Before After

After about a decade with a builder grade bathroom that was fine but not really his style, Jonathan made some gorgeous changes to his space. Turns out patience truly is a virtue, at least when it comes to glamorous bathroom renovations. From Jonathan: I bought my house nine years ago, new, and my master bathroom was complete with builder grade fixtures, lighting, brown walls, brown ceiling and travertine tile, as far as the eye could see.

Aubrey brings up the very important (and totally technical) design concept of finding the right vibes in your space. Sure, you could make some smart upgrades that would save on labor and make the space more aesthetically pleasing, but sometimes when the space just isn’t right you have to commit to a big ol’ project. From Aubrey: I would love to share my story of our newly remodeled kitchen.

We don’t all have a mudroom in our home. We don’t even all have an entryway. But nearly all of us have at least one hallway. If you’re looking for stylish and functional design ideas for whatever kind of narrow space you’re working with, find inspiration from this dreamy mudroom makeover.

One of my absolute favorite elements of our living room design is the IKEA Billy bookcase hack that TJ Breil of Slab Woodworking rescued. I say rescued because we attempted to create a hack of our own, using the bookcases you see here and a shelving unit, to fake the look of built ins. We got as far as putting it all together but the process of making the unit look “built in” was a dud.

Road tripping across the country sounds dreamy enough, but Becka’s gorgeously renovated camper makes the whole excursion so glamorous! From Becka: My husband and I decided that we wanted to invest in memories with our son before he started school so we purchased an older, used 5th wheel RV and gave it a big makeover to take on a cross country trip this summer (that we are currently on!) I want to inspire people to think outside of the box and see the potential in the older RV’s.

When Alexia purchased her first house, she got all of the freedom and joy that come with homeownership as well as some very ’80s bathroom tile. With a trip to IKEA, some lucky finds and some smartly shopped tile, Alexia was able to create a soothing space on a budget. From Alexia: My house is from the early 1980s, the bathroom was carpeted when I moved in (I stripped and sanded) and the ‘before’ tiles were the original builders décor.

I was driving by the intersection of 16th and South Van Ness in San Francisco one day when I spotted what looked like an Eero Saarinen side chair (with metal legs) in a pile of discarded furniture. I turned my car around to take a closer look, and turns out it IS an authentic Knoll Saarinen side chair(!!!). The upholstery was in poor condition with rips and stains, but other than that, the chair looked like it’s in a solid condition.

We’re all about the goings-on inside of your closet, but sometimes the outside needs a little love and attention. Anne hits all of the functionality & beauty buttons with her new closet. She not only had the closet fixed to fit the space and her needs, she added some gorgeous color and pattern to her spare room. From Anne: My old closets had ugly doors, and too much space behind walls. I wanted to open up the access and have sliding doors.

Aniko’s living room certainly wasn’t awful, but it didn’t feel like her. With a little white paint, some stylish DIY action and an excellent pink rug she totally lightened up the space and gave it a ton of character. From Aniko: Our poor little family room went through multiple stages since we’ve lived in the house. I tried decorating it many different ways, but we haven’t done any major projects in the room.

When Paige and Thorben moved into their San Francisco apartment, they knew they were going to stay put for a while. And though they were renting, the couple made it a goal to customize their apartment to their liking—something they could call home and be proud of. Throughout the years, they’ve tackled many ambitious projects: building a Murphy bed, custom shelving, and “hacking” their kitchen lighting.

This Before & After is all about the pursuit of a beautiful dream. When they bought their co-op in Manhattan, Laura and Peter had a dream, the same dream that animates the hopes of millions of New Yorkers: an in-unit washer and dryer. In pursuit of their dream, they intentionally bought in a building that allowed retrofits of washer and dryer connections.

Meredith moved into a lovely mid century modern home with a decidedly not mid century style kitchen. Ten weeks of living through a renovation with three kids led to a gorgeous, window-grate free update. From Meredith: My husband and I bought this dated, yet lovely mid century modern home in River Forest, Illinois in September 2015 and immediately saw its potential to be something great. He is an architect in Chicago and I am a stay-at-home mom of three with a background in fashion and styling.

The good eyes over at Mignonne Decor were able to overlook the 90s sitcom floral pattern of this chaise and see it for its true potential. They not only re upholstered this bad boy, they used a total unique mix of textiles to do so! From Johnelle: Mignonne Decor is a furniture and design shop based in Berkeley CA. We specialize in transforming the old and unwanted into fun and funky statement pieces! We reupholster, re-stain, repaint and repair, all in house.

Astral’s antique market find was almost perfect, save for one thing. After some deconstruction and reconstruction she has a stylish and gold pattern free swivel table. From Astral: I LOVE mid century modern furniture. I lucked upon this beautiful vintage swivel table at an antique mall. Everything about the table was great EXCEPT the gold pattern in the glass. At first I thought that the pattern was part of the table underneath the glass and not a part of the glass.

Name Location Years lived in Room Room Size Ashley and her husband moved from Denver to a small town in Illinois a couple of years ago, buying an old 19th Century home in the process. It came with a real doozy of an upstairs bathroom. Since the couple is pretty hands-on (Ashley does a lot of DIY projects here at Apartment Therapy) they planned to tackle the space themselves.

What sounds like a totally stressful situation, moldy walls and dilapidated cabinets, had a silver lining for Kessie. She was able to transform her kitchen into a space she loves, and live to tell the tale! From Kessie: After purchasing our very first home we realized we had mold in the ceiling and part of a wall of the kitchen. The old cabinets were falling apart when we bought the home and weren’t salvageable.

Séverine Piller and her boyfriend Gianfranco loved this Milan apartment from the start—specifically the loads of natural light and great architectural bones. But Séverine, an interior designer, saw ways to improve the space to fit their modern tastes a little more. And one big change was the kitchen renovation. From Séverine: As [the kitchen] is also the entry of the apartment, it needed to be functional and practical but still give a feeling of being spacious and inviting.

Patience truly is a virtue, as demonstrated by Megan’s two phase bathroom remodel. By keeping one eye on savings and one eye on design, she was able to create a tastefully modern space that didn’t break the bank. From Megan: When we moved into our 1960s home seven years ago, the bathroom was an eyesore. The blue tile and wallpaper were original to the home and they needed to go! The problem was that we didn’t have a budget to completely remodel the space.

When Séverine Piller and her boyfriend Gianfranco first walked into this Milan apartment, they knew it was love. The place had great bones and was filled with lots of natural light. However, it doesn’t mean Séverine didn’t see room for improvement. An interior designer by profession, she made some simple changes that streamlined the living and dining area, creating a minimal, bold and graphic space that fits their modern aesthetic perfectly. The stair rail was removed.

Moving from NYC to Chicago we were pleased to find a neighborhood that felt very New York in the Gold Coast. Giving up life in NYC was sad for us, but living in Chicago offered the opportunity of a larger apartment and this apartment specifically offered amazing views of Lake Michigan. A virtual blank slate, the apartment had not been updated in over 30 years.

Fireplaces are a dream feature for a lot of folks out there. They add character, charm and warmth. But sometimes, the look of the fireplace isn’t quite right. Autumn’s living room had a ton of 1920s charm but the color of the walls and the look of the fireplace kept it from feeling like home. With some smart color selection she was able to turn her living room into a welcoming spot.

When spots are out of sight it gets super easy to just let them exist in a sort of functional disarray. Clara had enough of her cramped closet and decided to get to work making it the best it could be. From Clara: When I first walk into a consult, I never judge my clients’ homes. They are busy with work and family, it’s understandable that things get busy and their home isn’t perfect all the time. I, however, do judge my home constantly.

Closet space is certainly useful and often a desired selling point when searching for a home, but with an opportunity to trade that for a luxurious master bathroom, Ryan and Joanna opted for the latter. Immediately after moving into their new home, Ryan and Joanna jumped into a major renovation project—turning two relatively small and generic bathrooms into two beautiful custom spaces, losing a closet and a back door in the process.

While Nicolette’s design senses to her that this chair had serious potential, but rehabing the chair in its original fashion was beyond her pay grade. So she got creative, and with a little paint, some upholsury magic and voilá! From Nicolette: Once I closed on my new house I panicked, I knew it was bigger than my current place, so I suddenly went chair crazy. Since home renovation is expensive I had to budget.

After buying a home that had been in her family for years, Katie knew there were changes to be made. Her open space updates took her space out of the ’80s. From Katie: My husband and I bought a 1980s ranch home from my grandparents. The home has been in our family for 20+ years. We knew that every room needed to be touched but that idea excited us because it has given us the ability to make our house exactly how we want it! The biggest project to date has been a brand new kitchen.

The previous owners of Amanda’s house had their hearts in the right place, it’s hard to argue with more storage, but the execution left a lot to be desired. Amanda made some super saavy storage decisions, switched up the lighting and got lucky with some surprise hardwood. Check it out! From Amanda: The previous owners of our house closed in part of the front porch to make a huge closet at the front of the home.

With some smart color choices on the walls and the floor, Lisa took her dining room from a little bland, to bold, bright and inviting. From Lisa: My husband and I bought a 1900 American Foursquare over the summer and have been steadily working to make it our own. The house hasn’t had any significant updates since the 90s so the work was much needed.

When we moved into our Victorian row in 2007, it was a pleasant-enough looking house. But my husband and I knew we wanted to renovate—especially the wood-paneled kitchen (even if it was white!). We decided to leave the kitchen as-is until we lived in it for a while and really used the space (we also didn’t have the funds at the time).

Yasmin hit all of the magic words with this project: DIY, IKEA, Storage. And while it may seem counterintuitive to open up your laundry room to the world, it works wonders for Yasmin’s space. From Yasmin: The laundry situation was not very glamorous before. A stacked Washer and Dryer in a tiny dark closet, with no built in storage space. The potential was great. We ripped out those ugly brown doors that were keeping the space so closed.

Before: My previous kitchen was outdated and nonfunctional. I had a –very!– red textured backsplash with mahogany cupboards, two different styles of floor (red and black tiles and wood parquet) that visually shrunk the space. Lots of different heights and depths among the cupboards created an overall sense of confusion.

Mix together a dash of plaid, a scoop of inspiration and a sprinkle of You Tube and you have the recipe for a gorgeous office chair upgrade. From Steph: A friend gifted me a great old desk that her mom had found on the curb years ago and everybody knows if you give a girl a desk…she is going to need a chair. I found this chair at a local Goodwill and knew it was the one. Even though the vinyl was cracked, I lived with it for a few months until I found a remnant I liked.

When we bought our little Laramie, Wyoming bungalow, we knew with a little work we could take the bland kitchen up a notch with some imagination, rearranging, and color. Given that the main floor is was so small (642 square feet), revitalizing the kitchen improved the vibe of the whole house.

Emily juggles a successful creative business as well as her family of four so having a space to work at home is crucial. She had a large enough room to work in, but it was dated and not necessarily the most functional. First, Emily worked with a professional organizer to help edit her current work space. Add some of her signature cheerful DIY style and this uninspiring room was transformed into a bright and fresh space that will keep her organized with no shortage of creative inspiration.

I often think of custom made cabinets as a luxury, but for Maria, they’re a necessity. There’s no IKEA in Serbia, so Maria had to do all of the measurements and design herself, the result is a cool & sleek European kitchen. From Maria: I bought this one bedroom in July 2015 and had only month to renovate it. All major demolition, plumbing and electric work was done by contractors. By the time they left the place, I was almost broke.

My brother and I purchased a 1924 multi-family home just under a year ago. The house was in great shape but definitely needed some aesthetic updates and both kitchens needed a complete overhaul. It was important to me to keep the kitchen era-appropriate while incorporating a modern color palette and materials. We demoed the day after Thanksgiving and took the whole room down to the studs. My dad did all of the electrical work and plumbing and we hired a team to install the drywall.

Sometimes, you get caught up in the moment. Nicola started off with a short and manageable to-do list and then kept adding more to it, in the best way possible. Luckily IKEA helped keep her costs low as her to-do list grew.

We didn’t necessarily love this kitchen. My parents built the house in 1999, but the kitchen had a random, generic feeling to it. Oh sure, Mom dressed it up and tried to make it her own, but it just never felt right to her. We just started calling it “the room with the food” since we knew we could do better for her kitchen-wise. After my dad passed away from a long illness, my husband and I wanted to make their home as comfortable as she liked and exactly as she wanted it.

Callie’s new take on Carrie’s inherited chair may have you looking twice at your aunt’s old living room set. Through a perfect mix of good bones, some incredible fabric and collaboration between friends, this chair really came back to life. From Callie: I’m an Austin textile designer and painter (and my treehouse home was on Apartment Therapy a couple years ago).

If you’re a color loving renter, contact paper is your best friend. Medina went all out adding color and pattern to her rental kitchen in a security deposit friendly manner. From Medina: I really went all out with the makeover. It is a rented apartment, but that didn’t stop me from decorating and injecting some color into it. The floor is wallpapered which I have a tutorial for on my blog. The cabinets were changed by adding contact racing stripes (all renter friendly).

I’m always amazed by people who are able to see the potential in somewhat ordinary pieces of furniture. This cabinet had been put out to pasture by a local school and Naomi snatched it up knowing it could be something beautiful. From Naomi: When I salvaged this old cabinet from the nurse’s office of a local school that was about to be demolished, it was gross – dirty, rusty, and covered with some strange gunk.

Sometimes, you’ve just got to follow your design loving heart. Faith found a lovely antique credenza, but it didn’t seem quite right for her. She stopped fighting her instincts and now has an adorable piece of furniture that she loves. From Faith: I purchased this gorgeous dining set on craigslist for a song and while functionally it was a fit for my space, stylistically it wasn’t working.

Christina had been pretty faithful to the character of her old Victorian home while adding her own style. There was a lot going on in the original hallway and she made some smart design choices to transform the space without losing a sense of the home’s charm. From Christina: One of the last pieces of our fixer upper 1902 Victorian was our hallway and entry. We have worked hard to preserve the original wood floors, structure, and character (original copper hardware!) in this space.

Oh, Scandinavian design. It truly is a small space inspiration. After Eric saw it first hand he came back revitalized and ready to rennovate. From Eric: I bought a small condo in 2001 when I was a student. I was a single dad and going back to university was a crazy move. But it was cheaper to buy than to rent so I went for it. When I walked into this 1923 building that had just been turned into condominiums, I thought “what is this place…?

It is so easy to fall into our home routines. In no time our placeholder basket becomes our throw-everything-here-I-promise-I’ll-get-to-it-later basket. Jane got herself out a storage rut with some simple and smart choices. From Jane: One of my favorite unexpected parts of the IKEA Home Tour renovation was my entryway! Unexpected because I didn’t think there was a solution for my small nonexistent entryway that was a complete mess.

This kitchen won’t be for everyone- but I love it to pieces! I decided early on to replace the upper cabinets but to repaint the lower cabinets as they were solid wood. The only problem was which color! I spent a lot of time on pinterest following the ‘OOooooh’ factor. Anything that made me make a noise of desire got pinned and I found myself pinning a lot of dark green kitchens… I’m all for interesting design but that seemed a bit too edgy even for me!

Sometimes, all you need is a little white paint and creativity. Two simple design choices made a huge difference in the look of Emily’s fireplace. From Emily: This electric fireplace surround was picked up from a thrift store. It was a black color and all of the details were hidden. There was a faux brick finish on it. Using some bright white paint and some simple peel and stick tiles, were all that was needed to make this fireplace stand out.

While not lacking in a certain crumbly charm, the bathroom in Colin and Orli’s Crown Heights co-op was definitely not a place where you would want to take a bath. Five different layers of floor tiles, installed on top of each other over the years, made for an unsettling drop when stepping into the tub. The subway tile walls were starting to look far too much like an actual subway for comfort, and thanks to many decades of water damage, the whole thing was falling apart.

Project by: Adam Bechtold of Adam Bechtold Interiors Location: Great Falls, Virginia Though the room above could certainly fit the tastes of plenty of people, to the young couple who bought this 1970s colonial-style house (their first home), it didn’t fit their style (and felt rather dated to them). So they enlisted the help of Adam Bechtold to take this room from traditional style to something more cozy and nature-filled.

Not all wallpaper is created equal. And while it is having a well deserved moment, some wallpaper can make a room feel instantly dark and outdated. Yasmin found an inexpensive way to banish her bland wallpaper, among other things, and brighten up her whole kitchen. From Yasmin: When we got this home, we definitely loved the original 70s homey feel to it, the original owners were so kind as to even leave us some orchids in the kitchen!

Who among us hasn’t spotted that rare garage sale find full of potential and charm, only to look at it and sigh, “What’s the point, anyway? Time is endless yet fleeting.” Charles did exactly that and the results are pretty breathtaking. From Charles: I was looking to add a little mid cent mod flair to my living room. So I spent countless hours scouring the internet to fill the void, and to no avail.

While Emily’s kitchen certainly wasn’t in the worst shape visually of some of our submissions, I became much more invested in this transformation (and wept for the state of her baked goods) when I found out she was using a 50 year old oven. From Emily: Our kitchen was original from 1965, and after living with it for two years we decided it was time to renovate – I’d been using the original stove and oven!

Kevin’s hallway update is an excellent blend of style and function and a testament to really thinking about how the furniture is serving the space when making design choices. Also, I’m a total sucker for an interesting ceiling and this one is tops. From Kevin: When it comes to small spaces that are hard to design, the hallway is one of the worst offenders.

Our 1961 Colonial house on Long Island had orange shag carpeting and some delightful fixtures when we purchased it in 2013. We ended up renovating nearly every room in the house, but it’s taken all this time for me to finish decorating! The room I’m sharing is our powder room. It had a shell shaped sink in the shortest vanity I’ve ever seen when we started. I decided to use the small space to get dramatic with color.

One thing I love about this upgrade is that you can still see the heart of the original kitchen, it’s just…grown into its looks. Cara made a ton of smart choices to upgrade the look and usability of the space to create a bright and sleek kitchen. From Cara: Before we even put in an offer on our current house, we knew that to make the house fit our needs and gain serious points for resale, the walls separating the closed off kitchen and formal dining room needed to go.

Spoiler alert: they remove the carpet. And, yes, it goes a long way in brightening and modernizing the room, but Christina and her boyfriend don’t stop there. From paint, to furniture, to light fixtures, this is a pretty impressive overhaul. From Christina: My boyfriend and I bought a one bed, one bath condo in San Jose, California about a year ago and immediately saw so much potential for it once we moved in.

Here’s a thing that’s bound to happen when you’re house shopping: you see a place where the previous owner has replaced the kitchen (or bathroom), ostensibly as a selling point, but the new kitchen or bathroom already looks incredibly dated. It’s especially frustrating if you really like the place otherwise, because then you find yourself in the position of either living with a kitchen that you really don’t like, or ripping out one that’s brand-new.

In October of 2014, my boyfriend, Sean and I purchased the tiny row house I had been living in for the past six years. When I moved to Philly to be closer to family I hadn’t expected our little residential spot off of (a then desolate and rather gritty) Frankford Avenue to all-of-a-sudden become Philadelphia’s hippest/hipsteriest hood.

Who couldn’t use a little glam in their life, right? Okay, so maybe it takes a certain type of person to pull off a really glam look at home, but Tim from Design Maze and the resident of this apartment were the perfect team to pull off this eye-popping den with a modern take on Hollywood glamour. I think it will make even the most minimalist design lover feel a little glam-envy. The best part? This is a rental apartment so everything is temporary.

Bradley and I had been house shopping for over a year, but in the Denver market, it was nearly impossibly to nail something down in our budget with all of the crazy investor offers constantly swooping in with full-cash offers. We had just lost another bid on a house and the next day, I got a call from our realtor that he had just gotten a listing and that we should come take a look.

When you find the perfect apartment, but it doesn’t have a closet, you have two choices: You can either A. throw away all your clothes, or B. get creative. I chose B. Finding an apartment in New York is not easy. In fact, it is damn near impossible.

Cintia’s beloved saucer chair needed some major TLC after battling the elements. She not only resurrected this chair with a ton of style, she did it in a low cost, totally green way. Once in pristine condition, my vintage saucer chair was left out in the weather for many years and slowly disintegrated. I had quite a sentimental attachment to it so was reluctant to throw it away. It took me about a year, working on it intermittently to complete this project.

Project by: Marc Houston of Marc Houston Lifestyle & Interiors Location: Boston, Massachusetts It’s not hard to make an apartment with great architectural bones look good. Just fill it with some decent furniture and let the tall ceilings, brick wall and crown molding do the heavy design lifting.

When we bought this tired little cottage, we didn’t really know what we’d gotten into. Sitting empty for 3 years, the pipes had burst, the furnace had died and there was a small lake in the basement. Oh – and it was truly the homeliest house on the block. We had just started our ‘encore career’ to buy and renovate homes in a little town in Maine. But this project was a bit daunting for newbies! It took 5 months of work to transform it from top to bottom.

Hidden among many other obscure objects at a garage sale in Princeton, New Jersey, this bentwood rocking chair sat dressed in black paint and heavy black leather upholstery attached with large tacks. At the time, I couldn’t place where this piece had come from. It wasn’t a Thonet chair, but it had the similar features and was certainly older. As I continued to look at it, the colors and materials looked so heavy on such a small, slender frame. It begged to be refinished.

Project by: Dana Reca of Circa Dee Location: Bucks County, Pennsylvania Have you ever faced the task of cheering up a dark room? If you’re looking for inspiration on how to transform a dreary space into a cozy, welcoming room (that you might want to actually spend time in), you might find inspiration in this professional project.

When we purchased this home we knew it was going to take a while to make our way through the house, as every room needed work. We started with the first floor so we actually finished construction on the living room over a year ago. However, we’re slow decorators. We like to take our time and find the perfect pieces for the space on Craigslist, thrift stores and flea markets in addition to other retail spaces.

Ashley’s took her guest bedroom from all-purpose-catch-all to swoon worthy oasis. Just look at that gorgeous green! That fabulous rug! When can we visit? From Ashley: When we first moved in, we had a pretty standard guest bedroom. It was outdated, had dingy walls and a wallpaper border. It sat like this for quite some time and eventually just became a dumping ground for random decor pieces, clothes, etc. My husband and I had finally just had enough.

We renovated our kitchen in June 2015 with a substantial amount of GardenWeb help. The kitchen is sort of an awkward layout. It connects an entrance hallway and the dining room. We were working with a narrow galley kitchen with a swing door on one end and a pocket door on the other. Our home is a mid-century modern that was built in 1952. Structurally, we opened up both ends and wrapped the cabinetry into the dining room.