Name: Chris K.
Location: Columbus, OH
Size: 612 s/f Renovated Carriage House
Favorite resource:
A tablesaw!
What inspired you?
For my first apartment out of college, I was lucky enough to find this carriage house that had been renovated into three small but unique dwellings. I've always dreamed of designing a house and everything in it but since that was out of the question at the time, I decided to start with this and furnish as much of it by myself as I could.
Living Room
...The apartment has a long and narrow floorplan and I was able to custom build some pieces to fit exactly where they needed to and maximized the available space. Luckily there are 10+ foot ceiling throughout so it never feels too crowded and it allowed me to hang some mobiles and lanterns to balance out the rooms top to bottom.
dining
Office (in laundry room?)
Design Tip:
Don't be afraid of customizing pieces or designing them from scratch to fit your needs.
Bedroom
EXTRA:
The futon and endtable were designed to be wide enough to fill the space on wall and low enough not to obstruct the view out the windows. The endtable has an integrated magazine rack/ display and opens up to store extra blankets. The coffee table was made as a school project out of laminated birch ply and features an built in planter and foot rest.
CCH_Console+Vases.jpg
The TV console fits perfectly along the opposite wall and hides all my video and stereo equipment inside. It has casters that allow to to spin around and face the kitchen if I'm working in there. The bulb vases were made as a Valentines Day present for my girlfriend.
CCH_Dining+Kitchen.jpg
There wasn't a very good space for a traditional kitchen table so I built one at bar height along back the wall where there is a large window that was once access for the horses in the carriage house. To save space, the legs facing the living room also double as a bookshelf. The Giulietta stools and Eames Plywood Side Chair were picked up at a DWR warehouse sale.
CCH_Bedroom+Office.jpg
The bedroom is pretty spare, except for a bed and desk, the top of which is a salvaged metal panel from an airport luggage X-Ray machine. I was able to find a vintage Eames Aluminum Group Soft Pad Chair and refurbished it to nearly new condition, repainted the found filing cabinet and decorated the walls with images from the Eames Case Study house and an enlarged image of Charles' photo of their wire chairs with wooden bird sculpture.
Hopefully this isn't too wordy a submission... I just wanted to give some background on the furniture I made and the way it laid out in the apartment. Hope to hear from you soon!
Copyright © 2008 Apartment Therapy
Glad to see another AT fan from Columbus. Nice job with this (German Village?) carriage house. Love the dining table with the bookcases built into the leg. Would have liked to have pictures to show more of the apartment though . . . no pics of bed, kitchen, or bathroom. But, I like what you have shown.
LOVE the clean and simple furniture building you did,
and the little things like the brackets for the kitchen shelf lining up with the window frame.
were you a design student?
I'm a little confused about your kitchen
(is there a sink and a stove?)
and yearning for some decorating accents
but overall, great job!
Sorry for the lack of pics of the kitchen, the range/ oven/ sink are behind you as you look at the kitchen table and out the window. I chose to focus on the parts of the apartment I had the most influence on.
Guido- I was a design student until about a year and a half ago. I work at a design consultancy in Columbus now.
Glad to see Columbus so well represented, very nice place. I really like the built-ins/handmade pieces particularly that coffee table. The only thing I didn't like is the use of scarlet and gray on the couch. Although in any other city, I probably wouldn't have noticed it.
Chris...
Hi from Grandview!
It's fun to see Columbus represented in the contest and represented so well. I really like how you've created multiple uses for objects.
great work!
Love that blown-up image of the Eames chairs.
That lounge would be an amazing place to watch the snow.
Love it! It's really cute.
I like the clean, modern details of the furniture, and the contrast with the exposed stone walls of the carriage house (doesn't that get cold??)
It feels real, attainable, and it's an example of something that looks put together and cool designwise from some place that's not on the coast. And there's no ikea that I see! :)
You do have a nice view out the windows...
and passers by have a great view IN...
Richard- At first I didn't get the scarlet and gray comment, since I've only lived here a short while. Though I have nothing against the BUckeyes, you won't find any OSU paraphernalia in my place.
Yay Columbus (I grew up there)! Looks like a nice unit and I like what you have done here.
Way to go O-hi-o. I loooooovee your self-designed console/dining table/bookcase.
looks fantabulous...those throw pillows are dope...where did they come from?
LOVE the blow-up of the wire chairs/bird.
ENVY your woodworking skills. If you ever move to DC (it seems like everyone from Ohio eventually does) please start your own business!
Very nice.
Chris - Great entry. It's so fun to now have a home team to root for in this fun contest!
I love your custom pieces. Do you or any of the others from Columbus have any local carpenters to recommend for creating custom pieces? I have ideas for two pieces floating in my head, but absolutely zero carpentry skills.
Dan- The white pillows are IKEA, the red ones are custom designed and sewn.
Love the furniture you designed.
RE: the carpentry in Columbus question, sometimes all you need is a friend with basic woodworking skills if you want something simple/square. A friend of mine (highschool woodshop) created a lovely bookcase for me (4 squares with a curved display shelf on the end). You never now, just ask around your friends might have hidden talents and access to power tools.
Love the creativity and ingenuity in the self-made furniture. In terms of overall design aesthetic: so-so.
LaDonna--
"your friends might have hidden talents and access to power tools."
I like the sound of your friends.
Also LOVE that the pillows came from Ikea!!!!
I am *very* partial to a carriage house since my husband and I live in one ourselves. Your space is lovely; I wish I had brick exposure like that! It's beautiful.
I also applaud your taste -- very organized, warm, inviting, great furnishings. Your dining area, facing the view outside, is a lovely nook.
I'm also thrilled that you're from Ohio. I mean, I'm not from there myself but I'm excited that someone from outside of a big hipster city stepped up and entered. I love all the big city entries, but I'm just happy to see someone stepping in from O-HI-O! It's encouraging that there's style coming out of the woodwork from ALL OVER for this contest. I wish the contest would extend into April and May. I can never get enough of these home tours.
Ah, house tours. It's when you take a night walk and you glance into the homes you pass - yet feeling guilty about it... you know you'd love to stop and look at every detail but a peeping Tom you're not... Well AT satisfies this curiousity for me because 1) I can analyze the space of complete strangers and 2) best part, they like it and 3) I won't get arrested! Yippee!
:)
BTW
**Are those the 'house of cards' you have there to the right of your television? I own a deck, I love them.
Wonderful to see craftsmanship and real care put into a space.
Wow. And wow again.
Chris, how incredibly talented you are. You are fantastic at not just designing unique, eye-popping pieces, but also in building them yourself!! Incredible. Your boss is lucky to have you.
Pls start your own business soon. That coffee table alone will be a big seller. Don't know what you need to do to protect your design rights, but do it soon.
I'd love to hire you for some design projects.
Chris,
You did a great job painting that salvaged file cabinet.
How did you do it? (would love to get tips on prepping metal surface for painting and type of paint to use)
I have banks of dull grey metal file cabinets that could use exactly what you did for your cabinet.
Thanks in advance.
decor8 holly- Yes, it is an Eames House of Csrds, albeit in not a very creative arrangement.
gekko- If you don't have access to a professional spray booth (fortunately I do), you can buy bare metal primer at a hardware store and autobody paint at most auto parts stores in spray cans. Then all you need is a back porch or yard and alot of newspaper to lay down...
and to both of you- thanks so much for all the complements!
Good until you get to the work station. Never liked the idea of taking a bunch of little photos, put them in a bunch of frames that take up a lot of space on the wall. Put those pictures in an album and put some real art on the wall.
Chris is obviously very talented and I could easily live in his place. Congrats!
Not to ruin the fun, but are we having a repeat of all the comments from the first time we looked at this entry? I enjoy reading the posts, but a lot of the info is repetitive (Chris' background, for instance). I have work to do, people!
Ooops!
Now I see wear I am. My apologies.