A massive built-in project

Adele and Jeremy spent a good 4 weekends to accomplished this massive media, wardrobe and storage combo. Time well spent!

"My husband worked on installing 'built-ins' for about 4 weekends in a row using the new 'black-brown' Pax wardrobes that Ikea has. He customized them to make them look like built-ins by cutting down two of the smaller closets to create symmetrical shelves on either side (so it didn't just look like a big hulking wall of closets).


I can't stand the little peg holes, so he turned around the pieces and drilled new permanent holes for the shelves (so that the line of holes is facing out where no one would see it). Then he cut down two doors so that our TV would be exposed (also to again add some decorative shelving around it so it wasn't just a wall of closets).

We found pulls that looked like our bedside table pulls and we also dyed the little plastic shelf holders black (for some reason they don't make a "black-brown" version of those little shelf holders so they stick out like a sore thumb.)

Now when people get a tour of the house they say 'Oh, were those built-ins here when you moved in?' We think we saved ourselves at LEAST 10K!"

Snug desk in laundry room

Hunter mixed and matched Ikea cabinets for a sweet work station. Too bad it's hidden away in the laundry room!

"We recently finished a laundry room desk area that found us combining a few stock Ikea cabinet pieces together (one for the height, one for the width) and found that an oversize cabinet door makes a swell desktop:



The most valuable thing (piece of advice wise) is the use of 2 cabinets to make one (width from one and height from the other) and the use of a 24x64in door for a desktop -- saved us literally a thousand dollars on silestone (and the Ikea Numerar countertops look great at a distance, but begin to unravel at closer inspection -- especially over time)."

New York Design Center Sample Sale

The New York Design Center Spring 2009 Sample Sale (click on image to enlarge) begins Friday, April 3rd. Included in the sale will be the 20 Baker Tulip Chairs that Michael Tavano used at his DIFFA Dining by Design table. The best thing about this sample sale is that you won't get home and realize you bought a shirt that you will never wear just because it was on sale. Although, you may want to bring your room measurements with you just in case. Happy Shopping!

Winner!!

Kym and I are so thrilled by the response to the Grains Sack Pillow giveaway!! We had over 200 entries!!! Congratulations to Lisa of Lexington, KY! Lisa, please send on your email and we can coordinate the shipment of your pillow.

Another big thank you to Kym Fraser of Three Fine Grains for donating the pillow. Above is the newest item in Kym's ever growing collection. These are framed grain sacks! Just lovely!!

Also Kym was so touched by the huge response that she is offering any one who commented and additional 10% off any pillow until April 9th. Just let her know your name and comment when you place your order.

Finally, come back tomorrow evening to read all about my trip to New Orleans!! I am exhausted, but excited to share some of my finds on my wonderful adventure!!

The transformation of a room.

This post could also be titled:

How to work with 25-foot ceilings.
OR
How to work with a paint color on 25-foot ceilings that you now hate.

OR

How to work with a sofa you bought waaaay too fast you now can't stand.

OK, so let's move on. Remember when I showed you how to cut and install molding here? Well, this is what I was working on:

This wall goes up reeeeeally high, and when we moved in, I knew I had to do something economical to decorate it. I didn't want to spend one meeeeeellion dollars (thanks Jennifer!) on a massive art piece, so I ended up painting a huge rectangle on the wall and hung some vases in it.

We loved it at first and then the room was just blah. Big massive sofa that didn't work with the wall color. Big massive wall that didn't work with the sofa color:
So I got a bunch of brilliant ideas and spent just $3o to do a mini-transformation in the room. I added a little bit of molding to the rectangle and moved the vases around. I knew I needed something else to give the furniture more height. So I made a sofa table out of planks of wood. (It was incredibly easy, I'll show you how to do it soon!) It was just what the room needed:

I covered the "sofa table" in fabric and found accessories from the basement. Later I made new curtains and added the pillows, pulling in some more color. Pulled the ficus tree from the dining room for some more height:

Well, the ficus tree would practically devour anyone who sat near it. I have Christmas party pics of our friends shooing it out of their hair. It had to go. And all the sudden, EVERY TIME I saw those vases and flowers, I wanted to rip them off. the. wall. They were driving me mad.

So what's a girl to do on the cheap?? Add more molding!:

For just a few bucks, it created a whole new look in the room. I also removed the fabric covering the sofa table and just painted the wood instead. Again, I pulled from around the house and the basement to make the accessories work better: Before: After:

The wall color is still driving me nutzo and the sofa is OH-so-comfortable but a couch cover is calling my name. But we really, really love this room now.

This is something I cannot stress enough -- I think making a room you absolutely love can take a lot of time. This transformation has taken five years and I'm sure I'm not done yet. You have to live with it, see what works, what doesn't -- before you find the happy ending.

Art Smart: April Ugallery Picks

I know I had a painting of cherry blossoms in last last month's Ugallery post but I couldn't resist posting another once since it's actually cherry blossom season in Washington, DC. That and the fact that the painting is ridiculously beautiful! In case there is someone who doesn't know about Ugallery, they sell affordable art by young student artists. You can also now email the artists with questions or commission requests through their portfolios on the Ugallery website. This month, I tried to choose art that reminded me of spring. Enjoy!

Deeply Rooted, 2007, monotype bleed print on paper, Charlesy Charton, East Tennessee State University, $250

Untitled 2, 2009, oil on canvas, Matthew King, Massachusetts of Art, $1000

Rainy Sunset, 2007, photograph, Mark Elverson, Massachusetts College of Art, $80

Goodby's Creek #1, 2008, acrylic on canvas, David Nackashi, University of North Florida, $550

Stairway to the Skies, 2007, photograph, Christine Vineyard, Georgia State University, $100

Horizontal Forest, 2008, oil on masonite, Katherine Widen, The Cleveland Institute of Art, $200

Our Farm House, 2009, oil on canvas, Lana Williams, University of Oklahoma, $500

Jerry, 2008, photograph, Michael George, New York University, $85

Unlikely Constellation, 2006, mixed media (collage) on canvas, Diana Delgado, The University of the Arts, $4200

Top Artwork: Enchanted Cherry Blossoms, 2009, acrylic on canvas, Colette Wirz, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, $1000

Colour my kitchen!

Dawn redecorated her kitchen a couple months ago, with a clever idea for her kitchen walls.

She says, "Living in an apartment, I'm limited in what adjustments I can make, but I was bored with my kitchen's honey colored cabinets, dark green counter tops, and ivory walls. I wanted a color on the walls and to take advantage of some under cabinet storage space.

My solution?

Add color by sandwiching a piece of bright orange and red Fredrika fabric into a basic Clips frame, which fits neatly into the area between my cabinets and stove. (The areas to the side of the stove have long rectangular frames of the same style from a craft store.)

For an accessory rack I used a tension curtain rod (non-Ikea) wedged between the cabinets. A couple Bygel baskets and a Kalmar container hang perfectly from it to provide storage space. Voila! A similar plan on the opposite wall above the sink pulls the look together."