china shepherdess

Take the orange pill.

Pink and orange has been my favorite color combination for quite a few years. I've been pairing these two happy colors since designing my first personal website about ten or so years ago. To quote Jonathan Adler,

At the Adler Laboratories on Hudson Street, NYC, we've made a very important scientific discovery: Pink and orange, combined liberally, raise the serotonin levels in your brain, creating euphoria. 

This was why I was looking for some orange accents for my pink bedroom. The first was a failure, but I kept searching. Then I saw maison21's post about a sale at unison and their bolster pillows caught my eye.

 

 

 

This photo doesn't show off the pink walls in all their splendor (note to self, learn how to use my new camera better), but the orange and pink really makes me happy. I know not everyone is a fan of worthless accent pillows, but I, myself, quite enjoy them. It also is a bit amusing that they rather resemble over-sized pharmaceuticals.

May they help me have sweet dreams.

Simply tourist.

I saw this wallpaper on Retro Renovation today and was smitten. It would be the perfect thing for, don't laugh, my bedroom closet. The furniture in the room is all modern, as in nowadays purchases from CB2 and Ikea. However, I'm going to be hanging my collection of mostly kitsch vintage Paris prints and paintings (including a fun paint-by-number) gallery style on one of the walls. If I put this wallpaper in the closet it would be a nice complement to that collection and would also hide the minor the cracks in the plaster walls. Definitely an extravagant way around that problem, but a closet wouldn't require much paper, and tax return time is coming soon. Now to find someone in "the trade" so I can found out how much it would really cost me. 

P.S. Here's a link to the NY Tiimes article mentioned in Retro Renovation's post: DESIGN REVIEW; When Artwork Has a Sticky Back

Yes. Yes. No.

The chair is staying. The rug is staying*. The pillow? Um, no. It's already on its way back to Urban Outfitters. I'm not sure what I was thinking with that purchase. It's like somebody upchucked Kraft Macaroni & Cheese onto 1970's bathroom wallpaper. And not in a good way.

All this is crammed into the corner because the rest of my bedroom floor space is filled up with parts to the Ikea wardrobe I need to finish putting together. The noisy background interfering with my pretty pink walls is because I clearly shouldn't rely on program mode while using my new camera in low light conditions.

Just a wee post to celebrate my two month homeownerversary! I sometimes beat myself up because I don't feel like I've accomplished much. Then I remember that I've only owned the place for two months and I just moved in the weekend before Christmas. 

*The rug may end up in the tv watchin'/karaoke singin'/guest room instead.

want

This Vivienne Westwood pillow from The Rug Company would be perfect for my bedroom, but at $635 it just ain't happening.

phony baloney

You may have noticed there hasn't been a big reveal of my bedroom. The excuse is that it is still very much a work in progress. Realistically it will be that way for quite some time. One big thing it's missing is a chair of some sort. I have found many that are quite appealing. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Room & Board's Norton in Gunmetal.
• Room & Board's Norton in Spice Leather.
• CB2's Parlour Chair.
• And, the biggest dream of them all, an Eames lounge chair and ottoman in ivory  leather.

None of them are really in the budget right now. I mean I have a whole house I need to fix up.

So luckily, one of the blogs I read pointed out a bunch of "designer-inspired" chairs they found on Overstock. I've wanted a real Eames rocking chair since pretty much forever, but just haven't had the cash and/or area rugs to make the commitment. I spied the white knock-off Eames-ish rocker on Overstock and decided it would go quite nicely with the white, streamlined thing I have going on in the bedroom and would cost basically the same as a dinner or two out.

Honestly, I do feel a teensy bit guilty about it, but the cost is the difference between having a chair or not. There's also the whole controversy about how the authorized reproductions are made of plastic (as is my knock-off) and the vintage ones were made of fiberglass. I'll let other people sort that out. Maybe someday I'll get a real one, but in the meantime, I think the knock-off will work well in my pink, but not too pretty bedroom.

No, I'm not putting a ruffled canopy bed in here.

I am worn out from packing, work and whatnot, but here's a quick update on the one room where I've made substantial progress -- my bedroom. Painting was a lot more work than I expected. Here's the run-down.

Before

Don't you love that scalloped trim on the closet? It was one of the things that first made me fall in love with the house.

During

The ceiling paint wasn't in terrible shape, but I wanted to freshen it up, so we did that first in a basic ceiling white from Hirshfield's. While painting, it was sort of hard to tell where we had painted and where we didn't. I've since heard of magical paint that goes on pink and dries white. I might have to try that next time around!

Next up, I started to get the Devine Color's Berries & Beans on the walls. The paint is lovely, but I ran into a couple of issues.

1. In the before shot the walls look like they are primed white (by the previous owner). What you don't really see, and what I didn't realize until I started painting, is that the primer is really thin in many places and there's a lot of blue/green paint showing through.
2. The kind folks at the paint store estimated I'd need a gallon for this room. Maybe I'm a sloppy paint waster, but I ran out of paint before the room was completely done.

Luckily, these issues were solved by throwing a bit more money at the problem and buying more paint. I ended up using two coats on most of the room and I think I have most of the problem blue/green spots hidden. It looks great to me, and that's all that really matters.

After-ish

These two photos were taken after the first coat of paint. With the lights on (and a camera flash) you see the "true color" of the paint, or at least the color that most resembles the paint swatch. I really like how the color contrasts with the woodwork. The photos don't really show the lovely sheen this paint has on my plaster walls. After using it in my bedroom, I'm really sold on Devine Colors in the Delicate Finish and, if the Mango Tango Beans isn't too bright, may just end up using it in my kitchen.

This isn't officially an after post because this room isn't done until there's some furniture in it. Right now, I'm just planning on putting my bed (duh) and a chest of drawers in there. I know I also want a nice chair and side table.

After I live in it for awhile, I'll figure out what else I want. It would be great to add a wardrobe or two, but I'm not sure they'll work with the windows and heating vent layout. The vintage light (I know, I know) needs to be swapped out for something a little less twee, but that can wait until I find the perfect fixture. Oh, and I need window treatments. Ugh. Methinks a trip to Ikea is needed pronto.

Delay of game

Things haven't been moving along quite as quickly as I expected they would, but some progress has been made.

I'm nearly done painting my bedroom. If you recall, I had initially planned to paint it a light grey. Plans changed when I was window shopping in the Oval Room and fell in love with a coat by Sonia Rykiel.

After I became smitten with this gorgeous coat, I just knew I had to use pink in my bedroom.

A more sensible person would have picked up a few sample pots and had at it. However, I was impatient and wanted to go ahead and pick up some paint so I could get started. Benjamin Moore's Color Capture iPhone app gave me a few good suggestions based on the photo of the coat. A light, warm, ballet pink seemed like the perfect choice. I considered the app's excellent suggestions, but I decided Devine Color's Berries and Beans was the perfect color for me.

This scan of the paint chip isn't exactly true to the color, but on the wall it's absolutely gorgeous.I went with the Delicate (eggshell) finish and it has a beautiful, luminous sheen.

Here's a poorly lit before shot of the room. I am in love with that scalloped trim on the closet!

I did all of the cutting in while I waited for CB2 to deliver my bed. My in progress shots are trapped on my camera because I lost the cable, so those will have to wait for now. Yesterday's project was touching up where the pre-primer blue/green was peeking through and rolling the walls. Unfortunately, the walls eat paint and the recommended gallon just wasn't enough, so I'm going to have to head back to the store this week to pick up a bit more. Here's hoping it will match well.

I've decided to ramp up my move-in a bit, so the plan now is to complete my bedroom and potentially complete the kitchen and living room before I move in. I'll do the rest of the rooms after I move in. There's certainly plenty of room for me to put all of my boxes of crap in the other two bedrooms and I'll be able to keep my bedroom as an oasis of calm while all of the work is going on.

My first big purchase

I made my first big purchase (besides the house of course) and ordered this bed I've been eyeing from CB2.I love the integrated angled headboard -- perfect for reading in bed.

It's important to me that I get the bedroom in order as soon as possible so that I can move in and have an oasis from any other projects that are going on around the house. I still haven't made up my mind about color, but the bed's white frame will work with whatever palette I end up using.

My sister and I are heading off to Hirshfield's this morning so that she can buy paint for her place and I can grab a bunch of paint chips. I'm leaning toward painting the bedroom a nice restful light grey, and then bringing in color with the duvet and other accessories.

Grey has been one of my favorite colors for a long time and it happens to be trendy right now, so it's easy to find lots of inspiration pics. Here's a slideshow with examples on CasaSugar.