I’ve been decorating our new bedroom addition for this spring’s One Room Challenge. It’s a small room, so I used a lot of creative tips to make the most of the space! Here’s a round-up of the strategies to help … Continue reading
I’ll call this week to be the “telephone hold music” of the One Room Challenge – I am excited to share our new bathroom. I can take credit for the design, but not the construction. There’s also a small DIY project in there! In the meantime, I promise I am working away on other projects for decorating our new bedroom addition, including a custom daybed.
As a reminder, this season’s project is a bedroom and bathroom addition we built last year. It’s going to be a space for our oldest, when he’s home, and also serve as a guest room or lounge!
It’s fun to see how my vision for this room evolved. In the original “mood board,” I was going with my classic blue-and white look, but you could tell that I was already thinking about how to bring in some green.
Over time, while we were waiting and waiting for building permits, my plan evolved to be more modern and more green. One of my major inspiration spaces was the Woodlark Hotel in Portland, where we enjoyed a stay a few years ago. From that space (left picture below). I was inspired by the elongated subway tile, stacked vertically, the mix of white and dark green tile, and a mix of black metal and antique brass. This led to my final design (right picture below):
And here’s how the room turned out!
This tile combination makes me so happy!
While I left the bathroom construction to our contractor, I did add a DIY touch with the window glass film. There are so many options for window film, so you can have fun browsing for your own favorite. The one that spoke to me for our space is the gingko-themed stained glass from Asgerart on Etsy. It was easy to apply and adds style and much-needed privacy to our little bathroom! To fit our windows, I used two panels side-by-side.
Hope to show you more progress in the bedroom soon! In the meantime, you can see all the other fun room transformations on the One Room Challenge website!
Julie AKA “Jewels”
I seriously love the One Room Challenge. It’s just the motivation I need to finish off projects. I’ve been puttering away preparing the gallery wall in our new bedroom, and with this week’s progress update launching, I got the energy to finish hanging everything after work today!
As a reminder, this room is bedroom addition we built last year. It’s going to be a room for our oldest, when he’s home, and also serve as a guest room or lounge! It’s a petite space, but I had big plans for this wall, and I really feel like it opens up the room!
If you are looking for tips for your own gallery wall, here are some ideas to consider:
Here’s a before-and-after look at the space:
This collection includes a DIY fabric-covered picture mat and a photo I took of Finn and printed at the local drugstore.
As I said, these walls can talk! Clockwise from left, a photograph taken from Fort Point, under the Golden Gate Bridge, that Steve and I bought at an art fair ~25+ years ago; an LED sign with my son’s name that my sister sent from Hong Kong; a small canvas print of a photo I took, featuring spring blossoms and Victorian houses; photo of Finn I took and printed; nasturtium print by Henry Evans calendar under a DIY fabric mat. My friend Penny gifts me a Henry Evans calendar every Christmas!
More treasures: paper silhouette cut-out from the Canadian National Exhibition when I was a child; strawberry ceramic bowl I bought at an art fair with a friend ~25 years ago; Vassar College pennant for my oldest; 1924 newspaper found in the walls of our last house; replica Group of Seven Canadian landscape painting my parents got on an Air Canada flight ~30 years ago; fern print from another Henry Evans calendar.
Last of the treasures: a beautiful branch painting by my mom ❤
I’m working away on some other projects that I hope to share with you soon! In the meantime, you can see all the other fun room transformations on the One Room Challenge website!
Julie AKA “Jewels”
I seriously love the One Room Challenge. It’s just the motivation I need to finish off projects, and the community is always really positive. I love finding new accounts to follow for inspiration and encouragement! I’ll link my prior ORC projects at the end of this post.
This Spring, I’m going to be decorating a new bedroom addition we built last year. It’s going to be a room for our oldest, when he’s home, and also serve as a guest room or lounge!
I can’t take credit for the construction work, but I will take credit for the inspiration – I very literally had dreams about finding space for just one more room in our house, to accommodate our family of five, with regular visits from my dad. After turning ideas around and around in my head, I figured out that we could enclose a little unused patio and reconfigure the adjacent rooms to make a new bedroom and bathroom. Some of us lived through the months of noise and dust, but you can just enjoy the pictures!
The result is a small bedroom and bathroom that make a big change to how we live in our house. While I couldn’t give our oldest a lot of square footage, I wanted to give him a lot of style and function in this cozy space. I got design inspiration from a lot of places, but my biggest inspirations were Designer Timothy Whealon’s living room featured by New York Social Diary and the Woodlark Hotel in Portland, where we enjoyed a stay a couple of years ago.
When I find a space that really inspires me, I try to describe the key elements, like a recipe, to help me recreate it. And when I am looking at a few spaces, I try to find the common elements that I love. For this project, I was drawn to:
I’m so excited (and nervous!) to tackle this project – hope you’ll follow along!
You can see all the other fun room transformations on the One Room Challenge website!
Julie AKA “Jewels”
My brain has a tendency to look at furniture and think, “What else could this be?” Our family has been on a journey this past year – we wanted to move houses, and logistically, it worked best for us to … Continue reading
I love such a love for beautiful fabrics! And why use just one fabric to upholster a chair, when you can use two?! The back of a chair is a great place to use a more delicate, expensive, or ornate fabric that might not be ideal for the seat, and the contrast between the two materials adds a lot of interest. I’ve seen great examples of this from some of my favorite designers:
Candice Olsen used a contrasting fabric on the outside of these beautiful dining chairs. The blue ties the seat and outside together.
Sarah Richardson strikes a great playful note with these chairs upholstered in multiple fabrics. Again, the color theme - in this case, red - tie them together.
So, I was looking around my house for a way to try this, when my eyes landed on a pair of green side chairs that we’ve had for many years as extra seating in our living room. They were originally dining chairs that worked well for saving space, and I cut down the legs to make them more comfy for lounging. Our new house can get dark, so I’ve been trying to lighten up our furniture, and I just happened to have recently bought this gorgeous floral fabric. I didn’t even have a specific plan for it, but I knew that I had to have it (did I mention, I have a weakness for beautiful fabrics?!) I spotted it on Fabricguru.com, which is my favorite online fabric store. They have great prices on remnants and an easy-to-browse interface. The downside is that a lot of the fabrics are discontinued or almost so, so if you need more down the road, it may be hard to find.
Robert Allen Waldemere Contemporary Floral Printed Cotton Drapery Fabric in Noir
Here’s what happened when the old chairs met my new fabric:
Waldemere floral fabric on the outside of green velvet chairs.
To apply the fabric, I experimented with our staple gun, but in the end, it worked best to apply the fabric with just a regular craft glue gun. I folded about a half inch “seam” around the edge and just glued it on. I was prepared to cover the edges – or staples, had I used them – with some piping, but I lucked out, and the panels had piping already, so it looked very finished with very few steps. I think you could retrofit a variety of existing chairs with some creativity and minimal upholstery skills.
For some more inspiration, check out these beautiful examples found by other bloggers:
Spotted by Caitlin Wilson at Saks.
Chairs by K-design, spotted by Decorati.
Go give it a try! It might take some adaptation to work on your particular chairs, but keep in mind using nailhead trim, piping, or decorative braid to hide staples and seams, creating a transition as you turn your chairs into eye-pleasing conversation pieces!
“Jewels”
This project is shared at:
Jewels at Home 