apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

My boyfriend's furniture has been locked away in storage for the past month and I went to go check on things this past weekend - only to find out that there has been some MAJOR water leakage. I feel terrible about this and the bottom inch of the legs of his dresser and headboard are white now. Is there anything I can do to salvage this?

I heard about some product at home depot that sucks the moisture out of the air - but will that fix my problem?

ErieIndiana -
AT:NY posted a tip on removing water marks from furniture...it may be worth a try. Here is the link.

The sponges at our kitchen sink start to smell moldy after just a few uses. So whenever I wash dishes, my hands smell moldy for hours. It's awful! Anyone have tips for keeping sponges clean? We wring them out after use but it doesn't seem to work.

I learned recently if you microwave a sponge for 15 seconds it kills all the bacteria in it. Maybe that might help?

Has anyone ever hired a professional interior designer for any kind of work?

We had a consultation w/ someone at Urban Space (won a free hour through their raffle), and asked them to draft a proposal for if we hired them for more extensive work. We just moved into our new condo so we're pretty much starting from scratch as we want to replace our old apt furnishings.

The fee for just doing furniture layout for one room was $700, and that doesn't include any info about furniture selection, materials, styles, colors, etc. That would have to be done through separate hourly consultations as needed.

Or, they could come up with a design board for us to use as inspiration that would also cost just under $700.

I personally feel we'd get more for our money with a design board, as it's selecting all the pieces that's the hard part. We can always move furniture around ourselves to figure out layout. But then what if we don't like the design ideas they come up with? And that's still money that could be going towards actual furniture...

There's also the option of just continuing to use them on an hourly basis as needed....

Just wanted to see if anyone else out there has had this dilemma or has had good/bad experiences w/ designers.

Thanks!

If you are meeting with a designer, they should be asking questions about what you are looking for, your design and color preferences, etc. This should give them a good idea of what you would like.
As a future interior designer (currently in school), I know that the boards take a lot of time and if the designer listens to the clients, they should be able to come up with some good options for you.
The people at Urban Source may have a portfolio of their projects, which would assist you in learning how they do and if the final products is similar to your aesthetic goals.
From what I know, Urban Source is pretty modern, so if you are more traditional then I would look around for someone who may be more along your lines of taste.
A board would help you get inspiration, but some of the products they suggest may be to-the-trade only, just so you are aware. But, that still may be great way to go to get some ideas and color suggestions
Also, from my experience an hourly range for designers does not usually go below $100. So, depending what the consultation and/or board would involve, it could be 5 hours of their time which equates to around $150 per hour.
You have made a good start though - just ask around for recommendations. That is typically how interior designers gain all of their clients anyway (rather than a traditional internet search).

chicagores07 -- you may want to look into whether Amy Lenahan with Design I Interiors offers the kind of help your looking for. Her pricing is very clear-cut and reasonable. We just did a design consult with her (two hours, $300) and for the amount of information/advice/recommendations we received from her, it was a bargain. We're getting ready to move into a new space in August, so we wanted her to help us resolve the big issues (color palette, floor plan) but we loved her so much that we'll probably have her back once we've been in the place for a while to get her recommendations on specific issues we'll inevitably encounter.

Her website provides basic information but she's more than happy to give you more detail as to what you can expect from her based on the package you've chosen. She's also pretty flexible about the packages -- if they don't fit your needs, she can work with you to come up with something that will.

Not sure what your timeline is, but I do believe she's taking maternity leave some time in July.

creative,

i make sure the sponge is dried fully after washing dishes and make sure it stays off the sink in a space where it won't get wet, just by the faucet. then every other wash, i microwave the sponge for 3 minutes. keep an eye on it as some sponges have plastic parts and will burn. i only had this happen once and it just left a little dark spot in the middle of the sponge. i don't have a problem with smell anymore.

S in Chicago,

At Target we found a really useful stainless steel wire sponge holder that sticks to the side of your sink with rubber suction cups. We used to keep the sponge in a little dish by the sink, but this is much better.

The water just drips down into the sink and there's one less item to clutter the countertop.

and make sure the sponge is damp/wet when microwaving it. I've heard of many folks setting the entire microwave oven on fire trying to clean a dry sponge.

Don't forget that the sponge will be very hot (I know, that should be a 'duh'!) so don't reach right in and grab it when the microwave dings.

Has this site been changed recently? From my view, I can no longer see the tabs at the top to navigate between and of the other AT blogs. I have to manually type in kitchen.apartmenttherapy.com etc.... am i the only one with this issue?

MC, I haven't had that kind of problem on either my home or work computers, but since I'm not a computer nerd (Boomer, feel free to chime in here!) I don't know what to tell you. Hope you get it resolved soon, though.

I don't use sponges. They gross me out. I use a scrub brush for any dishes that don't go in the dishwasher, and bar mops for spills and general cleaning. Bar mops dry quickly and are easily machine washable.

S in Chicago:
I had the same smelly sponge problem! We tried microwaving the sponge on a regular basis, which helped a little but didn't keep the sponge totally smell-free. I also bought one of those sponge holders that stick on the side of the sink so that the sponge could dry more quickly, with no appreciable improvement The thing that finally did the trick was - believe it or not - switching to Trader Joe's dish soap. My old roommate, who was trying to be more enviro-friendly, bought some and the smell problem stopped. After my roommate moved on and the last bottle of Trader Joe's ran out, I grabbed some Dawn at the grocery store. The smell was back after one use. I thereafter bought some Trader Joe's, started a new sponge and, I don't know how or why, but no smelliness at all. Hope it works for you, too!

I throw my sponge in the dishwasher each time I was dishes. It gets the smell out, but it does come back.

I gave up the sponge years and years ago. They are basically bacteria and mildew dream homes.

I should have saved this question for the new green site.

I was talking to an engineer in the power industry about green energy. He was saying that most people who pay for green energy do not receive that power. That makes sense because green energy production is only a small percentage of the overall production, there simply isn't enough to serve the population.

But, you can still pay for it. It's probably more expensive but if you buy it, at least there will be a demand for it so it must continue to be produced and sold on the market. So, one of my questions is how many people pay for green energy even though they know they are not receiving it?

Second, should people get some sort of incentive for purchasing green energy? That is, to assume that green energy is better for the environment than any other energy source.

I have a color question and am desperately in need of fresh ideas.

I'm redoing my living room and wanted to paint the walls some sort of green because the light that comes through the window is invariably filtered through trees and never direct bright sunlight. Instead of fighting the weird light I wanted to fully embrace the sort of forest undergrowth feeling the light gives.
I started painting some samples today and realized the greens I chose all wash out my sofa, which is a mint/pistachio-colored Knoll loveseat. I want the sofa to pop, not fade.
Any suggestions for wall colors???

I was on the quest for a decorator for about a year. I did end up hiring a small company to help me out. The fee was a 'retainer' of $1200 to work on my living room, dining room, and foyer. I remember that her hourly quoted rate was $120 and she told me that the retainer put a lid on the billing for the space. I was not one hundred percent impressed; I understand that she made money on the items that she presented (her markup was 25%) but I totally felt like the only options she would consider were things that she could make money on. She did present beautiful boards with everything laid out, and I could have purchased everything that evening from her. She ended up giving me the cold shoulder after I sourced some furniture on craigs list that was nearly identical to what she was trying to get me to buy. That few pieces that I did buy from her were really nice, though very expensive. I ended up finding an ad on Craigslist for a chaise lounge for sale. The ad listed a link to 'Andersonville Dave' on apartment therapy hometours to see all of the items he had for sale. He was selling all of the stuff in his apartment. Oddly, the next day apartment therapy had a link on their page talking about his apartment sale. I ended up buying a few things from him, telling him that I liked his style. I asked him about doing some work for me. He was a little flaky about it, telling me that he only takes on a couple of clients at a time and does most of his work for another company. Long story short, he ended up coming over for a consultation, rattled off more ideas in 20 minutes than the other designer had in her entire presentation. I had to really pursue him to take me on as a client (it should be the other way around!) but it was great when he did. Dave charged me a retainer of $1500ish, but he wanted payments in one third parts. He also refused to buy furniture for me. Dave said that selling furniture is not what he liked to do and that it made it hard to be creative and deal with marking thing up. This worked well for me to some extent, allowing both of us to shop around for what was in his brain. I did get tired of the process at the end and would have preferred a more 'hands on' approach from him. I was also a little confused during his first presentation; I assumed he would come with boards like the other designer. He showed up with copies of furniture layout floorplans and an envelope filled with pictures of furniture. We did a sort of 'mix and match' activity with furniture pieces. It was hard for me to visualize some of the things we figured out. He did drawings of a couple of walls showing me how the furniture would look and it cleared up my confusion. I did ask him about boards, and he told me that that was not the way he worked and that he felt that they were a waste of time. It was nice to really see a range of options for things although it made things a little more confusing for me. The spaces that he worked on turned out amazing, and he managed to stretch my budget 100% more than the other designer. We are about to start on the rest of my place in the fall and I look forward to it. He seemed to know some amazing sources for things in Chicago and we had a couple of really fun days driving around and picking up furniture. I don't know if his style works for everyone, but I have not had anyone come into my place and not like it. His email is dhdinteriors7@aol.com.

annalyssa:

I sat and thought about your dilemma. It sounds lovely and exactly what my ideal living room might be, couch and all. Since you've got the green couch, why don't you offset it with a darm cream. Not one of those barely-offsets-white-on-tthe-trim white, but something that (for example) holds a small tint of the green but isn't noticable unless you put it against white. Or you could get a cream that is tinted toward brown. Or a cream tinted toward blue.

I can think of several possibilities, but let's use cream-tinted-green for an example. Paint the majority of your walls this color, including behind and beside the couch, and then use a bolder green as a contrast color and paint borders. Right now, I'm a fan of broken lines: I have a white, vertical, dotted line of textured notecards along certain vertical places of my walls lately. Extending vertically along doorways from lightswitch plates, along a corner in the room, in a niche that's the perfect size. But you could paint borders along windows, underneath or along shelves, and next to peices of furniture (not your couch) that are square and need a little color next to them. You can also get green decals for your walls that make a statement.

In other words, use the green as an accent color to accompany the accent which is your couch.

kate, do you have any photos anywhere of your vertical lines? sounds intriguing.....

Annalyssa (pretty name)

Have you thought about a red? Not a fire engine red maybe a yellow base red.

Check out:
http://www.dominomag.com/resources/sites

click on the paint sources. You can look at paint chips and colors 'til your eyes glaze over.

Annalyssa, what about pink for your wall?

hrh, pink was my motivation for this entire project! i just thought to myself: a pink wall with red curtains. and now i'm redoing my entire apartment starting with the living room, and i am so glad that one day, while sitting on my white sofa in my offwhite living room in my new (and renovated, sort of don't touch anything it's so new) condo in an old leafy part of montreal, thought: PINK.
(like that song in funny face and now i'll have that song in my head all day).

anyway, i just painted it brown (davenport tan to be precise) and it looks great. i will save the pink (and the red) for another room.

kate, the "tinted green" is going in my hallway. i tried it in the living room but it wasn't warm enough (i needed to warm it up considerably - i wish you could see the before and afters...)
you are all fabulous. thanks for your help and great ideas.