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design vacation :: angsty teen boy’s room

21 October 2013 by Andrea Leave a Comment

My little boy is not so little anymore.

In fact, he’s a teenager. Guess that means it’s high time for an angsty teen room.

When we last saw the boy’s room, it was a vintage cowboy room…

Not so cool for a teenager. So sadly it had to go.

Then it needed to cure for the requisite length of time. Here at Homage Style, we don’t just jump into projects. We think them through, allowing the creative juices to flow. Some call this procrastination. I call it the creative spirit!

Well, this past week, my son went to Washington, DC with his 8th grade class, so I decided to take some time off from my day job and revamp the boy’s room. So off I went on yet another design vacation.

My son picked his own paint color and it was deep cobalt blue from Behr. I felt that it might be a little dark and overpowering, but then again, I’m just the mom…what the hell do I know? So I let him have his paint color. Ultimately it was the perfect color to set the tone for a dark and angsty teen room.

Let’s take a look around the room, before the angsty teen boy gets home and kicks us out! Here’s the finished product…

With two windows, the room gets plenty of light, plus the black and white striped curtains from Ikea help to keep things light and fun.

At the foot of the bed are two grey beanbag chairs…

For the record, I don’t advocate TVs in kid’s rooms, but the boy scavenged this one, and a little dumpster diving never hurt anyone, so I let him keep it. Plus there’s no cable, so he can only play video games on it. Aren’t those beanbag chairs perfect for gaming?

In the corner above the TV is a globe lamp that I made myself from a discarded globe my sister the school teacher gave me…

Globe lamp how-to blog post coming soon. Bet my sister’s sorry she gave up that little treasure!

On the wall next to the TV is an old laminate bookcase that I spray painted ages ago for kid #1 and it’s still going strong. Above it is a manly French memo board that I created from a wooden retail display shelf…

Ohio State fans, don’t mind the Michigan hat…he only wears it on crazy hat day!

How-to blog post for the French memo board will be coming soon too.

The memo board is my pride and joy of the entire room! I’ve been percolating on this idea for quite some time now and was thrilled with how it turned out!

A closer look…

The wall opposite the window has some great features as well, like the floor-to-ceiling bulletin board made of 12″x 12″ cork tiles…

Isn’t that fun? Right now there’s a synthesizer in front of it, but I’m sure it won’t be long before it’s covered with all sorts of memorabilia.

Notice the You Are Awesome poster that I made last year at a letterpress printing class I took with some girlfriends. Plus there’s the lava lamp…isn’t that a requirement for every angsty teen room?

And the black and white striped canvas balances out the black and white curtains on the other side of the room and breaks up all that blue. It was super easy and cheap to make…just painted the canvas white, then taped off for the black stripes, painted the black stripes, and voila!

We’ve all heard the saying, the best things in life are free. Well, this is especially true for free art! It’s the best!

I was lucky enough to score some advertising art posters from work and was thrilled that they were the perfect colors and style for the boy’s room. And by score, I mean co-opt them after someone left the company and left these bad boys behind. The first is a cool clown placed to the left of the window…

And the other is a giant robot towering above the headboard…

To the left of the robot poster is a Serbian ethnic instrument, a tambura, which the boy occasionally tries his hand at. It, along with the wooden French memo board and the cork board, as well as the natural wood on the furniture and the wooden box on the nightstand add an earthier touch to what could otherwise be a too cold blue room. All the beautiful wood tones warm up the room while giving it a very masculine touch.

I was really happy with the way the room turned out, but was especially thrilled when the boy came home and said he LOVED his new room! I’d call that a successful design vacation!

tea time

15 January 2013 by Andrea Leave a Comment

Would you please pour me a cup of tea?

Oh wait. Something’s off. Looks like someone put Sharpies in the teapot.

Oh yeah. That was me. Because I love to use things for purposes other than their original intent. Like Sharpies in a funky Midsummer Night’s Dream teapot.

Clever, too, since I wasn’t serving up tea very often.

It’s cute, don’t you think?

little things – bracelet edition

6 January 2013 by Andrea 2 Comments

This is a broken vintage bracelet…

This is a broken vintage bracelet used as art…

Pretty clever, huh?

As much as I would love to wear this bracelet, there was no fixing it, because the metal wasn’t strong enough to repair. But I still love the vibrant colors and beautiful design, so on the wall it went.

Works perfectly next to my print of First Kiss by Bouguereau, which I bought at Target a number of years back for $3.78. Can’t remember what I ate for breakfast today, but can remember how much I paid for something clearance 10 years ago! Go figure.

Yeah, it’s the little things, people…

Showing off this project at Funky Junk Interiors.

little things :: recorder edition

5 September 2012 by Andrea Leave a Comment

If you have kids or ever were a kid, I’m betting that you have an old recorder lying around. Didn’t everyone play recorder in school? I know I did, my sister did, and both of my kids did.

And I’m guessing that you also have some weird little strip of wall that is too small for just about anything decorative. Well, guess again, people!

Dig up that old recorder make it sing again!

No, you don’t have to play Lightly Row…just find an awkward spot and hang that recorder up, just like this…

It’s just a tiny little speck of wall between two door frames. Perfect for a recorder! Don’t you think?

How much did it cost? $0, since I had not one but two recorders hanging around. And if you want to get all funky and colorful, you could spend about $5 and get one of these…

Now go play Lightly Row while you’re looking for a place to hang your recorder!

choosing an accent color

26 August 2012 by Andrea Leave a Comment

Recently I freshened up my family room by adding some simple accessories and not spending scads of money. My new accent colors are orange, yellow, and a vibrant green.

I chose those colors by taking a look at some of the accessories I already had in the room (that I knew I’d be keeping) and picking out some of the more vibrant colors, like the orange and yellow in this lamp shade (which has a great story behind it)…

The spicy pumpkin orange and greens in this chair…

The golden lamp…

The yellow in this vintage advertising art…

And the vibrant yellow lemon zest in the poodle’s martini…(and what poodle doesn’t deserve – hell, even demand – a martini?)…

All pieces that I already had in my family room that either I love (the art and the striped lampshade) or that need to stay because the lotto fairies didn’t leave me a winning ticket (the 90s chairs). Bottom line…I built an entirely new look based on what I already had with just a couple of colors that are now here…

and here…

Plus, just to keep everyone on their toes with a little design surprise, I didn’t just stick to orange, yellow, and green, but also added in a little zebra and black and white…

…because doesn’t black and white zebra match just about anything? Just shake your head yes and agree with me and no one will get hurt!

See it all pulled together in the family room here.

obstacles

8 August 2012 by Andrea Leave a Comment

We all have obstacles to contend with, whether it’s in our design projects or just life in general. It doesn’t matter how experienced you are or how big or small your budget is, you will face obstacles.

I discovered an obstacle the other day when I tried to fix my bed…

Here are some design obstacles that I can think of off the top of my head…

Little or no money
Project fails
Not enough time, due to a job, kids, or other obligations
Health concerns
Planning an eventual move
Lack of consensus on design plan with significant other
No inspiration
Fear
Any combination or all of the above

There are probably countless other obstacles that can prevent one from making a house a home. The question is, do you want to make changes to your home?

If the answer is yes, then the obstacles can be overcome. But on your terms. In your own time.

Don’t feel pressured to be like anyone else. No one but you truly understands the obstacles you’re facing. Don’t let those obstacles prevent you from making your creative dreams come true. Sometimes we need to release ourselves from expectations – the way that others think things should be or the timeline they try to impose on you, or even expecting too much of ourselves.

Little or no money

Get resoureceful! I’m not ashamed to have limited funds and you shouldn’t be either! There are plenty of freebies or cheap options out there.

Consider these…

Scanning your neighbors’ trash, or as it’s known in trendy design circles – Dumpster Diving! You know the old saw…one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Put it to good work! One of my favorite pieces is my zebra ottoman, which I pulled out of a neighbor’s trash pile and revamped to fabulousity!
Accepting hand-me-downs – Sure your mother-in-law’s chair might be super-frumpy, but recovering it with your fave fabric will make it frumpilicious!
Shop Goodwill and other local thrift shops – Never know what you can find!
Repurpose to create new things, like I did to make this “plant stand“.
And never forget how inexpensive spray paint and wall paint are. Save your pennies and splurge on the paint, which can make the crappiest tchotchke look awesome!

Project fails

All I can say about this is plenty of my projects are failures. I guess that’s how we learn. Don’t know if you’ve noticed, but it seems that a lot more design shows are beginning to share the inner workings of how they put together their designs and how they stage rooms, and many are now also sharing project snafus. That’s refreshing. Because if even the big-time pros with a design staff have an occasional project fail, then why wouldn’t you and I?

My thought on project fails is learn from it and move on.

Not enough time

Yes, we live in a busy, busy world, where sometimes it feels like our lives aren’t our own. A 24/7 place where we’re always connected, companies suck up more and more of our personal lives, kids are overscheduled, and we’re generally encouraged to go, go, go.

I get it. I live it. But somehow we have to steal some time back to make our nests a place of calm respite. To make them a place we love to be. Our favorite place in the whole world.

I don’t know how to tell you how to make that happen, other than to say that we need to get comfy with doing things in small increments of time and maybe not finishing the project today. I am the Grand Pubah of Unfinished Projects, the Queen of Curing, but eventually the important stuff rises to the top of the heap.

Learn to pick the important stuff off the top of the heap. Eventually, your vision will be realized. Besides, design is an always-changing, ever-moving target, right?

Health concerns

There are plenty of people out there, quietly suffering with health issues that can zap their energy and ability to start or finish projects. Even if they have amazing ideas, they may not be able to bring their ideas to life.

If you have a health issue that slows your dreams, just do what you can when you can. I have struggled with this too, and often wonder if I’ll ever get my old energy levels back. Perhaps not. But I’m not going to let it stop me. Does it slow me and my progress down? For sure. But I just keep on trucking, sometimes moving at a snail’s pace, but always continuing to dream about my future projects, and I hope you will too.

Planning an eventual move

Yeah, you’re busted. Just because you’re planning to move in 6 months or a year or ten years, doesn’t mean you’re off the hook for feathering your nest.

You have two choices. You can leave your place bland and impersonal because you might be moving eventually, or you can make it into a place that you love, starting today!

Lack of consensus on design plan

It’s called compromise, baby.

No, I don’t mean the kind of compromise that we both decide to like my ideas always. (Although wouldn’t that be awesome?)

If you and your signif other can’t agree on one project, I’m guessing that there are plenty more projects to start on that you do agree on. Move on to something different and come back to this one later. Maybe one or both of you will have a change of heart or your overall vision will change.

If that doesn’t work, there’s always couples counseling.

No inspiration

Can you say Pinterest? With Pinterest and all of the design blogs out there, none of us have any excuse not to get inspired.

Don’t have ideas? Then copy someone else’s and apply them to your space. Eventually, you’ll get inspired with your own ideas or offshoots of others’ ideas. Go for it!

Fear

We’re all afraid to some degree. What if it doesn’t work out? Then you’ll learn from your failure (see Project Fails above) and move on and try again. If you’re really fearful, start small. Something small and inexpensive isn’t going to destroy your world if it goes wrong. But if it goes right, it may just rock your world! So…

Just Do It!

The message here is to do what you can, when you can. Let yourself off the hook if you don’t work at the same pace as others. Forgive yourself and get comfortable with who you are and your obstacles won’t seem like such difficult problems to overcome. They’ll eventually become part of the terrain that is your life to navigate. Don’t worry, you’ll be great!

little things :: work cubicle edition

10 March 2012 by Andrea Leave a Comment

For those of us who work full time outside the home, we spend more waking hours there than in the homes we love with the family we love.

OK, now that I’ve depressed you, let me at least encourage you to do something to spruce up your cubicle space.

Nothing as extravagant as you’ll find here…

Maybe something a little more subtle…

One of the ways to soften the harsh edges of a cubicle and give your workspace some life is with a plant. Here’s a plant that I’ve had at my desk…

Just your basic succulent. (I can’t handle plants that need any more care than very infrequent watering, hence the succulent.)

Then one day we were cleaning out our supply of old versions of dictionaries and style manuals. I work as an editor, so we need to work with the most up-to-date versions. The books were going to be tossed in the recycle bin, so I decided to give them new life and add some height to my plant…

Use what you have decorating at its finest! Now it’s just a little thing, but it’s really spruced up my plant and my desk! You can add a little design just about anywhere with a stack of books. And no need to pay lots of cash for this one…check out the dumpster, the recycle bin, your bookshelf, or the library book sale.

Here are a couple of other tchotchkes that I use to personalize my cubicle space…

Because I love me some letters and numbers, I *had* to own this lamp when I saw it on clearance at Kohl’s a couple years back.

And this sweet thing from my monkey collection…

Just a couple of things to make my cubicle to seem less sterile and more fun!

Have you done anything fun to brighten up your workplace? Share your pics on the Homage Style Facebook page.

And don’t forget to enter the Spring Cleaning Giveaway for a chance to win this adorable sterling silver charm bracelet!

Click here for contest entry details.

Showing off at…

design vacation – project break :: the letter a

22 February 2012 by Andrea 3 Comments

In the midst of my craft armoire declutter yesterday, inspiration struck, so I decided to go with the flow and create a little something.

I started with a canvas that I had painted in black & white stripes for a previously failed project.

In my decluttering, I came across an old atlas that I was saving for a moment like this. My son has an collection of letter As, since his name starts with A, so I had the idea of making a letter A with the map of Ohio, since we live in suburban Columbus, Ohio.

Here’s the Ohio page…

The Columbus area is a lighter color, which will make the perfect center of a lower case A.

A lesser person might actually print out a letter A in their font of choice and trace it onto the map. I decided to create a more imperfect freehand version…

Then I adhered the letter to the painted canvas using rubber cement, which will create a good hold and will allow both the paper and the canvas to remain smooth.

All that was left was to add it to my son’s collection…

Done deal! Perfect addition to his collection, and since the canvas had already been painted, the project only took about 20 minutes.

And don’t forget to enter the Spring Cleaning Giveaway for a chance to win this adorable sterling silver charm bracelet!

Click here for contest entry details.

Showing off at these link parties…

design vacation – keeping it real in the master bedroom

20 February 2012 by Andrea 5 Comments

Sounds kind of scandalous! But when you see this, you’ll realize how completely scandalous it really is…

Messy-licious! And there’s more…

Nothing like watching an episode of Hoarders to jump start the spring cleaning bug.

And that, my friends, is my bedroom. Let’s just say it’s gotten out of hand. So I started with a big cleanup. Which took a surprisingly long time. I’m sure that had nothing to do with treating myself to occasional trips to Pinterest.

While it’s not quite ready for the full reveal, here’s a little something…

Nothing wrong with this vignette, but I’ve been trying to add a touch of mod around the house, so I want to mix it up a bit.

I found a terrific iridescent vase at Target, and it looks pretty good…

…but it could use a little more height. Something along these lines…

These are pieces of wood that my son broke when he was in tae kwon do. But the raw wood looks too, well, raw, so I painted it with a gray craft paint, not worrying about priming or if the woodgrain showed through the paint. Call it character and texture.

There, that’s better. The painted wood adds height and texture. Plus the wood pieces have special meaning to me, and now I’m using them instead of having them stuck in a cabinet. My son even wrote his name on one pieces, making it extra special.

Plus it looks great, don’t you think?

Don’t forget to enter the Spring Cleaning Giveaway!

Showing off at these link parties…

ottoman before & after

8 January 2012 by Andrea 11 Comments

About a year ago, I found this ottoman in my neighbor’s trash…

It was in pretty bad shape, but sturdy nonetheless…

Obviously trash picked, since there was even garbage in the springs…

Gross, but salvagable!

So, I let it cure in my garage for a year.

Eventually I picked up some zebra faux fur, which I bought from Joann, using a 50% off coupon from the Joann app on my iPhone. I bought a yard and a half, which cost me around $12 with the coupon.

This weekend the moment of inspiration finally struck!

I already had high gloss black spray paint, so I cleaned up the ottoman and spray painted the legs.

I didn’t worry a whole lot about getting paint on the original fabric, since the faux fur is thick enough to cover any discoloration.

The legs weren’t looking too bad…

It’s amazing how much of a difference just the black paint makes.

And now for the faux fur…

I began by stapling the prewashed fabric in the middle of the wider side of the ottoman.

As an aside, if you’re in the market for a staple gun, let me recommend that you consider an electric staple gun. They’re just a couple bucks more than a manual one, and totally worth it, because the electric one won’t kill your hands the way a manual one does. It’s still a workout and you’ll still break a sweat, because you need to press firmly to release the safety and you’ll need to pull the fabric taut as well. But overall, it’s much easier to use.

After stapling several places in the middle, I stretched the fabric taut and stapled similarly on the opposite side.

I stapled my way out from the middle, and then did the same on the shorter sides of the ottoman, working my way to the corners.

When I got to the corners, I folded them like I was wrapping a present, tucking them in and under as flat and tight as possible.

So that it looked like this on the side after stapling…

And like this underneath…

I wasn’t terribly concerned about how things looked underneath, just as long as it looked good on the visible surface. And I think it turned out looking pretty darn good!

Isn’t it adorable? I love it!

Best of all, it was a super inexpensive project. Only cost me $12 for the fabric, plus the spray paint I already had on hand (approx. $4), and my time an effort. Can’t beat that!

I’m not sure if I’ll keep the ottoman with the red and orange chair, since they’re both pretty bold, but the combination is growing on me, and boy do I love the zebra faux fur ottoman!

Would you keep the chair and the ottoman together?

Showing off my new ottoman at Funky Junk Interiors and Kammy’s Korner. And jumping into the contest over here…