Apartment Therapy Archive: Jun 2016

Pale pink and copper are like one of those couples that look so good together that once you see them together it’s hard to imagine them with anyone else. And like all good couples, they bring out the best in each other: copper gives pink a bit of an edge, and pink brings out the warm, rosy tones in copper, giving it a special glow. Here are a few of our favorite examples. Above: The folks from Livet Hemma paired a copper pendant light with an IKEA duvet dyed in a peachy pink.

With or without a house built in the 1950s, it’s possible to achieve a mid-century style mixed with your own personal flare. Astral’s home seamlessly joins elements from mid-century design with both modern and vintage elements—and some contemporary chic. Find out how you can achieve Astral’s style with the shopping resources below!

Whether you plan to spend all summer playing in the waves or sitting pretty poolside, you’re going to want to take along some warm-weather gear. A nifty misting fan, a wet bag for your damp bathing suit, a portable marble (!) phone charger? You’re going to need all of this. Above: This handmade cotton and leather bag is reversible: Flip it to the teal side when you’re lounging by the pool. Reversible Beach Tote Bag, $42, from Shop La Plage.

Name: Alejandra Bennett and Oliver Katz Location: Beacon Hill — Boston, MA Size: 600 square feet Years lived in: 1 year; rented Alejandra Bennett and Oliver Katz’s s light-filled Beacon Hill apartment in Boston is a convergence of new and old, near and far. The couple has filled the apartment with hand-me-downs and inherited family pieces, budget solutions and quality staples purchased for their first place together.

Name: Erin & Ken Francois Type of Project: Backyard Redesign Location: Upper Tangletown — Minneapolis, Minnesota Type of building: 1930s Tudor-Style Duplex The Renovation Diaries are a collaboration with our community in which we feature your step-by-step renovation progress and provide monetary support towards getting it done in style. See all of our Reno Diaries here. Spring has sprung and Erin and Ken are itching to fix up their gloriously large backyard for grilling season.

If your under-air-conditioned (or not-at-all-air-conditioned) home has you feeling the heat, there are some small visual changes you can make to help your place at least look cooler. Little things like doing away with fuzzy sheepskin throws and adding blue-based colors can make your home feel fresher—without having to adjust the thermostat. If there was ever a time to embrace minimalism, it’s in the summer.

Name: Brian Mitchell and Ericka James Location: NoPa— San Francisco, California Size: 1,450 square feet Years lived in: Owned 1 year When Brian bought this house in the NoPa neighborhood of San Francisco, there wasn’t much left of the two-story structure. Some might have passed up the opportunity, but he saw healthy architectural bones and potential. Within a year, the house transformed into a beautiful, modern California mid-century home.

Outdoorsy types have their own unique organizing struggles. You see, bikes and surfboards and other sporting equipment are big. And they’re really hard to store neatly at home–especially without a garage or a mudroom or even more than a few hundred square feet to work with. These house tours, though, managed to make it work, finding tight and tidy spaces where they could store some big equipment at home.

(Image credit: Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects for Medlock Ames via Dwell Magazine) From The Kitchn → 3 Ways to Keep Your Wine Cool This Summer

It’s probably not a surprise that color changes the look of a room. But perhaps even more importantly, it can change the feel of a room. In this post, find a series of GIFS that take this lovely white-walled room from one of our tours and adds different wall colors into the mix. You’ll be able to see the visual effects of adding cool, warm, dark and more hues on the overall look and feel of the space.

I like to think of the dress as the chameleon of the closet. Pair a short summery dress with a Panama hat and Converse sneakers and you’re ready to walk the farmer’s market; strap on some metallic-heeled sandals and throw on a pair of statement earrings and you’re ready for date night. With that logic, perhaps we should all have a dress-only wardrobe?

Name: Ruth Steadman Location: Crystal Palace, London Size: 550 square feet Years lived in: 9 years, rented This high-ceilinged apartment in a large early-Victorian house is home to writer and psychotherapist Ruth Steadman and her cat Tallulah. Although it’s rented, in the nine years Ruth has lived here she’s managed to create a home that feels truly her own.

It’s hard to imagine a more fabulous, fun, fantasy-fueling space than Rory’s Vibrant Urban Jungle Paradise in Downtown Los Angeles. It’s full of bold bursts of color, neon lights, quirky accessories, natural materials and a whole lot of pink! Below, find the shopping resources to recreate some of this decor magic in your home.

Summer’s (finally!) here, and everyone’s scrambling to get outside—but there are plenty of ways to embrace the season indoors, too. Bring in color, add a playful print, open the shades—and presto, your whole home suddenly feels a lot like summer. Punch Up the Color: Accents like throw pillows, tinted glass vases, and area rugs can liven up a room with white walls and neutral furniture. These accessories are also the easiest and cheapest to switch out seasonally.

When I’m planning a trip, the main financial factor I consider is the cost of the actual traveling, whether it’s by plane, train, bus or car. Airfare and lodging especially can be overwhelmingly expensive, so it’s tempting to consider these the true price of the travel, but there are so many other costs that can creep up on you. In addition to wages lost if you don’t get paid time off, here are ten expenses that can surprise you on even the thriftiest of vacations.

Sometimes you just want to shake things up like right now. Fortunately Stephanie is here to walk us through a super quick and easy way to add some pattern to your life. Skill Level: Easy Time Required: 5 minutes Project Cost: $3.00 From Stephanie: Hop on the global decor trend and give lamps a globally inspired look with paint pens! White paint pens were used to revamp lamps with a mud cloth inspired pattern. White Paint Pen Dark Lamps Clean lamp bases to remove any residue.

One of my favorite things about home design is the wonderful variety of ways in which clever designers have re-invented the chair. When you picture a chair you probably think of one of the traditional forms of the chair, with a back and a seat and legs.

Shopping for a sofa can be a little nerve-wracking. There are so many styles, and so many prices, it’s hard to know where to start. So we’ve chosen three different classic sofa styles, and hunted down three different examples of each, in three different price points: low (under $1,000), mid ($1,000 – $2,000) and high ($2,000+), to suit pretty much every taste and every budget. Check out our picks. Low: Sofia Chesterfield sofa, $849 from Urban Outfitters.

(Image credit: Sara Kate Gillingham) From The Kitchn → 5 Important Things to Consider Before Bringing Food on a Plane

Name: Clare, Jakob and baby Nikolai Location: West Berlin, Germany Size: 122 square meters (1313 square feet) Years lived in: 2 years Jakob and Clare moved into this West Berlin home a couple of years ago, and have since added little Nikolai to the family! Light-filled rooms and tall ceilings are balanced with a contemporary mix of furnishings and stunning architectural detail.

(Image credit: Merfin/Shutterstock) From The Kitchn → 5 Tips for Bringing Food to the Party

The best thing you bring on vacation this summer might not be the sunblock. In today’s uber-connected era, getting online is pretty much a necessity. But in certain places (and certain situations) it’s either difficult or downright impossible to get connected easily and cheaply. But there’s another solution… It’s a compact, battery-powered gadget that creates a wifi network around you almost anywhere, without needing an outlet or wiring into a wall like at home.

Name: Maria Location: Moscow, Russia Located in the old district of Arbat in Moscow, Russia, our three bed city center penthouse has lots of charm with its mix of modern and historical. Black marble retro fireplace, a mix of updated granite and original hardwood flooring, tall ceilings with crown molding and bright rooms. It’s a modest 128 square meters (1,378 square feet) but its layout makes our space feel bigger. Originally from the United States, we moved to Moscow as expats.

Q: Hi! I am hoping you can give me some much needed advice. I am renting my first apartment—it’s a two story townhouse—and I think one wall in the foyer would benefit greatly from a really bold, patterned wallpaper (I have no restrictions on what I can do in the unit). There’s just one problem. I have always been told that paint and wallpaper should only end at a corner or some other break in the wall, and this particular wall has no breaks.

Before we bought a house, we were champion renters. We lived in a studio, a one-bedroom, a two-bedroom, and a house —all without taking on the title of owners. During those years, I experimented with lots of ways to customize our home without altering the bland beige, sad shag, and lame laminate inside — not to mention the outside space when we had it. I’m a crafty DIYer, so I was able to work some non-permanent magic.

(Image credit: Courtesy of Scholastic Books) From The Kitchn → The Best Snacks, According to The Baby-Sitters Club

From Apartment Therapy → Top Ten: Best Water Bottles, From High-Tech to High-Design

Name: Joan and Matt LeMay Location: Fort Greene, Brooklyn Size: 850 square feet Years lived in: Renting 2.5 months We cannot get enough of Joan, Matt, and their consistently awesome style. We first met Joan in her Portland studio, and Matt later in New York once their lives merged. Now in their first new apartment together, this creative force has been gracious enough to let us chronicle their style evolution—and after living there for only two and a half months!

Sometimes you get tired of seeing the same trends over and over. Sometimes you want to try something a little different. Here are five trends you may be a little fatigued by — and five fresh new ideas to try instead. If you’re tired of gallery walls, try this: one single statement piece. Gallery walls have been around for a while, and they’re still a great choice, for the right space.

Living in a small space isn’t easy. Sharing that small space with another person and making it look good? That’s an incredible feat, but it’s one that Will and Kate tackled without a sweat in their small studio apartment in Hell’s Kitchen. Find shopping resources to replicate their smart mix of affordable mid-century style buys and vintage finds.

As a renter, building your own built-in bookshelves is out of the question (unless you butter up your landlord, I guess). But you can get kind of close. Here are a handful of storage solutions that, like liquids and cats, will fill any space. And the best part about modular, design-your-own pieces is that they can be reconfigured to work in your next apartment (and every apartment after that!). Boxy modules snap together with small clips, and can be placed on the floor or on top of a stand.

Walking into Rory's house is like walking into an adult Disneyland...if your version is a wonderland of wild colors, impeccable attention to detail and over-the-top accents.

Removable wallpaper seems like one of those “too good to be true” design elements. You get the charm and elegance of wallpaper, without having to painstakingly remove it with steamers, hot soapy water, and 22 different types of wall scrapers. Once you tire of it, all you do is just grab a corner and pull it down. A while back, we installed some for a makeover project and then returned after a couple of months to take it down.

If you’re a recent college grad (or just someone lucky enough to have their own apartment for the first time), chances are good you’re short on both space and money. With that in mind, we’ve rounded up five sofas perfect for both small apartment and small budgets, all less than 60 inches wide, and all less than 500 dollars. Above: Zach Mid-Century fabric loveseat, 53″ wide and $278.99 from AllModern. Rana settee, 49″ wide and $471.99 from Joss & Main.

The needs of your skin change throughout the year: While winter might require a heavy moisturizer just so your face doesn’t crack in half, summer calls for higher SPFs, lighter face creams and no-fuss, glow-inducing make-up that stays put in the sweatiest of situations. To formulate our summer beauty essentials, we turned to three expert bloggers to share their seasonal must-haves: Emily Schuman of Cupcakes and Cashmere, Amber Katz of Rouge18 and Lara Eurdolian of Pretty Connected.

Dear Alice, My daughter’s wedding seating will be assigned. The groom’s folks have been divorced for 15 years. The father is bringing his long-time girlfriend. Where do we seat the MOG? It seems awkward to have them seated at the same table and he would not like it. She will be attending solo. To make matters worse, she makes racial comments and talks about every conspiracy theory out there.

Q: I moved into a flat with my girlfriend and baby about 2 months ago and ever since we moved in, I have felt a bit on edge sometimes in the flat. But then about 2 weeks after we moved in, I was in the room on my own and the radio turned on right in front of my eyes. It’s strange because it’s happened 3 or 4 times since and it’s only ever me who’s in the room.

Fitting big hobbies—the type that require a board, a helmet, and maybe even a wetsuit—into a teeny-tiny home can be a tall order. Your best bets for storing this space-hogging gear are to work them into your decor plan or place them in often-overlooked spots (aka hide them in plain sight). Here are nine ways to stash sports gear, without cramping your style. This bike rack from CB2 doubles as a shelf, with a small platform to place your water bottle or helmet on.