apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Wonderful calm in this home!

is it common for ny'ers to renovate rentals?

Best post ever!

This apartment is the perfect antidote to an episode of "Hoarders" — I love it!

What a cool place! Although my stomach turned a little to see the computer on the radiator. . . you will put it somewhere else when it gets cold outside?

LOL you live on my block, love your place....wish my landlord would give me a deal for all the home improvements I have done......oh well. If new yorkers didn't work on their rentals most new yorkers would be stuck with the landlord special! If you want to see my place, various pics at www.homesweetbrooklyn.blogspot.com

How is that a renovation? If I owned the building and my next tenants were sans cabinets in the kitchen I'd be a bit upset. Although, the decorative paper/textiles in the moulding is neat and a nice idea for my own apartment.

Did not work for me. A bit incomplete and looks very cold to me. Reminds me of those hospitals that you see in the movies that take place I believe in the 40's/50's.
I think a nice fluffy rug by the bed would be nice.
For me there is no nook to cozy up with a book.
I would find it more refreshing for the hot summer, but as winter approaches, I look for something cozier

Very true to the spirit of 70s lofts. If that's your inspiration, you nailed it.

I. Love. This.

I knew I would love it when I read "Who else lives here? A mouse (seen once)." I do wish we could see more of the kitchen - wonder if they are looking for more practical/bigger pieces for in there? Doesn't seem like enough storage or counter space, unless you really don't cook at all. But to be able to redo it your way AND get a break on the rent is brilliant.

I also thought this felt cold. For a place with such good bones, it could have been actually renovated into something really amazing. But, for what looks like it was done on a really tight budget, it looks impressive.

OMG! I love this post ... inspires me to be a 'creator' and not a 'consumer'!

WHAT is hanging over the bed???

I like the floors. Fantastic. If my flat were not graced with old walnut floors I would break out the floor paint. The kitchen...hrmm. I am going to assume that it is a space in transition? The before was better than the after in there...but it might be amazing one day. I just got done painting the floors in my basement and love how it toally transformed the murky grossness of the space into something sexy....actually, my basement kind of shares a similar 'undone but done' look with this place. http://www.strangeclosets.com/?p=15610&cpage=1

I like this a lot, except for the floor. I don't mind that they painted it, but that pale grey just feels so cold and industrial. Somehow I feel that the floors, just oiled up a bit, would have worked better with the look they've got going. I really like the "spare-ness" of the furnishings, especially the mix of styles.

Throw me a sweater and tape some padding to my body. This place looks cold and all of the surfaces look hard. Do love the rug in the living room though. The molding on the walls is lovely too.

It looks to me like this is the beginning of a long-term renovation. While a lot of Greenpoint apartments have great bones, covering those bones is a often whole lot of saggy baggy dated cheapskate skin. Unless you have endless funds at your disposal, it's pretty much impossible to go from "ersatz Home Depot Kitchen" to va-va-voom in 6 months.

My boyfriend just moved into an almost identical apartment which, while it has some of the most beautiful details I've ever seen in an affordable NYC apartment, also has tea-rose wallpaper, greige ceilings, hideous water-damaged carpets, and mismatched patchy linoleum. Someday it's going to be beautiful, but right now, "transitional" is probably about the best word for it.

I also meant to say - and this house tour is FABULOUS inspiration for that transition!

I don't get it? Lord knows the kitchen wasn't anything to crow about before, but now it looks like a SRO flophouse. The only thing missing is a frayed wire hotplate. Weird kitchen.

It looks creepy to me actually. No surprise for the mouse. Can't imagine what it looked like before the "transformation". The whole set up looks like a hospital room from one of those creepy movies :) No pun intended.

I definitely couldn't live there.

my partner and i moved to Greenpoint in '93 and had a similar apartment - 2 bedroom - railroad, 900 sq feet for $600/month.

it was white and had gray porch paint floors, and was on the top floor of a similar building and had rounded arched windows - it was the best apartment we ever had in nyc!

as a new yorker, i feel compelled to ask what everyone is wondering - what you guys are paying for a similar pad 16 years later?

I lived in two New York rentals for over twenty years. My landlords (who were already head cases) would have gone nuts if I pulled out the kitchen cabinets. They can take you to court for that kind of thing, particularly if you have something as desirable as a rent-stabilized apartment.

Other than the extremity of the kitchen reno -- which as I noted above, is of questionable legality -- I loved the spare vibe of this place. In many ways, it is very beautiful. It is almost Shakeresque. Q. What is the object hanging in the blank picture frame?

Is that the new refugee style?

recession chic is dat chu?

I love this one.

This place has a ton of character and heart. Sparse, yes. Cold? Never. I love the deconstructed look. I hope that it never becomes a perfect, cookie-cutter, dime-a-dozen Stepford apt. As long as these guys live here, I don't think that's an issue.

If I were a mousie, I'd move right in.

This looks pretty much exactly like the lofts I lived in during the early 90's in Hoxton, the equivalent to the meat packing district in London, UK - except Hoxton was the the centre of the furniture making industry. Those were the days before the developers moved in, all leases were - strictly speaking - commercial but nobody cared. On the odd occasion when the fire inspector announced himself we all stashed beds and mattresses away. It didn't fool anybody, but it kept up appearances enough to allow us to get away with it.

These days the lofts we lived in are 600 sq/ft condos of course.

I love the look, brings back many pleasant memories.

A calm oasis! What's the color of the floor paint?

Wow, your place looks to me like you'd really like to be willing in Williamsburg, and this location is as close as you can get, so you've tweaked your decor to match your aspirations. Nice.

Renegades!!!!!!!!!!!!!

How will people ask you to drop the names and pedegrees of your furnishings?

Errr. Your kitchen is a bit too dogmatic. Unless you never prepare food - then you can leave it as a politicsal statement.

I once lived in a half abandonned housing project. My flat came furnished with 2 steel cots, 2 school desks, 3 stools, and one school chair. The spare bed in the spare bedroom was my wardrobe.
My only purchase was a small scratchy handwoven rug from Egypt (about $10) but the flat became one of the warmest and most inviting places that I ever lived. The town was so elderly and poor, that there was nothing to scavange on the streets, but inginuity and Mother Nature took took the place of "objets trouves"

Are you squatters?
The place is lovely but it just looks like step 1 of a renovation, the "ripping everything out part" and then you stopped there.

Really liked this one.

Seems like AT is starting to skew toward more higher-end, professionally done spaces, which I find kind of tiresome and not particularly inspiring. I can get my fill of celebrity interiors and Viking-stove porn elsewhere, everywhere.

This place gets back to the roots. Nowadays, it's much more difficult for New Yorkers to get their hands on a low-end rental and work with a landlord who's willing to deal. But in gentrifying neighborhoods, it used to be fairly common. Several of my young architect friends renovated their cheap apartments in cooperation with their landlords. Great lab experience for the young builders/designers and great value for the often-struggling landlords (hard to believe but true).

This place is clearly a work in progress, as all real homes are. I think they're off to a terrific start, with plenty of room to move and grow. I'd love to see updates in the future to see how things evolve.

I love the simple, restful, minimalistic look of this home. Good work!

Some pieces are really great--the living room rug, the long bench, the bed. But the overall look felt a bit unfinished. That said, if the people living there like it, then it's all good.

makes me think of a country or beach house. Simple and bright. I much prefer the new look in the kitchen, but agree that practically, it might need some more storage/prep area. Those hideous cabinets just make you want to cry, and the boxy feel made the kitchen look cramped. Open shelving again makes me think cabin or shore house.

Excellent work in 6 months--I'd call it Civil War hospital chic! All those patterns--I don't see it as cold at all.

The mouse has good taste...I love this place! Granted, its sparse in its furnishings, but there is something soothing about these rooms. AT needs to show more homes like this...and not the typical MCM homes that all have the same furniture and wall hangings.

I agree it could be cozied up a bit in spots, but that's just my taste. Overall I think it's a terrific job. I love the bookshelves. And the desk/table lamps.

I don't really "get" it. I wish there were more homes profiled that showed you neat solutions for everyday living... Everything always looks so sparse and clean. I dont like the laptop on the radiator either.

While I enjoy a bit of minimalism here and there, this goes beyond that.

No offense, but this looks more like a squatters paradise than anything else and with the bedbug crisis here in NYC, I wouldn't dare take anything off of the street.

um....don't really see anything too special here.
As they said, it's stuff they found on the curb on "big trash night".

Also, WHY is the laptop on the radiator? .....and WHY did that deserve a photo? Is that a "what not to do" photo?

To me, this house is typical of people who take a grossly "eclectic" mix of furniture and accessories, and then proclaim it to be some kind of "style."

I'm starting to think some of the tours are a joke...like "let's photograph some random pieces in a room and wait for the gushing to commence." One or two interesting pieces does not a tour make! This is by no means the worst tour I've seen, but it's in the top 10.

What I find interesting is the discovery--I think--of your future design in looking at these snapshots. It looks like you're headed into gold/white territory. The place has some scruffy baroque qualities sneaking about in its interior design that I can see you adding to later on. I'd nix the green/rustic railroad element (though I'd love to see those porcelain-topped tables in a different kind of place) and just go whole hog on the whole scruffy ornate element that's coming through in a bunch of places. Playing up that blue would be helpful to balance the gray. And for green, I'd stick to plants in ornate containers. The walls, too, could use some color texture, perhaps use a deeper gray to accent one or two? In any case, it's definitely a space that you'd want to stick around in and, as mentioned by many others earlier, kudos to you for negotiating with your landlord.

Well all I can say it is certainly different from any other you have shown. I can't say I would want to live there ----of course if it was finished it might be a different story.I am not familiar with railroad apartments - why do they call it by that name??

This place almost makes me scream. There is no space planning. The bed , at the very least, could be placed
with the headboard on the short wall. And that little dining table in the middle of the room? The pieces are cute but did you try any other configuration? It just looks like everything is in the wrong place.

It's like a really well done fresh-out-of-school first apartment. Even IKEA or thrift store furniture would kill your budget so you scavenge. You're tired from working at a crappy job all day so you don't bother to reupholster, stain or paint your dumpster treasures. You just arrange everything neatly, with a bit of flair. Sometimes the sparseness depresses you and sometimes it just seems honest and unpretentious.

So yeah, weirdly, I like these photos. Maybe because seeing this place makes me nostalgic. I lived in an apartment that looked like this: rough, peeling paint, high ceilings, beautiful light, old plumbing. Even though it was a terrible apartment by most people's standards, it felt kind of romantic and bohemian to have a leaky roof and prewar fixtures. (Of course, this only works when you're young).

But please, get rid of the Poland Spring boxes and all the little toys on display. They nudge this from almost poetic simplicity to 'if it looks good it was an accident of the light'.

Reading these comments reminds me why I'd never in a million years send photos of my home to AT. Not the constructive comments, just the mean-spirited name-calling ones. So unnecessary.

This is original. No trendy furniture are design cliques.

At first glance, I didn't get this. But when I saw what you did in the kitchen, I started to feel it. There's something so wonderful about peeling back all those layers and just being with what's revealed.

It makes me think of the 1930s....Woody Guthrie might drop by and sing his latest song before you all go to the union meeting. It's genius! And six months....amazing. You guys have a lot of energy. Bravo!

To the poster who asked what is meant by a 'railroad apartment', see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railroad_apartment. (I seem to remember learning about these in grade school).

I like the sparse, white-grey look, and agree with other comments that compare this tour to a beach house feel. But on that note, the sparse furnishings could do with some softer, cushier additions (what I also love about simple, comfortable homes). The 'full' shelves could be repeated elsewhere to bring colour & substance, and an over-stuffed chair would be better suited to curling up on and reading an old copy of Moby Dick than any options I could see.

As a parting comment, keep going with the renovation and don't forget to put back in some of the functionality to the kitchen, still using your style.

This very well may be my favorite post ever! Only utilizing that which is needed helps one to focus on careful selection of items. This would be hard for me, because I have a tendency to hold on to junk. I know, though, that it would be spiritually better (cleansing if you will) to scale down and retain items more intentionally. Well done. This will be forever an inspiration. Thanks a million!!!

I like this place very much, but I think the edge of M.C Esher tile in the kitchen is hazardous in terms of toes...
Oh and I want to see the bathroom please!

I'm hoping it'll be nice when it's finished... it's just too Leningrad at the moment though. And that couch is just beyond description!

I think this is very pretty, and I like the kitchen redo much better. I would rather not have cabinets than have those ugly ones. But I do agree that some nice glass front cabinets or a rolling kitchen island with butcher block top would be helpful for prep and storage space. I LOVE the bed and the side tables, too. I am a fan of using trash days and roadside finds to furnish a place. Several of my favorite pieces of furniture were found curbside. Oh, and I also love the painted floor. Lovely!

More people should aspire to live this way. It's so unpretentious and honest.

Love it! Don't really understand the negative comments, but I to each his own.
I'm trying to spruce up my small apartment on a very tight budget and this one inspires me to think more outside the box.

Where did you get the cushions/covers for the bentwood chairs? I've been trying to find some that fit mine, but have had a really hard time. Was thinking of having them made.

"WHAT is hanging over the bed???"

looks like a loincloth in a fream :)


and call down people about the 'undoneness'! they have only been here a few months and say the renovations aren't complete.

anyways, I love the use of your space and hope to see you get some awesome refurbished storage chest or something in the kitchen.

love the bed. furniture is a mix of mid century modern and bohemian grunge. like it