apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Hi all! First time post here. Let me just say that you are all some true small space savants and have been a great resource in my quest to spruce up my place. I'm stuck on a problem, though. I'm moved into a new place and want to add some color to the walls. Problem is that it's a rental and the lease agreement says in no uncertain terms that painting of any walls is in violation...period. I'm a little disappointed because I would love to paint a wall or two. Now I am trying to come up with a way to add some color that would have a similar effect to painting without actually painting. I've thought of painting a few canvases some solid color but that just seems too easy and i've never been a huge fan of that look. Any suggestions for adding large swaths of color without a bucket and a brush? Also, any other ideas to add some contrast/depth/etc. to a smallish room in lieu of painting I would love to hear. Thanks all!

Thank goodness it's another open thread! One question and one comment--

All the street vendors downtown have these enormous, boxy (rectangular), woven tote bags that weigh nothing themselves yet are big enough to hold a full-sized goat or a manhattan-sized bathroom... does anyone know WHERE I can get one of these bags??

My comment is that I am SO loving the small apartment competition I can't believe it. I look forward to each new entry and when they appear, I drop everything to run the slideshow right then and there... yesterday I even watched one on a conference call (very bad!). It's making me reconsider my longtime desire for MORE space; it could very well change my life. Thanks for running it!

What to do with a rental
Twice I covered my walls with rolls of photo paper. The first time it was a huge 'Kermit' green color and over that my daughter and I did a Monet inspired collage of lily flowers using various shades of pink colored paper and beautiful blues. It faded wonderfully and when we got tired of that- I found 4’ wide rolls of beautiful a deep burgundy red flocked paper and covered my living room/sleeping area with it. We attached the paper via staple gun and long staples. (The staples were later ‘camouflaged’ with similar color nail polish)
Now after living in that apartment for over 10 years (so the deposit is probably a moot point), and tired of the landlord standard mold colored beige, we painted the apartment any colored we felt like and it looks great.

Other things I’ve seen were fabric panels hung from hooks off of the picture rail, or hung across the ceiling. I hope this helps.

Jeffro -- Actually, people have asked this question before. If you search through the archives, people have give great advice on removable glues, hanging drapes, stretching fabric over large frames and other cool ideas.

Bonnie--I am pretty sure you cand find those on 14th Street (west of 6th Avenue) or, if all else fails, a walk down Canal Street is usually fruitful.

~C

This old house....It's the only thing I have it worse for than AT. (they make quite the bed fellows)

www.thisoldhouse.com/toh/html/news/carlisletour.html

I go on and on about this place and just found out...it's open to the public AND for sale. I'm making the drive up with a number in my head and no hopes what so ever.

I also had a question. Last month as everyone knows was kitchen month. My last piece just arrived and...HELP! I went overboard

overboard = buying a pasta pentola and rarely making pasta

Storage ideas for the kitchen? I'm sort of apposed to hanging items. Any suggestions are more than welcome.

Thanks

Off topic[colon]

We've had an architect design the "bones" of a 2nd floor house addition (midwest). Now we need to choose tile, counters, plumbing fixtures, carpet, etc.

We're looking for someone that can help us envision how all the various choices (tile, cabinet, counter, fixtures) will affect the overall look of the bathroom(s). The architect doesn't seem to be of much help.

What type of professional do we hire for this? Interior designer?

We don't really want help with furnishings, etc., just the semi-permanent items.

Thanks

Jon B - I think you want an interior designer - maybe even one that specializes in bathroom design.

sidebar--
Go vote for AT on the The Webby People's Choice Awards!!!
http(colon)//pv.webbyawards.com/

Regarding painting the walls - make note of the exact color paint, go ahead and paint the place anyway you like, and when you leave just repaint again. The landlord won't know or care. They put those clauses in leases because some people paint their places in purple, black, and orange, making the repaint costly and time consuming. Many moons ago I used to do speed repaints in an apartment complex, and everything was Navajo white and brown (ugh!), but it was a cinch to touch up the place when a tenant vacated. So go ahead, enjoy yourself. Just stay under the radar (so to speak).

Speaking of painting rented walls...
The walls in my new apartment are sand paint - chosen (I think) to hide the many imperfections. This makes it difficult to paint over. I like the idea of hanging fabric, but I fear it will make my already tiny 250 sq-ft studio seem even smaller.

Any other thoughts?

Thanks

Mary--
I finally found some of the articles and posts you were referring to about wall painting. It seems that most people are in agreement that I should just go a ahead and paint them as I wish(Justin included) and deal with the fallout that hopefully will not come. My only concern is when I have the maintenance guy to fix anything or when they need to show the place when I move out. Just worried I will have one of them running back to the landlord and "taddling" on me. I wish there was some way to express to the landlord that "I'm not like all your other tenants" sort of feeling and let him know that I am doing it to try and make the place "nice". I may just go ahead and paint it and see what happens.

What a nice note about AT on designsponge!

I've found those giant tote bags at Pearl River. I con't know if they still have them since they got all fancy. Otherwise you'll want to try some of the stores below Canal St.

Why oh WHY is there now Ty Pennington "designed" home collection?!?!?

Patrick (t.o.o.) - not only do I love your apartment and your design sense, you crack me up!

For some reason, I saw a bunch of those big plastic bags at the H+M in Soho.

Not to defend Ty Pennington, because I also laughed when I saw the commercials, but apparently he went to the Art Institute of Atlanta for graphic design and just did carpentry to pay for school. Then carpentry became his main gig. So maybe he really did have a hand in the design? Probably not, but there's a chance ;)

michele-- good point. But I can just picture some (team of) designers, bitterly downing Jack Daniels at some dive bar as they watch their work being hawked by the 0% body fat carpenter front man.

It's just that those commercials seem really forced, and he looks so outrageously ill at ease at "his drafting table" and "talking design." Maybe just a bad commercial director?

So patrick, I take it you have already seen Ty in the shower scene?

jamie pup--
SAY WHAT?!?!? Maybe I was too hasty in my judgment... let's roll the tape! ;)

heheh - sorry didn't mean to raise your hopes but I'm actually talking about a book he did about building stuff for your home I think. All I remember was that he announced it on Oprah (don't know what I was doing watching that but it sucked me in) and they showed one picture in the book of him in his shower but I think he was wearing board shorts. I do recall seeing and thinking he had a pretty hard body though so I figured you had seen that pic.

Oops forgot to mention why I came here tonight - I just watched for the first time the Dwell magazine programme on the fine living channel. It was everything I could have hoped for! The magazine is great but to be able to see more of the homes as the camera sweeps through and to see and hear the architects, designers and homeowners talk about the design, the process and living there made it the best home design show I have ever seen. It is now on permanent keep status and set to record all showings on my DVR. Just got to figure out a way to transfer to my powerbook because even 120 gigs on the DVR is not enough to archive all the stuff I want to keep.

Can "AT TV" be far behind?!?!?

Re Dwell

I just signed up for a trial subscription. Is a guy living in a midwestern arts & crafts bungalow going to get anything out of it?

I hope so. I'm addicted to Inspired House and TOH mags.

...also addicted to this site.

Webby thing wouldn't function for me -- dunno why.

I say go ahead and paint. If you're wanting to remain true to the spirit of the law, though not the letter of it, use a light color. Like, maybe a sage green, instead of a kelly green? If you like things intense, then maybe a bright yellow, instead of a bright purple?

Alright, let's say you're still cowering in fear, because it's your first apartment and you don't even want to go with paint. If you have picture molding, which is this molding that many apartment have that's about a foot below the ceiling (often they have the kind of beams in those ceilings like the too-big-for-the-contest apartment had with the green walls). Anyway ... if you have picture molding, what it's for is to hang picture wire from these specially made hooks.

But, what you COULD do, is instead of (or in addition to) pictures, you could hang fabric from them in a very regular pattern of short swags that would do kind of like a bunch of small smiles all the way across. Of course, you'd have to get a LOT of this fabric, so maybe it would need to be cheap. I'm talking about creating the kind of look they had in certain pictures of old Roman places. I can't think of exactly where you would find pictures like I'm talking about, but sort of like the wallpaper border that the Hillary Clinton had installed in one of the rooms of the White House, only having it come all the way down the wall.

Or you could create enormous folding screens out of those strethed canvases you mentioned.

Good day. I believe that this is an appropriate place to post this question. I have always rented directly from a management company, and have never dealt with renting from an owner directly. I viewed a condo today that I found on craigslist. The pictures and description failed to reflect that it is still undergoing some renovation (attaching doors, painting). This touched my antenna, but I did like the place overall so inquired about application procedures etc. The owner had no type of paperwork like a lease, (she said she could find it somewhere) but that in order to secure the place I would have to leave the first and security payments. I was not comfortable with that, I don't think money should change hands even in check form, without receiving a lease or some sort of documentation about what I am providing payment for. So, the apartment will likely go to someone else as she noted several other people were coming by that evening. Im wondering, was I right to feel uncertain or is this normal for direct owner rentals? Thanks.

C, owners should have paperwork. I'm not sure that you'd want to live in a place owned by someone who has a lease around "somewhere." It sounds like your caution was warranted.

Bonnie, in addition to all the good suggestions given seen here, those bags are also available at Bag Man (appropriately enough) on 34th St. They have some very unique designs.

To jump in with my own question (/confession), I just pulled up awful carpeting in my hallway after giving up on getting it clean (it was terrible quality, and not new when we moved in seven years ago -- only fear kept me from doing this much sooner). The carpeting is through the whole two-bedroom apartment, but I only yanked up one small section. Underneath? Awful (but mercifully thin) vinyl and under that, unvarnished wood floors in pretty good shape. The worst part of this story is that I am a renter -- and I live the floor above the landlord. I'm concerned about noise. He'd need to replace this ugly carpet before he rents to another, so I like to think I've done him (the early stages of) a favor, but did I really just get myself in a mess of trouble? I hate carpet, I have little money to put something new down myself and anyway I like the look of these floors. Would I need to seal them? Should I even try to get away with this impulsive move? I saved the gross carpet and could put it back down, but that would be a shame.