apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

love the wit and whimsy of this home!

Love this.

Nice pix. Love your T art.

<3

the teddy bear chair....did you DIY or did you get it from the famous person who designed it? I saw it in Vogue a while ago

Oh my god, LOVE!!!! I miss Boston. And MA in general.

I love the doll doorhandle! This home makes me smile!

Nice job, both with the house and with the post. Nice to see a posting from someone with a kid.

I love your home. So fun and full of light and creativity. I'm enchanted by the fat teddy bear lounging on the bed in particular.

Your house has a really great vibe. Thanks for letting us see inside. I love, love, love your set-up with the crayons on the table and mismatched chairs. That room has an easy-breezey feeling about it that makes me want to pull up a chair, a glass of chocolate milk, and a colouring book. Very comfy and real. Thanks again!

I am in love with your place. So comfortable and warm but with such personality and style. I love how pieces have a story or meaning behind them. I am North of Boston in an old Victorian. I know the painted wood debate well. Paint won out and I love it. I was interested in the "T" art. If she selling these are was this a special gift?

Thank you for sharing your home. Well done.

What a wonderful for home for a child to grow up in! Love your DIY spirit.

what a great post and house tour. you said just enough without giving us too much. i enjoyed getting to know your family through the pics of your home. love it..really enjoyed it. you deserve a place at AT. I wish you great success!

Love your kitchen, esp. the open shelves and those countertops. I've bookmarked Fireslate for when I'm finally able to redo my kitchen. The whole house is wonderful.

What a great post and a great house tour!
I especially loved spotting my teddy bear from childhood sitting in your son's stuffed animal storage :)

What a happy home! I love your lists!

I love your house...so beautiful.

Love your home! Your kitchen looks so inviting, and I'm jealous of your ability to get mismatched chairs to work. That blue cabinet was such a steal! I wonder if I can DIY something similar to that. did it have a countertop?

This makes me want to move out of San Francisco, have kids, get a yellow lab and create a home/house just like this. I love your home. :)

I love it! I love the combination of colors, the slate grey-blue with the red, chalkboard paint colors especially. I'm very inspired. It strikes a terrific note of warm industrial and makes me very nostalgic for my old Somerville days. How courageous to put your own home out there!

THIS IS WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT! I love love love your home! It makes me smile. It litrally brings a smile to my face. There is whimsy, playfullness, cheekiness and joy. And it looks like real breathing people live here. This house underscores all of the problems I have with many of those cold, sterile apts you show in the New York section. Like Luca's apt that so many people are raving about. It looked like a robot lived there. None of the pieces told a story about the owner. Where are the sractches and dents and wear. The war wounds of everyday use? The pieces in that apt were all slick, cold and totally divorced from the owner. It was a catalog space with no narrative. Your home is the exact opposite. Only you could live there because it has your fingerprints (both literally and figuratively) all over it. Thanks for the inspiration!

This house looks so comfortable, and I love how you've managed a pulled-together look with so many flea-market/craigslist finds!

Best boston finalist yet!

Love the humorous elements. Very lively and thoughtful. It made me feel like the kid (s) are encouraged to be creative and have must feel so special living in this home.

Kudos! I love it!
( and you totally make me homesick for a boston road trip! )

I like the idea of showing your own home when trying out for an AT blogging spot. I think it should be a requirement!

Gregory and Laure from ATLA both ended up as writers because of their homes. Why not you?

Very cute space. Thanks for sharing.

Very nice!
I would love to know which paint you used in the kitchen and in the kid bedroom...!

Dude, I WANT that teddy bear chair! Is that a bertoia chair with stuffed animals sewn to it?? Can you show the back??

i love love the open cabinets in the kitchen! and baby blue plus red is one of my favorite color combinations!

The last picture is wonderful!

Also, this is reminds me of AT when I first started reading it.

I love this- probably one of the only truly original looking home interiors that is also practical ever to appear on AT- Boston and beyond!

I want to know a bit more about the desk chair too- what's it covered in? It looks like perhaps vintage Chinese rice sackcloth? Where did you find that? Thanks and keep up the good work!

Oops, sorry- I see now the chair is the first thing you mentioned. Did you really recover it yourself, or did you have it done professionally? About how much would a job like that cost? (I'm thinking of doing the same to a vintage Bergere chair I have with my collection of vintage suzanis).

This home is so lovely! And, it actually looks lived in!

I love the light, bare wood of the kitchen cabinets, too.

Yeah! I'm from Wellesley too!

A post.

*A [plus!] post :)

I wish I were your neighbor so I could sit in your funky, sunny kitchen and get advice about where to find the best architectural salvage, or how to attach teddy bears to a bertoia chair. I guess I could settle for having you as our AT Boston blogger (I hope). Your house is so real, fresh, imaginative and inspiring.
Jeanine, you are my new design guru! Thanks for having the courage to open your doors.

Very well done! Eloquent use of space, light, and materials. Absolutley love the spaciousness of the kitchen.

Great post! Loved the relaxed writing and your home!

Amazing place. Kudos. The kitchen especially is really fun.

My one beef with this amazing house: Can't you take down that "colers" sign and correct the spelling? One day your kid's going to lose a spelling bee and blame his decorator parents.

how refreshing. this isn't a "house tour", this is a "home tour". I love your kitchen. also, very well styled... the scrabble game in progress. yay! a million cupcakes!

Thanks for the tip on your countertop. I live in the Boston area and we are in the process of wanting to redo our kitchen without costing a lot of money. Your house is lovely and homey.

This is the such a sweet house. If I weren't allergic to cats I'd want to move in for a weekend. And great to see a post that includes kids like this.

Just checked out the slidehow for a second time - still love it! Your lived-in leather chair kicks butt. I really admire your resistance to creating a prestine and overly styled environment, intentional or not.

Question: what is the soft blue/grey used on your walls?

Ohmygosh, Jeanine here, thanks so much for all of your nice comments! I was SOoooo nervous to post my own house. Now I can breathe again!

Keyse- I did make the bear chair, I also saw the one the Campagna brothers did a few years ago (they also did a hilarious one with all stuffed sharks), wasn't it amazing? I just bought long twist-ties from Home Depot and attached the bears (and turtle, racoon, squirrel)..

artsandletters- It IS a bertoia chair! Can you believe I found it at the dump? You should have seen my 100-yard dash over to it. I would love to send you a photo of the back of it if I can figure out how to do it offline.

Miriam- I took an upholstery classes at the sweet Eliot school in Jamaica Plain and upholstered the chair last fall. The teacher, Paul DeVito is energetic, funny, and never met a chair he didn't know how to tackle. I got the canvas chinese mailbags at Pod in Brookline Village. I thought it was funny that in addition to the chinese letters, the mailbags also say "Republique Populaire De Chine". By the way, Paul also does amazing (inexpensive!) upholstery if you don't want to tackle the Bergere chair yourself. He's at Melo & Son Upholstering in Somerville. Your chair sounds like it will look amazing!

OneWallKitchen- Thanks, I love the raw kitchen cabinets too! They are made out of poplar. I really did intend to paint them white, but once Guy put them in I had one of those "ahhhhh" moments. That actually happens to me a lot, I'll find something and have no idea what to do with it and then set it somewhere and love it.

Robin- The doorknob happenstance was similar, I got that little guy as a gift from my dad and stuffed him in the door when we didn't have a knob for a month. Sam loves it so much that he won't let me buy a doorknob now!

Paulinet- Sams bedroom is painted with "Overcast", its a C2 paint (hard to find this line but Babels in Needham carries it). The warm gray-brown in the kitchen is C2's "Archival". My friend Camilla turned me on to those colors, she can look through a paint fan and find the perfect color for anything.

Everyone, thanks again for completely making my day with your nice comments! And at this VERY moment David Ortiz just hit a home run- the Sox are up 2-0 in the top of the 7th!

Jeannine!
Your house is amazing just like you! I love all the bright touches of color popping out from the neutrals. Sam has grown. Thanks for the painting credit.

xxoo - k

two thumbs up for this house! so nice to see a house that isn't all new and matching. love the mismatching and cool thoughtful ideas. my favorite is that fucked up leather chair, even indiana jones would be proud of owning that bad boy!

Steverino--I'm thinking perhaps the son spelled the word? I know I had my son make up the signs for our laundry sorters....

This is an utterly amazing home.
Totally fearless, that's what you are. I love that chair with the rice sacks: I would have covered it in something "nice" and then been worried all the time about it getting dirty with the kids about. You've managed to make a fabulous style statement with your practicality. Definitely my kind of decorator/mom!
Thanks.

Gorgeous. This is really a home, not an overdesigned house, and good on you for knowing the difference when you put this place together. This house tour is inspiring.

Ohhh, what a lovely home -- colorful yet serene, with many innovations to admire. I'm at once inspired and homesick for Boston.

And go, big papi! (Can't listen to Red Sox games here in NYC.)

Hi Martybird and DawnMarie- We love the "T" painting too and it looks even better in person! Its painted directly onto plywood. Sam requested two trains- one headed to Alewife and another to Braintree- both parked at Charles Street Station on a sunny day. Karen painted it perfectly! She also painted the chubbiest, most adorable MTBA "75 Harvard Square via Huron Avenue" bus you have ever seen.

DawnMarie, They were gifts a few years ago when Sam was 5, but I'll ask her if she'd be interested in talking to you about painting one. Now I see that she just commented-- hi karen!

You have inspired so many people with your light, courage, wit and generous warmth. Your home and the pictures of it are just another way to share that inspiration! The readers of AT have spoken!!! Bring on Jeanine's Boston blog!!!! :)

I grew up in Wellesley, and I can't believe a house this cool is allowed in that stuffy town. Beautiful and warm!

I love this house and this post. The only thing that worries me is that a Wellesley girl might not be able to relate to the woes of us urbanites squished into 500-square-foot apartments in the city!

We're renovating in Cambridge MA. I too moved into a house with only a sink and an oven (which leaked gas). No fridge, no cabinets, no countertops, etc. A few weeks after we moved in, the wall mounted kitchen sink fell off the wall. Its been over a year. It is astounding what you can do with a microwave, toaster oven and hotplate (I'm not kidding).

Any chance you could give more details about your cabinet maker?

This one is now on my list of top five house tours - awesome place!

And, yeah, I miss Boston now, sigh. Charles St was "my" station too...

One thing I like about this post is how very regional it ended up being (without seemingly trying).

Seeing as how I've just spent a lot of money remodeling my kitchen, I think it's unfair that I'm now in love with yours. :o)

Who did your LEATHER Chair! It looks so authentically worn. I just must borrow your cat!
LOVELOVELOVE it!
You have lightened up my appartment with your wonderful breezy pictures!
Being a New Englander I completely appreciate your realistic, humanistic approach. Not so metro-sexual. Not so neutered!
Give me wimzy! You Rock!
p.s. stevarino-eat a sock!

Hi PrettyKitty- I hope the leather chair hangs in... our cat loves it. Every few days I put the stuffing back in it like Dorothy restuffed the scarecrow. I wasn't sure what room you liked the blue gray color- but the hallway with the stairs is BM Paper White, the LR is C2 Archival.. which.. oops Paulinet.. I hope you are still reading because that means the warm gray-brown kitchen color isn't C2 Archival, its really C2 Motley, sorry!

siobhan- Wow, I can picture the hotplate and microwave combo, because we did the same thing for 8 months while I was trying to figure out what to do about the kitchen. We actually splurged and got a portable electric burner from Target and really I could make anything on it, as I'm sure you can in your setup! Our cabinet maker was a wonderful guy named, well, Guy. His company is called "Rennovation Associates" (Medford) and he works mostly by himself doing rennovations. He did our kitchen, and is such a detail oriented carpenter that I begged him to do our cabinets, which he built in our basement. I'll call him tomorrow and ask him if its ok to give out his information. Check back tomorrow night and I'll post a follow-up comment.

JG- if you moved more than a year ago, you should see Charles St. station now! Its been totally overhauled and now even has an elevator.

Oh and anna karina, even if you don't live in Boston anymore, for something like $14.95/yr. you can subscribe to MLB.TV and listen to the Red Sox games audio on your computer!

Oyster- I think that steverino was kidding in his post about spelling, I had thought it was kind of funny. Actually I was going to reply earlier that I like seeing the "coler" laundry sorter because I tend to be obsessive about spelling and it reminds me to lighten up.

You just made my day with that MLB.TV suggestion -- thanks! Good advice for all of us expat Bostonians!

I forgot to mention that I love the industrial-style chairs in the kitchen -- they look perfect there (and when I see chairs like that they always bring back fond memories of art school, where we also used chairs like that). I love your whole house, but the kitchen and dining room are spectacular.

And your cat is adorable. Fluffy black kitties rule.

i absolutely absolutely love love love your home.

beautiful.

that doorknob doll is the funniest thing I ever saw on AT.

I had to sign up just to comment. I am so thrilled the world has discovered my dear friend Jeanine. I had the privilege of coloring easter eggs with Jeanine and Sam in that wonderful kitchen with her very affectionate cat " Little Guy" and her also affectionate (I know, hard to believe) fish. Her home is the coolest thing going in Swellesley - a place I can feel like a kid and play listening to great tunes. Everyone should have a friend like Jeanine and now you can through Apartment Therapy. I hope she wins :)

Vgates---I never heard of Jeanine before I saw her home here, yet I know I'd echo everything you say about her if I knew her! If the contest was based soley on a place's Happiness Quotient, she'd win hands down! (Not to say she might not anyway.)

I love the blue cabinet. And those mismatched dining table chairs? I never saw a more brilliantly selected melange.

solely

not

soley

Your home is fantastic! The doll-doorhandle, the "colers" sign, the kitty on the well worn chair... it's all perfect.

I'm trying not to be to "guy" about this, but some of the kid jokes are overdone. Functional blackboard, good, the deliberate hooked-on-phonics words in strikeouts, no. Occasional toy, good, teddybear centerpiece, not. 2 dolly madisons.

Thanks for the update! :) Charles St. station was badly in need of a renovation when I left, so glad it got it!

Hi siobhan- I reached Guy, the guy who rennovated our kitchen and made our kitchen cabinets, he's doing a job on the cape, but he gave me a # you could leave a message, 781-874-0636. He's an amazing carpenter, I hope you end up connecting.

Thanks again everyone for all of your kind comments!

ohh, this makes me want to move back to boston. such a WONDERFUL home. your eye would certainly be appreciated on this site! i really hope you win!!

As much as I like everything that's been mentioned, my favorite bit is that you are using lab stools at your kitchen counter. I love your style!

Jeanine -

Nice crib, love the kitchen especially.

Two quick questions: what color fireslate is that? We're having our Cambridge kitchen done up in it too. Is that the standard slate color, or another gray?

Also, where'd you get the white utility lamp over the kitchen island? Been looking for something like that ourselves for a little while. They have a few at Ikea that are okay, but not that nice.

thanks!
Andrew

I LOVE your house!!! It is so amazing. I have 2 little ones at home, so I love how you pulled it altogether w/ a place for everyone.

Where did you get your chalkboards? I've been looking everywhere and can't seem to find some. I would like to go to a store, instead of ordering online.

Hi Andrew- The fireslate is the "light grey". We didn't seal it because it would have turned darker and I like the sort of lighter driveway color. I had called up the owner, Tom Worthen, and he said it comes with some sort of sealer on it so you don't really have to seal it again (although their literature recommends using tung oil). A word of warning, this stuff does stain and won't stay perfect looking, especially with oil left on the counter etc. I don't mind and it ends up acquiring an organic like warmth, but I have some friends who say it would drive them nuts.

I love the ceramic hanging utility light over the island too. I'm not sure if you can tell, but it hangs from a red rubber cord. I got it on ebay, but its a droog light. They sell it at Moss, one of my favorite stores in NY (http://www.mossonline.com/product-exec/product_id/31250/category_id/45) but its a bit expensive for me so I've been hoping that another one comes up on ebay someday-- I'm nothing if not patient. In the meantime I only have the one!

matcar57- I've gotten the chalkboards at random yard sales over the years- the big one near Sams bed was being thrown out by a church in JP last summer. There's an old slate chalkboard on craigslist right now that sounds great but it has no photo-- http://boston.craigslist.org/gbs/clt/630849228.html. You could also try Todd Farm, the flea market on Sundays in Rowley-- it just opened yesterday for the season. And Brimfield is coming up too..

J -

Thanks for the info. It's funny but not surprising that nice looking "utility" lamps are so expensive. Sheesh.

Might have to consider the light gray instead of the darker one, but I think we are going to keep ours sealed as per the instructions. I'm a chemist, and don't mind the idea of a messy working lab bench, but my wife will not be pleased if they go all splotchy in no time.

Did you have a template made, or just do the measurements yourself? Our cabs are in, but I don't want to screw up the order. (BTW, there is currently a 6-week queue for Fireslate, versus the 2 weeks we were quoted when we made our initial order.)

a

Hi Andrew- Our carpenter Guy drew the outline and dimensions for the countertops on paper and then faxed it to Fireslate. We could have had a long wait too, but we ended up using the 3/4" thickness (which they had onhand, no wait) and had them miter on a thicker edge. This created an illusion of the whole countertop being a thicker slab. They can build it up to any thickness, and you really would never know. My friend Nancy has the darker color in her kitchen and it looks great.

Did you check online for utility lights? I'll take any excuse to forage for lights.
Check out http://www.bellacor.com/productdetail/52882.htm (this one's great AND its on sale!), also http://www.westsidewholesale.com (the outdoor lighting section, hanging lights). And http://www.lightinguniverse.com/WallAwningSignRLM_555.html -their "Warehouse Shade" comes in different diameters and colors. The diameter of our island light is 11", just for comparison.

Good luck! Jeanine

This is a phenomenally creative home! I just love it! What a fun place to live! The word that comes to mind is freedom, both from a livability perspective and from a design perspective (all the different chairs around your table). The T art is very cool and I just adore the chair with the Chinese mailbags. I want to hang out in your kitchen!! The bathroom really appeals too...clean, simple, yet still interesting!!

Cornelia

J -

Looks like even the 3/4" is back ordered now, in whatever color. Oh well.

So with the mitered edge, does it just hang down in front? Did your installer have to put blocks underneath it, to raise it up above the cabinets, to clear doors and drawers?

Thanks for all the lighting links, I'll pass them along to the boss, who's in charge of all that stuff.

a

Hi Andrew- With the mitered edge, it does hang down but Fireslate will build it up for you with blocks of wood if you ask them (we did). You would honestly never know it wasn't all 2" thick.

Thats too bad about the wait time, I hope that they surprise you and that it comes in early!

J

one more thing? Andrew, not sure if you are still reading this but if you pick up the new (May) issue of Dwell, the cover photo/story is an amazing house in South Africa with a beautiful seriously-thick concrete counter in their kitchen. It looks like at least 5". Gorgeous!

J -

Thanks for the tip. I'll check it out. We let our subscription to Dwell run out when we got most of the way thru our renovation, and as the money started to run low, not wanting to find something we should have done or bought instead of what we already committed to.

a