apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Does anyone have any experience with the IKEA Kloffstra or Langed tables? I want to replace my behemoth dining room table with something smaller but extendable, but still sturdy enough to make me look like an adult. Even though I'm on a super-tight budget. Any thoughts?

Anyone have any comment on today's New York Times article in House&Home about the demise of MCM? I also believe the market has been oversaturated for a while (thanks to DWR) and authentic vintage pieces were being unrealistically overvalued.

How do I paint furniture? This is a chair that is already painted. From previous reading here (I can't find previous discussions), my understanding is that I should use sand paper to rough up the existing paint, so the new paint will have something to hang on to. True? What grade of sandpaper? What kind of paint?

Pixie, I've been working on a like project for a while. Get on of the 3M sanding blocks. They should have one labeled for "between coats." As for paint, I explained what I wanted to the Sherwin-Williams guy and he sent me home with a quart of a semigloss light enamel. Or you can just get some spraypaint that says for wood. And then just go nuts. Try to avoid drips.

as far as sanding, get one of those sanding sponges -- much easier to handle than a sheet of sandpaper. i got medium grade for a recent project and it worked fine.

as for kinds of paint, there's debate about this. i've used latex interior paint many a time and it's been fine. others say that an oil based interior paint will wear better. i think the mess of oil outweighs the possible benefits (especially when painting indoors in a small space). the choice is yours.

if you're painting over something that has been painted before, be careful about colors. if you're painting a dark or ultra-bright piece white, you'll need a coat or two of killz or another high quality primer before you paint. for some reason red paint can require a lot of coats -- you might want to invest in a tinted primer if you're painting a light-colored piece bright red.

Does anyone know the name of the site/catalog that is sort of high-end housewares that are "natural" and organic in the sense that they feature a lot of products made from wood, silver-cast branches as candlesticks, etc? Sort of products in the style of Michael Aram?

I cannot for the life of me remember the name of it.

atomic librarian and opoponax,
Thanks for the info. Fortunately, I'm going darker than the original color--from yellow to maybe a fuscia-type color--so I shouldn't have the issues with going from dark to lighter that you describe, opoponax, but I will save that info for possible later use.

Fiona-
I think you are thinking of GAIAM

Thanks for helping out, Shari! Unfortunately, I know it's not Gaiam. It's ritzier than Gaiam, and it's fairly new.

Fiona - are you thinking of Viva Terra?

Pixie, the green sandpaper formulated by 3M especially for sanding painted surfaces as definitely been worth the extra cost in our experience. It doesn't get as gummed up as the regular stuff. From the reading I've done, the pros recommend 120 and 220 (the 220 being finer and used for sanding between coats). I found that the 120 was not rough enough to sand the oil based paint that had been on our baseboards since the 30's. So I had to go down to 80 and work up to 120. Hope this helps!

regards,
trillium

thanks trillium. How can you tell when you've sanded enough?

pixie - it depends what you're going for. if you're refinishing something, you generally have to sand until you get all the original off. if you're doing restoration work in one of those frequently-painted-by-landlord rentals (i.e. you're removing excess layers of paint, drips, etc.) then you'll want to do it until you see results. if you're just sanding to get a bit of a 'tooth' so that a new coat of paint will adhere, you just need to sand till you feel the desired texture, which is, well, rough.

when i sanded my formica bathroom vanity prior to painting it, it really only took couple minutes with a no-name medium grade sanding sponge to get a nice tooth on each surface, which adhered the primer coat perfectly. i didn't sand between coats of primer and paint, and it went fine and seems to be curing nicely.

Hey opoponax,

Did you take a look at the hair last night?

MEA CULPA ! I meant CHAIR.

why, are you stalking me or something?

now i'm kinda scared...

I was intrigued by the article in today's NYT, but I'm a bit worried now because I have long loved Art Nouveau and appreciate that prices for Lalique and the like have been relatively reasonable during the MCM craze. Please don't really let Art Nouvaeu take off again and then it all goes out of my reach.

Where here did I read something about an office space design contest? It was recent, with an upcoming deadline... sponsored by a stationery purveyor, if not mistaken...

Thanks opo--very helpful.

P2:

heather did a post on at:chicago about a decor8/fabulous stationary contest, with a deadline of september 29...click on my name for the link...

also: i've been meaning to thank you for planting the idea of the interlam wall panels as headboard in my mind from your ICFF reporting,
so...thank you!

dadgummit, where WERE YOU ALL when I came by here yesterday? I had to go to Ikea alone today . . .

janel--
Thank you! And you're welcome!! Hope you end up doing it.

P2,
Welcome back!
Where have you been, or did I and others simply miss your recent posts?
A couple of us had asked about you in some earlier threads.

So I bought the wall-mounted mid-century desk/shelves posted on Scavenger the other day...anyone know how to effectively drill through plaster-on-top-of-something-really-hard? I tried a masonry drill bit, to little effect.
Any Brooklyn handyman recommendations?

I think this was covered the other day but I'm not certain.

I have the tv cabinet similar to this
http://www.ikea.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=12&langId=-1&catalogId=10103&productId=11148

but with wood doors, is it possible to stain this without sanding? Perphaps a gel stain?

Shannon,
a drill with a more powerful motor might be the trick.

I have old plaster on wood lathe over brick.
Also I need to use new bits pretty frequently . . . I don't know why brick is so hard to drill through! Either way, it's better with a contractor's drill with a bigger motor than my dinky home model...

Hi, all,

I'm trying to put up a door on my sleeping alcove in my studio apartment this weekend (my recently rescued kitten has turned into a night owl and I am over waking up to my hair being eaten). Any suggestions? I am trying not to spend a fortune, and looked into just a room divider, but he could get through that. While not my favorite, are louvered doors easy to install?

gekko--

Hey, thanks (and welcome back to guido, too).

Have been working on some fun projects (a room makeover, an interior consult for a LOVELY West Coast ATer, styling a photoshoot yesterday, gearing up for a video edit, etc.) and had a hunk of an out of town guest over this past weekend, so I haven't been online religiously.

Also have been *slightly* disenchanted here of late with posters' comments and overall tone, so have been taking a little bit of step back for that reason too.

But thanks for checking and saying hello! People like you keep me coming back!