Mostly not worthy of pictures to share though since it's not complete yet. But this is something.

6/17/2019 12:39:42 PM