Showing posts with label polyvore. Show all posts
Showing posts with label polyvore. Show all posts

Monday, February 2, 2015

My Brother's Bedroom


Happy times together at our parents' house over Christmas

My brother, Taylor, recently bought a new house in the amazing city he is so lucky to call home, Charleston, South Carolina.  Fortunately for me, he has allowed me to continue in my endearing role of the meddlesome older sister who likes to give her two cents on his endeavors. When he casually asked if I could give him some ideas for a duvet for his bed, I of course said "sure!" I then promptly whipped up a board complete with countless things my bachelor (you hear that, single ladies?) brother may not feel are super high on his priority list, but hey, I couldn't resist the opportunity :)

Here is a picture of his room.



The wall color and rug were already in place, so I tried to work with them in making my suggestions.  I'm not sure what color is on his wall, but I chose Manchester Tan for this board, as it appeared to be a close representation.



He has two-inch white wood blinds on his windows, but was hoping to add something to try and block the remaining light that was still coming through the blinds.  Going with a true black-out drape would have been the obvious (and more expensive) route.  Instead, I suggested these dark velvet Ikea drapes thinking that what they lacked in actual black-out lining, they may make up for in their dark color and heavy weight.  The jury is still out, so we will have to see if they work for his purposes.  At $40/pair, they are at least worth a try!


I suggested a classic ticking stripe for his duvet.  It's hard to go wrong with this simple masculine look, and I thought it paired nicely with all the pattern in his rug.  (To clarify, the rug in the mock-up below is one I found for the purposes of this board.  It's the best I could find that comes the closest to matching his rug) I also thought it would keep the room from feeling too dark by adding a white coverlet to the bed as well.



The light flax colored headboard brings in some more texture to the room, and the lamps add a fun midcentury vibe.  I love the open design of the bedside tables.  They feel kind of unexpected and fresh to me.





The fabric on the toss pillows almost mimics the design on the side tables, and they help make the red in the rug feel intentional.



I tied it all together with a more modern piece of art above the bed.  It pulls all the colors in the room together and the loose, organic feel is a nice counterpoint to the traditional rug and the straight lines on the tables and pillows.



Here is everything together.  Totally bachelor-friendly, yet still stylish right? :)


Taylor's Bedroom

Sunday, January 25, 2015

New Bunk Beds!


We made a big change to Wade and Holland's bedroom over the weekend…we finally installed their new bunk beds!

of course little sister had to get in on the fun!

If you recall, their room used to look like this.



Switching out their separate twin beds for bunks was motivated primarily by the need for more space.  Their room is tiny.  Our house is quite small.  And we've got an increasing number of legos taking up residence on all of the surfaces in it.  So, operation bunk bed was the first step in creating some space in the room for the legos to hopefully find a consolidated home!



The kids were so excited about their new bunks!  Holland especially was just giddy as we were putting them together, bless her little heart.

Y'all, do you see my children cuddling together?! It was completely unprompted!  My heart!!!


The bunk bed is by Ikea and is about as budget-friendly as they come.  And I have to tell you--aside from having a true custom bunk room, this is my favorite of any retail option I've seen.

I painted ours Duxbury Gray by Benjamin Moore (and yes, it took forever. Our back yard has been covered in the pieces of wood for weeks, while I used the incremental bits of time I have for this sort of thing to go out and put one coat on, wait till it dries, sand it, paint the other coat.  Flip and repeat.)  The walls are Horizon, also by Benjamin Moore, and I liked how the Duxbury worked with the Horizon in here.

For now, I stuck a Persian rug I already owned on the floor, but I think I'd like to get something a little more fun, and ideally a little larger.  Aside from their shams, there's not a whole lot of other pattern in the room right now.  Well, except for their little art wall I made.







Ahem…someone likes to remove the bows from their handy little holding place!
I'm inclined to go with a striped rug because 1) I just really like striped rugs in a kid space and 2) I feel like it would work well the trellis pattern on the shams + the check on the lampshade.


Here are my top picks to spice up their floor, all from my favorite place for rugs, Overstock.com.

Striped Rugs for Kids Rooms

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Master Bedroom Progress and Plans

I hesitate to put pictures of our bedroom in its current state on here, but I wanted to show you all our new shams I mentioned the other week.  And also, for me at least, much of the joy of decorating is the creative process, figuring out the pieces of the puzzle if you will--and so it only seems fitting to share the journey, including the early stages.

I'm noticing that these pictures make the wall color look darker than it does in person...
As plain and boring as it may look right now, my new shams do make me quite happy!  I got them on major sale at Lands End (here is a link to them--they are no longer on sale and have since improved the fabric, according to the description.), and here is what I will say about them:  They are soft, the embroidery and monogramming are both done well, and I really like the style.  Here are my two critical observations, for those who may be considering them.  They wrinkle very easily (I know this because my five year old likes to build a fort with them and wrestle on them and do all sorts of things that I might imagine would honestly wrinkle even the most wrinkle-resistant items!) and the fabric is so soft that the edges don't stand up quite as much as I'd like.  It makes the rope detailing around the edges a little less pronounced.  But for less than $50 total, I'm calling it a day on my shams.






















  • Here are my plans (as they stand today…always subject to change of course!) for the rest of the room:

  • Add a big bolster pillow in front of the shams to bring in some pattern/color.  I'm planning to get a couple samples from the new Tilton and Fenwick line for Duralee to try.  Right now I'm leaning towards soft blues/greens.  
  • Get a headboard.  Saving up for this…I have a few possibilities in mind.  
  • Paint bedside chests to match.  I'll probably keep the same color that's on the one on the right, but it needs a fresh coat in a bad way.
  • Add matching bedside lamps
  • Hang set of bird prints (already own) above bed
  • Bring in 8x10 rug (bedrooms need rugs!  It's no fun stepping out of bed onto a cold, hard floor :(
  • Drapes for the window.  I don't really have a plan right now…

I already own these two bolster inserts, so I figure I'll try and rig them up to be one long bolster to avoid buying a pricey feather-filled long one!


I was recently introduced to the site Polyvore.  Have you heard of it?  I'd seen their fashion boards before, but you can create Home boards too.  Really quite fun for those of us who do not have Photoshop but would like to see our ideas together in one place (you can even add your Pins from Pinterest if you want to see what they will look like in a room mock-up.)

Some of the things on my board aren't the actual pieces I own, but I tried to give the overall feel of what I hope to achieve.


Master Bedroom Plans


Table lamp
overstock.com


West Elm rug
westelm.com


Duvet cover
landsend.com


Pottery barn bedding
potterybarn.com


Surya wall art
purehome.com


Bed frame
westelm.com


OKA white wood dresser
$1,355 - okadirect.com