I purchased this 1960’s folding card table and chairs from an estate sale for $20. The table top and seats were covered in avocado vinyl that looked like it hadn’t been cleaned since its last party, 40 years ago. The way the table is constructed, the center of the table top is level with the outer rim, therefore I couldn’t substitute tile or mosaic for the vinyl because it wouldn’t be level. The best solution I found was laminating fabric.

I check in with Craig (and his list) on a daily basis, and when I came across a pair of matching wooden arm chairs, I pounced. I talked the seller down to $75 each and brought them home for a facelift. We have a bright red coffee table I had sprayed at an auto detail shop, and I thought these could be a nice complement. A million hours later, all the nail heads and staples were out and I was ready to spray.

The second bedroom of our house is only 8 feet wide and 13 feet long. In spite of its size, we still needed it to function as an office/craft room and a guest room that would sleep 2 people. The major projects here were pulling up the carpet and painting the walls light gray and the ceiling blue. Then we found the perfect sofa bed for small spaces and built a wall shelf behind it since there wasn’t room for end tables. The whole transformation cost about $800.

LACK hackFrom Noelle: I decided to tackle my own project with my ages old white Ikea Lack coffee table using Cece Caldwell’s paint in Destin Gulf Green. I figured the worst that could happen is that I’d have to head out to Ikea and buy another Lack coffee table if it was a total bust.

 Anything blah can be turned into something wowing, including those ugly upholstered folding chairs. All you need is some nice fabric and spray paint. I used home deco fabric so it will hold up longer. I removed the seat cushions and back rest. The chairs I have were quite old so the screws were worn out and refused to come out, so I had to cut them off. Once the seat cushion and back rest were removed, the fabric was easily removed by pulling out the staples.

After researching relatively simple and inexpensive ways to update my bathroom’s hideous ‘butterscotch’ tiles, my partner and I thought we’d give adhesive linoleum tiles a go because they’re cheap, impactful (in classic black and white squares), relatively simple to install yourself, and super quick (versus not being able to use the facilities for a few days!).

We have had this coffee table for 12 years. It was the first piece of “grown up” furniture we bought as a couple, so it is quite sentimental to us. It has inlay detail on the top, and we had glass custom made to fit it so that we wouldn’t scratch it (I always referred to the glass as the giant coaster). In recent years, the table was looking increasingly orange (I think because the rest of our decor is slowly leaning towards 50 shades of gray).

A couple of years ago, a friend and I decided to invest in a home that we could fix up, and flip in a year or two. I also needed a place to live. I took on the role of general contractor, landlord and designer. I also took over one of the units on the second floor of this 4-plex. We found the perfect house in Roncesvalles, near shops, waterfront, highway and crown jewel, High Park. My unit was in a pretty rough state but I could see the potential.

I had the great fortune of moving into my grandparents house on our family farm a couple of years ago. It hadn’t been touched much since it was built in 1971, so we saw it as an opportunity to make it exactly what we wanted… starting with the removal of the mostly original carpet. It covered the entire house from kitchen to bathroom!  Since it’s a working farm, our house projects are limited to winter time.

I found this little piece at the Salvation Army for $7.50. I was looking for a nightstand and knew this would be perfect. The top had water stains where cups and glasses were placed, but other than that it was in good shape. Because I feel that I am drowning in brown furniture sometimes, I decided to paint the drawer fronts white. After sanding and patching the holes from the hardware, I used a high gloss lacquer spray paint on the drawers and stained the rest of the piece.

Most bathrooms are small, wet places, so choosing appropriate furniture is often a challenge. Learn from Jenny, who took a flea market lucite stool and fixed it up to work in her bathroom.Jenny from Little Green Notebook spotted this scratched up stool at a flea market and decided to use it as a seat for when she’s bathing her kids.For wet or messy locales, laminated fabric is a great alternative.