Four Rooms, One Goal

I am going to vent for a second. I love a white room. It seems most people do, in fact. I want an all white kitchen for example. However, all I see is people with white houses, room after room. I am getting a little freaked out. Are Joey and I the only people who think the "all-white-thing" is a little creepy/sterile? Looking at pretty pictures in one thing, but after viewing homes in person with all white, everything, I feel like it's missing something, like warmth, they homey feel, ....color. Design is a funny thing, and we all have our own thoughts on how a space makes us feel. No one is right, and no one is wrong, hence I believe it's art. It is what it is, at the end of the day. If you feel good in your room, then you did the right thing.

We feel crazed in most of the rooms in our home. They aren't dirty or cluttered. They aren't too small or mismatched. They are empty. This makes us stir crazy. There is a lot of stuff out there that is easy to knock, but there is also an abundance of beauty to get inspired from. This is where we get stuck. What kind of people are we? What makes us feel good? What makes our house a home?

We would love to know what room in your house you feel best in? Does it compliment your personality? Have people told you "that room is so you!"?

We have collected some photos that represent us. They are of bedrooms, as that's our major Summer goal: complete a relaxing room we feel good in. After putting the photos side by side, we noticed conflict.

photo credits: 1. Coastal Living 2. Cottage Living 2. Southern Living 4. Cottage Living

Room #1: As a married couple, we share a bed. I presume most married couples do. So this double bed is not an option, however the hanging bed is roll-on-the-floor amazing. It's clean and airy, cool and modern. Not to mention fun. We nixed this from our list of possibilities, because it isn't practical. It makes a wonderful option for a guestroom, and it's still in the back of our heads to do someday. 

Room #2: There isn't much we are drooling over, besides the 70's-ish mural of the forest. This would be an awesome white room (I know, I know), with the mural, in a room with a ton of windows. We can see doing this with a faux white deer head as the center of attention over the bed.This room inspired us, in the woodsy relaxed kind of way.

Room #3: It's no shocker a kids room brought us to our knees. The fabric can absolutely be used in an adults room, as well as the crown. The bed just looks like it wants to be jumped into. Being we want a king bed, this style isn't going to work for us, but the crown idea wasn't taken in vein. We have some ideas brewing. The textiles and color are surely somethign worth thinking about for the garden room

Room#4: Windows. Wall. Floor. We love the clean natural combo. Wood and white is no fail, no matter what style it's represented in.

After combining the things we liked about these inspiration rooms, we found a single room which represents them all. And with that, we have been inspired to move forward with the bedroom!

Photo Credit: Southern Accent

We are on a mission to build a bed

It's easy for us to fall in love with very expensive furniture. It seems once we finally decide on something and fall in love with it, we review the price tag and get that knot in our stomach. "Yes, that bed!" we'll say, then we will look at the $4,000 price tag, think about the cost of tax and shipping and buying a new mattress, and get queezy at the thought of throwing down $7,000 on a bed. Yes! A bed is one of those things you should splurge on, but $7,000 can get us a heck of a vacation, or that new car we need so bad. We love the beds above, and we 100% agree that's the style of bed we want. The first one is from Jayson Home and Garden (of course!), and runs $3,750 before the required additions. The second is from Restoration Hardware and is a bit cheaper coming in at $2,965. The third is made by a company called Hickory White (they have great stuff) and is the most expensive, but we can not disclose the price online. What to do, what to do....

Why, build a bed of course. We decided we are in a position where we must be aggressive. We have a lot of out of town guests coming and we NEED the bed in 'sleep ready' condition (so we can move our Queen into an empty guest room) ASAP. So we crunched some numbers, made some sketches, and here is what we came up with:

Bed Feet: $48 Home Depot

Fabric: $250 Vintage French Linen from various sources

Nail Heads: $30 Amazon (you can find in our store!)

Jig-saw: $70 Home Depot

Hardware: $50 Home Depot

Wood for Frame: $50 Home Depot

Super Think Plywood: $50 Home Depot

That brings us to a grand total of $548 + a lot of labor. A lot more realistic!

We will be posting a step by step guide of what we did, and how you can do it too! Wish us luck!

Unplanned Holiday

We had a bit of an unplanned holiday! Well kind of. We turned off the TV's, Computers, and laid down the iPhones and got to business this long weekend! We have so much exciting news to share, so many new projects we will be starting, and our second floor video tour!

In the meantime let us share with you a wonderful discovery we came upon this weekend.

Timothy Oulton has his own little piece of ABC Carpet and Home in Manhattan. When we entered ABC this past weekend we were looking at beds and couches. If you have ever been to the one in Union Square (or any location for that matter) you know how easy it is to get lost in all the glory it holds.We got lost in the most brilliant "exhibit" like display we have ever seen. Like kids in a candy store we fantasised about the British Flag Couch in our living-room. We pictured our old British home filled with old British goods.

No wonder we were smitten. No wonder it was so familiar and easily digested. Mister Oulton had designed our most favorite Spring line of furniture ever, and we had been drooling over the pages of his work on a daily basis. This was not the first time we were delighted with his work. What pages you may ask? Take a peek and find out. Looks super familiar, doesn't it?! Remember this post, or this one?

So that brings us to the burning question of, how will a bold couch be received? Is it tacky and too overwhelming, or hip and bold? Tell us your thoughts! We would love to know.