Showing posts with label mirrors. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mirrors. Show all posts

Monday, July 8, 2013

Love, Like, Loath: The New House

Heya Nesters!!

I just realized that it's been over two years that we've lived in this house and you guys have barely seen anything at all.  {All those other "responsibilities" have taken over.} But there is SO MUCH I want to share with you all! The rest of the house is really coming along nicely, a natural progression of bettering... except the master bedroom.  I don't know what it is.  I feel like I hit a roadblock when I chose a color I ended up loathing. Remember Wasabi Powder?  So, I am bringin' back the oldie but goodie "Love, Like, Loath" post. Which ironically, was also about my last bedroom.


It's lovely-- in this picture. But frankly. In other lights its kind of a bummer color.  May I say, slightly poop-ish.  And its a difficult color to work with others.  I have bought plum glass lamps to try to work those kind of muted shades but it just looked muddy.  I was thinking of adding some gold/brass accents in here to look a little vintage. But I just keep hating everything.



See how as you turn on the yellow light bulbs, it looks much more yellow?? Poop-ish!  Who has two thumbs and is a Debbie Downer about this room?  THIS GIRL!

The thing is, I'm a color gal. And while this is a color.... I like mixing complimentary colors together. I don't feel like I'm doing my job if I'm just doing black, white and the one color on the walls.  Which is exactly the rut we've fallen into in the master.  In fact, I'd rather have white walls and be able to put some awesome colors in the bedding and accessories!

So, first loath: paint color. But lets not be pessimistic here, lets follow the title and really get into it with the Love's first. {But seriously, I have a LOT to say about this room so bear with me.}

LOVE:
I LOVE our bed and bedding.  Our bed is the Hemnes King size bed and the mattress is also from IKEA and is the most. comfortable. mattress. ever.  I currently have our Home Goods white and beige Moroccan Medallion print/variegated stripe reversible quilt on the bed for the Summer.


The throw pillows are kind of a mishmosh of finds.  The 4 pillows we use while sleeping are Ralph Lauren from Home Goods.... and I only use white sheets.  I love white sheets. The "Performance Sheets" from Target are affordable, wrinkly resistant and super comfy. The euro shams are from IKEA. Then the velvet lumbar pillow I've had for ages. And I saw the raw cut pillow at BB&B on sale and it was still insanely expensive {even if I had used a coupon!} but without even searching, I found the exact same one on clearance at Home Goods for a quarter of the sale price!


So, I love our bed in general.  The other thing I love is the little set up on my dresser. 


If you cant quite see, I've got 3 containers on a mirrored tray with my favorite perfume, Stella McCartney Nude. And then my little frog box.  I got her as a present from an old friend for Christmas many years ago and I just love how whimsical she makes this otherwise very adult space. 


It's nothing wild, but it makes me smile.  And that's all that matters, right?

LIKE:
There are quite a few things in this room that I like.  And I am okay with keeping and improving upon them, or replacing.

First is all the lamps. They're all okay. They're a crackled glass globes.


I want to paint a bit of it with my beloved gold paint. Just an uneven, drippy bit on the inside.



And I thought I could compliment the other set of lamps by painting the inside of the shade kind of like this.  But do I want to do the gold and silver together? Not particularly.  Maybe the answer is to spray the base a fun color also!  Who knows!  But for now, they're "okay".

I also like the mis-matched night stands.  I've had them forever and I like that they don't match the rest of the Hemnes furniture.  I normally loath matching bedroom sets. But this one was simple, inexpensive and worked for us.  Another like!


Lastly, the simple white curtains. I like them. They were non-committal, white cotton, cheap curtains from Target. They're fine. *shrug* I like the way white curtains look in crisp rooms.  What I would like to ultimately do, is get a longer curtain rod that will allow the curtains to go all the way to the ends of the bed, almost as if its a secondary headboard. Would I like to upgrade to something with more pattern and color? You bet! But that comes after I get a clear vision of what this room should look like. 



LOATH: 
Ohhhhh there are so many things...  But this is a new addition.  


We originally had a GIANT AC built in circa 1969.  It worked great but sounded like a steamroller in our room at night.  It had to go.  Since we just had our windows replaced and we are siding our house in a couple weeks, the team that did the windows, also removed and patched the hole the AC left.  Doesn't it look lovely??  


It's going to be mudded and fixed up like new soon!  That wall over Matt's smaller dresser will have an interesting mirror.  We don't want just a standard every day mirror.  We want something funky and a tad ornate.  I'm thinking something like this....


Then the big blank space {that looks totally engulfed in flames from the poor images I took} over my dresser is going to have a nice big TV mounted so that we can snuggle and watch movies in bed.  I'm a big fan of watching movies in bed. 



Another loathsome moment in our bedroom is the space between our dressers that holds our laundry basket. 


The basket is too small for the space.  And it is constantly overflowing. I had a brilliant idea that may never come to fruition, but I want to add moulding to the base of these dressers and connect them in the corner.  Something like this..... 


Ignore my horrible photoshopping job. But you get the idea.  That way, we can have the laundry basket  in the corner still but hide the "dirty little secret".  Brilliant, right?! It's just a matter of figuring out how to do it all.  That would be one serious IKEA Hack! 

One of the last things I loath are the sliding wood doors to our closets. 


Yikes! Talk about dated.  But it's nothing a good couple of coats of white paint won't fix!  And I can spray the little knob-thingys with ORB and it will work perfectly with the wood of the furniture. We may even affix a full length mirror with some moulding on the second door from the right.  It's got the 
best space in front of it and it will never slide behind the other. 

And the very last thing I will gripe about tonight is the art.  We've got the front half of the room figured out for what will happen down the road. But its all the other "art" that's at the other end, near our bed that drives. me. nuts. 


This is sentimental.  I drew Matt a version of "George Lasso's the Moon" from It's a Wonderful Life for our first Valentines day, it had only been a month and was too soon for a real present.  And it's sweet and I love it, but it doesn't hold its own over the night stands.


I feel the same about this canvas art I made long long ago.  It just doesn't fill in the space well enough. I would love to do something like this.

Then there is the biggest point of contention.  The degrees. I love my boyfriend and I love that he's smart. {Maybe even smarter than me ;)} But he has both his undergrad and masters degrees hanging on the wall. He has his own office... the perfect place for a degree! After broaching the subject with him about possibly moving those to his office and maybe adding a piece of art to that wall instead, he got offended, saying that it's his only truly proud thing he has hanging in a shared space {aka not his office}... and he wants to keep them there...


*sigh*... I love him and his happiness is more important than the "balance" in our bedroom.  But They just look so empty there. So, I think what we may compromise on, is utilizing those sentimental pieces that currently hang over the nightstands and over Matt's dresser, and making a little gallery wall of sentimentality. Maybe I'll coin the name Sentimenwall? Eh? Eh? Like it??  

So there you have the longest winded blog post in the history of man-kind. Thank you for keeping up with my blabbering.  But now, I'm dying to hear your thoughts on what to do... whether you like what I like or hate what I hate. Let me know your thoughts, Nesters!

xoxo
G

Monday, May 23, 2011

Moroccan Peacocks

I was chatting with my friend Amanda recently as she was pontificating on how much she loathes her living room in its current state.  Amanda is a graduate student in music education with a full-time job as a music teacher.  She is living in a pretty awesome house not far from  yours truly, in the Boston 'burbs. She shares that space with 2 roommates. With one moving out and taking the art from the living room with her, this frees up the space for some changes.  She was, of course, talking to the right friend when it comes to decorating.  We got to talking and came up with some great concepts and landed on a sort of ultra girlie Moroccan theme with a peacock palette.

I took Friday off from work {With the intention of spending the vast majority of the day at the RMV.  Alas, about 3 minutes later, I was given the boot and told to go the "mail-in" approach.  No help, I tell ya. No help!}  so I had some time to kill and I popped into home depot and grabbed a ton of paint chips and here's what I came up with.


The girls already have a rug that is purple and beige.  So purple will be a heavy influence in the room.  But since we want it to be kind of Moroccan, we will be adding interesting patterns and pops of brighter colors like pink and orange.


Bringing in the idea of the peacock, we're going to tone down all that purple with some jewel toned blue and greens, focusing on teals.


These are the mustard-y, burnt orange-y colors that I pulled out also as accents to couple with the pinks.  I'm thinking throws, pillows and smaller decorative accessories. FUN!

And well Target was just across the street from Home Depot, so why not swing in there? I took some snapshots of some fun goodies that caught my eye as inspiration.


This tall, banana leaf vase would be perfect for some tall branches adorned with some hand crafted flowers. Hmmmmm... I smell a DIY project.


Adoring both of these hurricanes.  Both the rosey pink and punched tin are very romantic and feminine keeping with that aspect of the room that we want. 


Loving this big round basket for the corner of the room.  It would be a great storage space to house throw blankets, books, knitting or not-often-used remotes.


Now, Amanda's living room is not a looming space.  In fact, its quite "petite," shall we say.  What always solves a feeling of claustrophobia in small rooms? Mirrors, mirrors, and more mirrors!!  I love the idea of using these end tables to reflect more light than just a wall mirror.


Speaking of wall mirrors, a Moroccan theme wouldn't be complete without some beautifully intricate patterns and this quatrefoil mirror fits the bill. I wouldn't mind snagging one of these for myself, in fact!


This adorably girlie lamp is on sale and would be a perfect addition to the living room as well! But of course only with a colorful lamp shade like this violet one....



These fun little drinking glasses are from Target's new Calypso Collection.  I love all the colors and their metallic quality.  These could easily be grouped and turned into votive holders on a fun little tray.



So all in all, I think the impromptu trip to Home Depot and Target were both successful.  I certainly was getting ideas for things that work together and don't.  What the costs are that we're up against, what we can make ourselves, and color chips that we can whittle down to our palette.

Happy Monday Morning Nesters! I hope you had a wonderful weekend!  Do anything fun? Perhaps took Friday off to got to the RMV/DMV as well?  Dish!

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

If it ain't broke, dont fix it...

However, if it is.... you probably should fix it.  As we saw in my bedroom, I need to fix that heinous issue that's happening over my head when I snuggle up every night --That's right!  I'm talkin' about the bed frame and the framed poster over my bed.



Tuesday, March 8, 2011

One Mans Trash....

....is my treasure!  Matt and I went out to one of our favorite indoor Flea Markets on Saturday afternoon. We showed up only about an hour and a half before their marked closing time so we made a huge, speedy loop before we started getting down to the nitty-gritty.

via
To give you an idea of the caliber of this flea market, there was one of these Panthers there just waiting for a good home. We've also seen a helicopter, an 8 seater horse drawn carriage and most recently a larger than life-size elephant head from a movie set.  So! On that note, lets see the goods that we picked up. 

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Love. Like. Loathe.

Heya Nesters! Yellow, Aqua and Chocolate. Those are the colors of my bedroom.  Way back yonder, in my old apartment, I had the most beautiful pale aqua walls that were so incredibly soothing and they totally tied my whole decor together.


Now with the "no painting" policy in my current apartment, I have been feeling a bit lost in terms of where to go with my bedroom decor. 

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Fa la la la la -Remix!

Heya Nesters!  I started gathering my goodies for Christmas before Thanksgiving and first showed you this vignette.


But I got a nice little {on clearance} addition at Target over the weekend! YAY!

Thursday, December 2, 2010

The Gallery Grows

Heya Nesters! One of my favorite gifts I get for my birthday and Christmas are prints of my fathers vast portfolio of photographs from the late 60's and early 70's.  He has such amazing works and when I had my quick stint with art photography in college, his were my biggest inspiration.

{Image of the Triboro Bridge courtesy of my Daddio}

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Hello, Beautiful!


Heya Nesters!  I'm always grazing the sprawling fields of the Internet and magazines for inspiration.  I have found some heart stopping images that I couldn't wait to share with you guys! But this one above is my favorite. They cool gray of the wall brings such a different depth to this layered vintage wall.  I thought the modern vessel sink was such an interesting choice to juxtapose against the aged pieces. 

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Mirror Mirror on the Wall 2



Heya Nesters!  Yesterdays post was all about the bargain leaning floor mirror that I scored at Walmart. That wasn't where the bargains ended for this this gal. Oh no, I hit the jackpot at The Christmas Tree Shop.  Every bedroom design image that sticks in my brain is one that involves mirrors above or behind matching nightstand lamps. 

Monday, October 18, 2010

Mirror Mirror on the Wall...

Do you ever have those shopping trips where you plan on getting absolutely mundane things like soap or hand lotion and you walk out with forty dollars worth of amazing deals? I had 2 of those this weekend.  Good bye, Money. It was nice knowing you!  But man I scored this weekend when it came to mirrors especially. 


Remember a while back I started the hunt for the perfect {and perfectly priced} leaning mirror?  Oh. Yes.  I found it.

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

DIY Project: Reveal of Lexie's Night Stand

Heya Nesters! I have an exciting reveal for you guys today. I've been waiting with bated breath to grab the final reveal shots of this oldie but goodies.  Check out the before posts right here and here. So without further ado, lets take a look at the journey.


It sure was a humble beginning.  The piece is nice, however, I had visions of its potential grandeur.

Saturday, June 26, 2010

Temporary Wedding Nest...?

I work for Priscilla of Boston, a bridal gown manufacturer, in a character-filled building that has been here probably since Paul Revere was trotting through Boston.


Just kidding! ...But the brick factory was probably built somewhere around the turn of the century.  Being that our company is one of the oldest {and still going strong} bridal gown retailers in the country, we have also been renting this monstrosity since the 1960's.  Yes, you read that right: renting. Through various owners and changes of hands, we have always had our name over the front door. 

Monday, June 7, 2010

Lean Back, Lean Back

Hey Nesters!  Since moving into this new place, I'm newly spending much more time in my living room. Which explains why I have been so vehemently rehab'ing it and almost entirely ignoring my bedroom. But  one thing that keeps staring me in the face is this oh-so-blah blank wall in my bed room. 


Pretty horrific, huh? Ok, ok...  I can't lie to you guys, I actually house my laundry basket there.


Even worse, right? {Luckily it is possible to get a nicer hamper like this one that I am in love with. But that's step 2.}  I am the girlie girl that needs a full length mirror because I like shopping too much not to have fashion shows with myself in front of a full length mirror after a successful shopping trip.  Come on, you know you do it too and the warped five dollar mirror that came hanging on the back of my bedroom door just isn't cutting it.  I want to get an oversized leaning mirror.


I would kill for this Venetian Beaded Leaner from Restoration Hardware but its a smidge out of my budget.


This Rococo inspired piece is so ornate and lavish.  This is my dream living room.
{The zebra bench brings tears to my eyes.}


I love this little vignette so much.  It is an image of the bedroom from the blog from which I found my inspiration for this blog: Young House Love.  They have been featured on HGTV and The Nest to name a few. They are the cutest couple on the planet and they just had a precious little girl a few weeks ago!

So here I go on the hunt for a leaner! The first place I'm going to start is Home Goods, where I believe I'll have good luck.  Stay tuned to see how it works out.