apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Oh nice! I am definitely going to look for that. It sounds exactly like what I am up to...

Hey, and Chris, Jonathan Adler is a great source for ways to inject your place with some punch and funk, accessory-wise. Another route that could tie in with the aesthetic of Mission/Arts & Crafts is handmade anything... pottery (either period, which can be surprisingly modern, or Jonathan Adler again), folk art, a Gees Bend-inspired quilt... Colored glass is also gaining style steam, and could provide a great jolt of acidity... and I remain a HUGE fan of contemporary art. Good luck and keep us posted. Go take a "Before" picture now!!!

I have a huge pink and calico-ish quilt top that I bought at Hooti Cotoure in Park Slope. It's very bright and springy. It's seemd a bit folky or dorky, but maybe it's folk art. I always toy with the idea of putting it at the bottom of my bed for some color, but I'm too lazy to take it on and off the bed every night.

I also sadly think I have too many books weighting down the room. I need to take ATs advice there.

Not sure about Jonathan Adler. Hot or not?

There is almost no natural light in my apartment. I have 4 big windows, but they all look into an airshaft.

Molly, Home Depot carries the mirror tiles. It's been a while since I purchased them, but it was less than $8 per box. I can't remember how many were in the box, but more than 6. Maybe 10 or 12.

Honeycomb pattern -

There are ways to paint both ways - but I think your method is the best. I think that putting your light color down first and then taping your pattern and rolling the dark color will work perfectly. You may need a few coats of the dark so that it feels rich, though, since your undercoat will be light. And light coats/smooth wall will keep the dark color from bleeding underneath your tape.

Okay, I can't resist. Someone is selling an entire Poggenpohl kitchen on Craigslist. With granite countertops. I think that buying whole kitchens on Craigslist can end up being the cheapest way to redo a kitchen, if you are savvy and handy. I picked up a whole display kitchen two months ago and am redoing my own outdated kitchen. I got a cheap mover and we picked the whole thing up in CT and I installed everything myself. I am just about to tile and put in my appliances.

I've been having the best time following a kitchen-makeover thread at houseinprogress.net (which I first heard of here at AT). It's about four or five entries down, at this point.

It's a low-budget, interim makeover for the next few years until they can do a real one, and readers have written long, thoughtful, really interesting suggestions. And there are photos of the kitchen from every angle.

Whole Kitchens! I've seen a few of them on CL, but never thought they really worked. My kitchen is so tiny . . . maybe buying all of these "spare parts" from a larger kitchen would work to fix mine up on the cheap?

Thanks for your ideas and help, Patrick and Molly. I guess "Mission" is the nice name for "OldManLibrary," but I never set out to be mission or dark . . . it just happened as I collected old oak stuff that I loved.

I think lighting and "acidity" are two great suggestions. I have a modern black leather chair that offers some acidity, but it isn't bright enough. I also recently hung a huge old gilt, chipped in places, mirror over the couch on one end of my long narrow place. It breaks stuff up, makes the apt more my style. The exposed brick also makes it dark (the new people across the air shaft painted their exposed brick bright white. not sure how i feel about that)

I've been working on finding great lamps. The new Gumdrop Lamps at CandB are temptingly bright and summery. I have wood PB lamps with burgandy shades . . . too dark and not very me.

Oooh, a blank slate. I can't resist. So, I like a comfy, oak-y, "library" style apartment. My living/dining area has an old oak glass front book case, a pine farm table with oak chairs, curtains a deep red from pottery barn, area rug a similar deep red.

Overall my worry is that the place looks too "old man" or to "Pottery Barn" catalog, though most of my stuff has been carefully culled from thrift shops, flea markets and my parents house, with some help from PB on the curtains.

I want my palce to feel young and urban, but I want to stick to oak and deep red and a comfortable feel. Maybe my place needs some kind of a "vibe audit" so I can be confident that it feels like me.

Chris--
If your stuff has been carefully culled, it should feel like you, so you probably have nothing to worry about. If you love it all, then it's you. But if you think the vibe is too oldmanlibrary, then maybe it needs some "acidity"... a piece that you love but that doesn't "fit"... a piece of contemporary art, a modern chair, a piece of upholstery that is un-Mission... you'd be surprised how much overall edge you can get from one intentionaly dissonant note!

I'm redecorating my apartment and would love to do a light over dark honeycomb outline pattern on one wall. I was going to paint the light color on the wall first, then measure and tape off my honeycombs with painters' tape, then paint over with the darker color. Do I have this right? Is there an easier way?

Also, does anyone know where I can get 12"x12" inexpensive mirror tiles?

Chris- as far as your "oldmanlibrary" vibe goes, I'd suggest maybe lightening it up a bit -- either through color or lamps. My boyfriend has a very mission-y living room, and whenever he opens the blinds and turns on the lights, it just looks so much more open. Personally, my living room is filled with a bunch of thrift store crap, but my strategically placed lighting makes it all look fantastic.
That's all...

So how does everyone pick paint colors? I have a very modern type 2 story + loft that is (and we like) painted with clean white walls, we've injected a color into the bathrooms, which was easy, but trying to pick accent colors for architectural things (columns, dropped ceiling in the kitchen), is proving difficult to find the right color.

Chris,
I love Jonathan Adler's stuff (even though I'm currently studying him as a possible business model, so you'd think I'd be sick of his stuff already) and I do think that's the kind of look that would make your look current.

So I have a question too. I want to get a new nightstand to go with my ginormous bed (see the discussion about mattresses). Most nightstands, however, are too short to work. I can't see my clock and it's just an awkward height. I have to measure again but I think my bed is about 30" high. I'm willing to use something that's not a traditional nightstand but I'd rather stay away from anything that's too office-y looking. Oh, and of course, I don't want to spend too much. Ideas?

jb--
To get to some decisions about paint colors, here's some questions I would ask---
What colors do you wear and like the way you look in? The predominant colors of clothes hanging in your closets? Is the room primarily a daytime or nighttime destination? Can you see the various spaces from other spots in the space? Do you have any pieces (art/furniture/rugs) that you need to work around, or, any of the above that you want to downplay? How "high energy" do you want the individual spaces? The entire space?

Maybe some of these will trigger some thoughts...

My living room is of rather awkward dimension -- 23' x 9'. (Don't get too jealous -- it's in Philadelphia) Given that the room is so long and narrow, I think I need to devise a layout that would create one zone of activity on either end, but would like to tie them together with a piece of carpet or a rug (roughly 6' x 20') that runs the length of the room.

Through this site I have learned about great sources for rugs, but can only imagine that having one custom-made to get the dimensions I require would be terribly expensive. I am now wondering if going the carpet route would be a better solution.

Any suggestions for sources of great carpeting with a modern appeal that I could use? I guess I would have it cut and bound? Do I need to mention that I am somewhat price-sensitive?

Jonathan Adler's stuff is really gorgeous... but I think it's getting way over exposed. I have not seen the 'Today'show in a while but last spring his stuff was all over the set to the point where... well, it looked like the show was being filmed in the Adler showroom. I think his life partner has done some design work with NBC and helped arrange all of this...

I'm absolutely certain he's got an amazing business model... He's wildly successful, but to go that mainstream... Well, in my view it doesn't necessarily mean "sell-out" but it does change the uniqueness of the product, to my eye.

I'm still going to have one of his pieces someday... and his work is definitely ideal for people looking for wedding gifts.

Thanks for the honeycomb and mirror help. I had assumed the mirrors could be gotten at Home Depot, but I couldn't find them on the website. Didn't want to trek all the way there and come home empty handed.

Ruth- I have no idea if it would work with your decor, but what about repurposing a funky barstool? I looked at Ikea for reference and there were a few with seats 30-35 inches off the ground. You could always throw a shelf across the footrest/rungs for stashing a book or two...of course, you might be working with a Louis XIV bedroom set and this idea horrifies you.

I was going to suggest a high bar-type dining table to Ruth, but hesitated for the same reason (fear of horrifying). If that's too weird, how about a tall plant stand, or a pedestal with a thick glass top? Or if you like cheap and funky, how about wall-mounted shelves? We had the IKEA PS birch wall shelves by the bed for a while, complete with clip-on reading lamps. Not for everyone, but they have the advantage that they can be mounted at any height.

Anyone else obsessed with a color? Hubby brought home an old tangerine iMac, and now I can't get enough ORANGE! We have lots of navy blue in the apt, and orange really pops against it. Found some great orange poppy stems at Pier 1 and put them in a dark blue stoneware vase. Next up is an orange plastic office chair (to go with the iMac). And thanks to AT, Benjamin Moore's "Mandarin Orange" beckons to me every time I walk by Janovic...

Kim -- Why not try some of those carpet square systems that people have posted about on this site?

Ruth -- Again, I don't know what your bedroom looks like, or how handy you are, but the same issue of ReadyMade that featured Maxwell's floor had a "nightstand" that could hold a book and alarm clock. It was basically a box attached to the wall with a front that folded down at night.

jp -- Early on in design school they gave us an assignment to take apart a picture and use the colors to get the atmosphere of a room to work. Sorting through buckets of color chips can get exhausting if you don't know what you're looking for. Try finding something that has a set of colors that you like together and match 'em. Work on that set of chips, and you already have someone else's eye and choices involved and you can just refine them to suit your needs.

Thanks to whomever gave me the link to houseinprogress.com...

here I am at 10.30 at night trying to figure out what the hell the site redesign is going to look like and I can only think that it has to make SPACE. It has to make space for comments like these. I am totally sucked into this conversation... Jonathan Adler... I have SO many thoughts about his career trajectory.....has he jumped the shark.....(yes) I don't know...Anyway, to stick to the point, SPACE.....

Don't redesign too wildly. This site is appealing and readable. And this thread has been a lot of fun to read--do you need more space for it? Or does it just need to happen more often?

Maxwell, doesn't the fact that the conversation is taking place mean that there is a space for it?

Kim, Interface is the carpet square company. Flokati rugs might be another option for you (those ones that look like Afghan dogs)--they're inexpensive and available in all sorts of colors these days. On your next visit to NYC, you can also check out the carpet section in ABC Carpet's DUMBO warehouse--there are often great deals there. Or pain the floor?

Chris, one idea for something that will groove up your room's vibe in just the right way is a Saarinen side table. They look great with traditional interiors -- they look great with anything. A poem. Not cheap, but it's a classic you'll use forever. www.highbrowfurniture.com/tables/products/saarinen_side/

Kim, you can go to Home Depot and pick out a carpet you like and they'll make a rug for you out of it to any dimensions. And they have any color you want as long as you want beige. (lol)
But it's cheap and gets the job done.

Steam Heat. We live on the 6th (top) floor of a co-op complex, and it is always insanely hot in the winter time, so much so that we sometimes end up running the air. We've turned off all the radiators in our apartment, but there are two large pipes, one in the kitchen and the other in the bathroom that are always kicking off the heat. I went to Home Depot and bought some black insulating tape to cover the pipe in the bathroom, to try to cutdown on the heat coming into the bedroom at night (the bedroom is right next to the bathroom). It's a workable solution, but not the most attractive one ever. Any ideas on better ways to cut down on the heat? Or any ways to muffle the noise of the steam being let off at the top of the pipe every hour?

Maxwell... People already can do this through "good questions", and there are several threads on here that have branched out into their own conversations without having a special "space". If anything, you need to just have some sort of "most active" category under "most popular". That way, you don't have to post the long threads from the day before, and the conversations will keep going on their own.

C.K. Sample III,

You might want to go back and buy pipe insulators and slip them on. These items look like the pipes themselves but are hollw and have a cut running down the side the whole length of the pipe. Just open the slit and shove the insulator over the pipe.

Hope this works.

Rob, the idea of a Saarinen side table is great. I think that would go far in re-claiming my "old man library" space a more "warm modern."

Ruth, for a tall side table, I've used a metal French washstand. It is taller than the average side table, but still a relatively small surface area. The great thing about it is that it is foldable and can be moved or stored, if needed. It has a bar off the side for hanging a towel that I've used to hang a magazine I'm reading and mark my place. Mine was from Anthropoligie, but I haven't seen them in there in a while.

RE redesign (and space) - an archive by month or week would be fantastic.

And since it's a watercooler, any ideas on a medium high to low simple entertainment center? I want it to house my turntable (and obligatory reciever) but that's it. Very simple - maybe a long low table with a shelf underneath to put component and turntable on top. The vision is very minimal. Living room of couch area and then opposite end of the room, stereo. Nothing else.

CK Sample,
We have wrapped our steam pipe in thick rope from the hardware store. I don't know if it insulates as well as the proper pipe sleeves, but it's much more organic looking

I'm excited by all the ideas. Unfortunately, I can't attach things to the walls; they are serious old plaster over brick and I really don't want to drill. But I do like the idea of repurposing something like the French washstand. I do like to have a bunch of things by my bedside though. Right now I have a lamp, clock, tissues, pen cup, books and I have a drawer with various manicure related items not to mention the stack of magazines. And, tragically, my bedroom doesn't have a style unless you count "21st century information overload", so please don't worry about that. I'll try to take a look at Ikea's website, a stool is an interesting idea.

Kim, if you're using the space for two different uses, why do they need to be unified by one rug? Usually I see designers try to tie together one space with a rug i.e. the living area and then use another for a different space i.e. the dining area. So why not two area rugs? And I love the Flor carpet tiles. Their new catalog just came out and their designs are very cool.

Max, I would love to hear your thoughts on Jonathan Adler. Alpha is looking at some licensing opportunities and he seems like a useful model to look at for building that kind of design business.

As for the site, I do like the idea of having an open thread or bulletin board where readers can communicate with each other like we've been doing. But I do appreciate that you would want to oversee the direction of the discussions, so in the end, I have nothing useful.

Hey, guys, just wanted to comment that your spam filter doesn't seem to allow the full URL even in the URL field above the comment interface. Just a tech note.

Jonathan D, any pointers on where I can find these? When I went to Home Depot the largest they had were for about 4" pipes and I'd say these suckers are closer to 6-8".

guessetine, that sounds like a coool idea with the rope. Maybe I'll run that over the tape I already put up...

Regarding the revamp...I am particularly fond of the current color scheme as it allows me to browse at work without being too conspicuous.

CK Sample - do you think the spray insulation (available at most hardware stores) would be an option? You could THEN wrap it in rope or fabric.

Ruth, a floating box side table seems like you would have your answer. Perhaps hang two giving you four seperate surfaces for all of your stuff.

ok, new open thread question

A year ago, I was working on Franklin and Lafayette, and would walk through Tribeca almost every day for lunch. So, walking through Tribeca one day, I see this absolutely wierd clawfoot thing that looks like a tub for an elf... obviously very antique, and really more like a clawfoot shower stall. One side was even lower than the other three, almost as if it was where you step into the shower or something, or I could even have imagined it as a large antique baby bath or... I dunno. It was beyond fascinating. maybe 18-24" high, and maybe 30" wide x 36" long. Anyone know what this is and where you might source one? I'm going to copy and paste this to the bathroom string above.

Ruth -- I loved the washstand as a bedside table becasue it held so much stuff! It also had a rail on the back, to hold the bowl and pitcher originally I guess. It stopped the cat from knocking my clock, glasses and water cup on the floor.

On the redesign, I second the note on keeping the colors "quiet" for safe work browsing.

I am trying to figure out how to lacquer a wall. I've seen such an effect in magazines, but I am having no luck in finding "how to" instructions. I envision a Chinese red/orange lacquered wall, but fear that paint in a gloss finish will not give me the desired effect. Does anyone know how lacquering a wall is done?

Chris--
The more I think about your space, the more I think that you can "youthen" it up is by limiting your accent colors to only two, and seems like you are off an running with red as one of them. So my advice-- go white/canvas color with everything else, (i.e. bleached canvas panels on the windows, perhaps reversing to your red, to swap 'em out when winter turns to spring) especially large-scale white/off-white ceramics in a variety of surfaces... shiny to matte, etc. But go BIG with the scale of them, and with the swaths of color you use... scale, and simplicity will give your space youth and energy, and still allow your furniture to shine. Works with the Saarinen table suggestion, too...

Ruth--
At a recent trip to IKEA, I saw that they have a small-scale table that is higher then the average night table, and perfectly scaled (it almost looks like a little desk, but not). Can't remember the name, but they are in a nice weathered wood that could go formal/casual depending on how the rest of the room is styled. The other route-- knock together a plywood/MDF box the right size/shape for you, and drape it with fabric. I love the look of a draped bedside table.

Patrick -- Do you know if that table at Ikea is in that bedroom brochure that they stuck in all the free papers this week? If so, what page?

Ruth--
Not sure, since I didn't see the flyer. Nor could I find it on their website.

JK -

Polyurethane would work for your wall project, especially if you're in a postwear apt with sheetrock (smoother than plaster). Just make sure you do water-based poly over water-based paint (or vice versa) and use THIN, LIGHT coats. At least three coats of poly, but I would go four.

I would suggest, however, you take a moment to reflect - are you sure this is something you really want to do? You're looking at six coats of stuff on the wall, at least (tinted primer, two coats paint, three coats poly), plus sanding (LIGHTLY) in between the poly coats. What if you don't like the look? This kind of work shows every error- you will see every missed brushstroke, every bubble in the coating.

And this is not easily undone.

High-gloss paint is the better idea. Most people think it doesn't work well simply because they don't use enough coats. Four coats of an oil-based gloss paint and you'll be starin' into a mirror, friend. And if you decide to do it - be patient and go slowly. This will only look good if it's very, very well done.

Chris--
If you haven't had a chance yet, take a trip to the Room & Board store in SoHo. They've managed, in LOTS of room vignettes, to strike a balance between youth and tradition that I think may be up your alley. Some of it's furniture choice, a lot of it is accessorizing, some is upholstery choice, some is injecting one modern "acidic" element into the mix. Oh, and they just started carrying Saarinen side tables someone else had suggested...

You know that glass wall of photographed greenery in the restaurant in MOMA? Okay the same thing is being used as a treehouse in the revamped FAO Shwartz... It's a photograph of trees on glass with light shining through. I want that in my bedroom. Or maybe I'd settle for one of those enlarged photos turned into wallpaper. Where do you get this done? I've seen enlarged pictures of family laminated onto kitchen cabinets and something in the Times a couple of years ago where a guy put a picture of a Versaille interior on his bedroom wall. Instead of trying to emulate pictures in magazines you could enlarge the pictures and paste them to your wall. How much more honest (and witty in a heavy handed, but fabulous, way).

Chris--
West Elm some big chunky vases (glass, pottery and hammered metal) that could work with your look. Also, in this month's House Beautiful with a mostly mission-style kitchen that manages to stay current (with some modern chairs, a George Nelson lamp, and a really graphic area rug).

(yikes, that was missing some verbs, but you get my drift)