What do you do when you have a room in your house that you hate? A space that you avoid, shut the door and pretend doesn’t exist? Instead of letting it (the ugly space) rule you, you embrace it, find its strengths, and make it into somewhere you love.
This is what we’ve been doing the past six months. Our downstairs bedroom, the eyesore of our house, had hideous dark brown shelves, a ripped up carpet, poor lighting and a tiny closet. Functional, yes, but nothing to write home about. So we stepped back and envisioned the possibility of what could be. We knew we wanted to make it an office, recycle as many components as possible, keep the cost low, and end up with a space where I would enjoy working, reading and even watching the occasional DVD on our iMac.
Finally, months later, we’ve claimed success. The once brown shelves that dominated the room are now bright, sage and white bookcases, the old carpet has been replaced by Maple laminate, the closet has built-in shelving perfect for holding file boxes, and we’ve made a little reading nook with a day bed and yummy chocolate brown rug under foot (Guinness really likes the rug, as illustrated in this picture).
So far I’ve spent every morning drinking my coffee and catching up on the news in my new favorite room. I can even invite you to come and stay on our day bed (it unfolds into a double).
If you’re interested in what we did, here are the components we used:
Lubi Day Bed, in Khaki, CB2
Wool Rug, in Brown, Cost Plus World Market
Two cafe-style pendant lights, Home Depot
Gorm Shelving, Ikea
Throw pillows, Best of Everything (local)
Pittsburg Zero VOC Paint, Kings Paint and Paper (local)
Harmonics laminate, Costco
What’s left? Hanging some artwork, reorganizing the bookcases a bit and a few other odds and ends. But now when a guest arrives instead of shooing them away, I can say “Have you seen my favorite room yet?”