Aftermath

I'm having a very strong nesting urge.

Maybe it is because my house has been torn asunder by a 9 pound puppy named Auggie.

Maybe it is because all of my projects seems to be "in process," where it is more about trouble shooting than inspiration or results.

Or maybe it is a deep seated need to restore order in my small corner of a world that feels upside down since election day, never to be right again.

(drama queen)

We have lived in our house for 6 years, the longest I have ever been in one place as an adult, and we have reached that state where every drawer and closet and cupboard needs to be turned inside out and given a good scrubbing.  Honestly, that's a bit what my whole life feels like.

As cabinet positions are names and liberties (already!) threatened, decorating has never seemed sillier.  Yet I still believe in the comforts of home, and if I didn't live in a blue city in a (barely!!!!) blue state, I think I would be taking cover.

So what will I do around here next?  I have a little money set aside for house projects.  I am at a point where

a) I want things to work better for our family and contribute to our happiness or, at the very least, ease of living , and

b) I don't want to fall into the trap of temporary solutions

So I will probably have to make choices to stay on budget. The area of focus?  Our entry.

It has been a bit of a revolving door!  For a while it happily looked like this, until that desk went to the girls.

I had this vintage x-base desk (which I love) in the guest room, and wound up bringing it into the entry in a pinch.

But really, it's not working for us.  Not enough storage, and not enough free space beneath to add baskets.  (not that baskets are any solution with a puppy on the loose.)  I'm convinced that we need a dresser for storing gear: in the winter, hats and gloves etc; in the summer, sidewalk chalk and butterfly nets and jump ropes.  I had something in mind like this:

But guess what?  I mentioned it to my husband and he has an opinion.

He thinks we need a bench for people to sit on to put on their shoes.  (although--  We used to have that and I don't think anyone ever used it.)  So then maybe something like this:

Except in reality we probably aren't going to add a pendant light....and again that doggie likes to steal shoes (and gloves and socks and shirts and underwear) out of baskets

So we'll see!  Maybe I'll luck into some perfect vintage dresser and find myself with enough money left over to put a runner on my stairs.  It will be much better for the dog that way.

This is one of my more rambling posts, coming together over a week or two, but I'm hitting publish!

Whoa, hello!

This summer and fall were perhaps the fastest on record!

I've mentioned before that a lot of my focus has been on one massive project in California, that has been in the works for more than a year.  We are approaching the home stretch, and the last several weeks have been a crazy blur of major decision making.

I realized the other day that I have shared virtually NOTHING of this project or process.  It's a great one, full of great vintage, statement lighting, tons of wallpapers, incredible colors, 4 bathrooms from scratch, incredible folding glass doors for that California indoor-outdoor appeal, and so on.  The process has been so fluid it has been hard to stop and post about it.  And I am saving the final choices for the big reveal.

But!  It occured to me that it might be fun to share some of the looks that we DIDN'T go for.

So today, the entry.

I love this first look, but I knew even when sharing it with the client that it wasn't quite right for her.

This was more on the money in terms of elements in the house, but she didn't love the idea of a brown wood credenza.

This was the only option without a vintage storage piece.  The mirror was vintage to make up for it!  It doesn't read well in the photo, but the front of that buffet has a beautiful hex pattern engraved in it, and we do seem to have hexagons popping up through out the house.

What do you think?  Which would you choose?

Before and After: Tangletown Traditional

My husband and I are back on the photo shoot bandwagon!
I shared peeks of this transformation on Instagram last summer when everything was installed, but the full before and after is so much more fun.

Come on in to this GORGEOUS 1920s house in Tangletown.  When my clients moved in, it had received some "updates" that really weren't in keeping with the era of the house, and despite many lovely architectural details, the center hall felt a but unfinished.

Our goal: to restore the central public spaces of the home to full glory.  (And to refresh the small powder room until a full remodel happens down the road.)  To do that, we added wainscoting, wallpaper, new lighting, a wool stair runner, traditional window treatments, and elegant furnishings.  We knew the panelling was the right move when all visitors failed to notice it after the work was done!  It belongs so well, it looks like it has always been there.

Okay, before:

After!

Before:

After:

The Entry Before:

and After:

 Radiator in entry Before:

After:

Stairway and landing before:

And after:

(I think the carpet is the one thing that didn't photograph well--MUCH prettier in person!  But the pattern reads well here, so there's that.)

Stairway Before:

And after:

The landing before:

After:

The back bathroom before:

And after:

A few more details:

(love the mix of a reeded wood pole to connect to dark wood banister, with gold end cap and rings to tie in with the new gold lighting.  Also,  The embroidered vine-patterned fabric was really hard to capture!)

I always love a reason to paint a ceiling! 

Next up: the sunroom!  Think patterned cement tile and built in banquette.  Hopefully this summer.

Sneakity Peek

Modern, simple wood pegs and nickel show racks in a front hall.  Floating bookshelves in a living room.

Bit by bit, putting it together. That's what counts!

(Name that tune--anyone?)

Making the best of what you have: the entry

Let me ask you something.

So you use events in your home as a motivator/ deadline for completing projects?   For as long as I can remember, there has been no better way to accomplish projects than planning to have people over.  Need to paint the living room?  Schedule a game night.  Time to stain the deck?  How about hosting a barbeque?

We had a little tree trimming party this weekend, and it was no exception.  Most of the projects were not particularly pretty.  We decided to include ping pong in the festivities, which meant letting people in the basement, which meant reorganizing the storage, utility, AND project areas down there.  I did manage to accomplish one little project that I can show you.

Remember my little entryway transformation?  I used a hand-me down church pew, gifted poufs, and art and accessories I had on hand to create an inviting vignette in the entryway.  Only problem: the pillow was really too small.

I happened to have a yard of fabric from the Iman line at Calico Corner's that I got for less than $10 (bolt-end special) and planned at one point to use in this living room.  When the color palette changed just a bit over there, I kept it for myself.

I love the larger scale, the way the fabric has a sort of "grain," like the old wood, the stripe and ikat mix, and that it picks up most of the colors from my "whole-house color palette":  The green from the living room, office, and master bedroom; blue from the dining chairs; raspberry from the guest and girls' rooms, and a hit of bright yellow, a color found in very small doses just about everywhere.  (That yellow is also really textural, like a boucle.  It's cool.)

I will say, Dave thought it was a funny project to take on when there was food to make and floors to scrub, but it made me so happy that this was the first thing guests saw when coming into our home.

So, fess up.  Ever scheduled an event for the major purpose of getting something done in your house?

Reader Design Dilemma: What to do with a brick planter entry divider

Renee writes to me with a fun dilemma.  I'm going to give it to you in her own words, because I think she captures that feeling we all get when a built in element has us stumped:

So there's this thing in my house. It's a brick thing at the front door, sort of delineating the world's smallest foyer from the (also small) living room the door opens into.  I generally love it as a 60's element, I love the color of the brick and now that my kids aren't toddlers it's not as hideously dangerous as it used to be. But what do I DO with it?


Check it out:

My first reaction, to be honest, is that I kind of like it.  But Renee says that this is where plants come to die, and I know that if this was in my house, it would immediately accumulate keys, mail, bags, and Disney princess dolls.

Option 1--and Renee alluded to this idea--is to make it a bench.  At 22" tall, it's about 4" higher than a standard seat. and adding wood on top would just add to that problem.  To make a bench that looks like it came with the house, I would see if the top stone slab could be removed, and replace it with a 1" thick piece of wood with a nice grain in a stain to coordinate with the wood trim.  A 2" thick slab of wood would be in better proportion, but then there's that height issue again.

Option 2: build it up to create a room divider, better delineating the entry from the living space.  To keep it feeling authentic to the house, built in 1962, I would look to a geometric treatment.  Here's some inspiration:

[via midcenturyliving.blogspot.com]

I'm a big fan of this one, because it would echo the horizontal pattern of the brick, and the dowels could make for fairly easy construction while keeping things open.  Now, if Renee didn't want to physically connect the screen to the stone base, today's lightweight materials would allow for a screen hanging from the ceiling, like this:

[via designshrine.net]

Though, to be clear, I would stick to a pattern like the one above.

To add a layer of function, the divider could be built out as very narrow shelves, like one section of this guy:

[via stylisheve.com]

This would provide space for the aforementioned keys, maybe even an objet or two when the kids are a little bit bigger.  Wouldn't this be pretty in a woodstain with some sweet little 60s glazed vases in the openings?

If these options feel either too closed off or too difficult to build, I would consider something with very simple lines.  A horizontal wood slat feels true to the period, but allows the builder to choose just how much space to leave between slats.  Horizontal would be nice:

[via atomicindyrealestate.blogspot.com]

And, really, so would vertical (love the connecting pieces in this one)

[via dcarch.com]

And then there's the possibility of a rope wall.  I spotted this one over at the Brick House, and I love the sort of rustic simplicity of it.  If you check out the blog, there are even basic instructions for the construction.

[via the brick house]

Problem solved, right?  Well, there's one more issue.  What do you do with that planter?  With the narrow shelves, and the rope wall, the base piece of wood could cover over the planter opening as if it never existed.  Both treatments are open enough on the sides that they wouldn't need to interfere with the light switch on the wall.  The other screens are trickier, because they don't have bulk at the bottom to cover up the hole, while the slatted walls would run right into the lightswitch if they were built down the middle of the stone.  In those cases, I say hang or build them behind the planter (on the living room side), and keep something leafy and green going simultaneously.

What do you think?  what would you do with this brick divider if you really loved it and wanted to make it work?

Renee, I hope this helps!

If you have a design dilemma and would like some help, send it my way at heather[at]heatherpetersondesign[dot]com