Decorating, redux
Leslie Deak
Okay, so we got the ceiling fan installed, and there's some patch work to
do, and I decided I don't really like khaki everything, and we're probably
gonna paint. I'm thinking of a pale spruce green in the bedroom, with a
light mediterranean blue in the living room, both with white trim.
Bedroom furniture is all in a blonde wood, though none matches (me,
match?). We rotate bedspreads when we launder the sheets--we've got navy
blue, white striped damask, and pale green flannel with leaves (think
Eddie Bauer here). The living room has another mish-mosh of furniture in
blonde woods, with the futon cover in a deep green. The carpet in the
whole place is "apartment beige", and we have a couple of area rugs with
mostly dark green, beige, and blue. There are a couple of snapshots at
http://me1.egr.duke.edu/~ldeak/pictures/picspg.htm, under "Our Home," but
I'll try to get some more up tonight.
I favor a simple, light style of decorating, kind of a mix between "beach
cottage" and Arts and Crafts. I went to Barnes & Noble yesterday to look
over books and magazines, and couldn't find a SINGLE publication that
wasn't "over the top." So, I've got questions.
1. How did you (the ANCW) pick paint colors? I've been poring over "color
wheel" stuff today, and I need practical advice.
2. What brand is good for interiors? I read today that Benjamin Moore is
the best--don't buy paint at Home Depot.
3. Any good magazines or books for simple decorating styles?
-Leslie
Lynn
> 2. What brand is good for interiors? I read today that Benjamin Moore is
> the best--don't buy paint at Home Depot.
Why not? All the paint we've used for the past three years in this
house has been from there...and I believe we got paint there for my last
house as well...we've never had any problems at all.
Lynn
--
My mind wanders...but my body is too tired to follow.
Geri
<ld...@me1.egr.duke.edu> wrote:
>1. How did you (the ANCW) pick paint colors? I've been poring over "color
>wheel" stuff today, and I need practical advice.
When you think of describing yourself with a color/colors, which
colors spring to mind? Maybe it sounds flaky, or maybe I'm just too
into color, but I identify very strongly with certain colors and these
tend to be the ones that suit me at any given time. And my color
preferences have changed over my life -- when I was little, it was all
about purple, everything purple. I moved on to greens and subtle earth
tones for a long time, and in the last few years I've started moving
toward stronger earth tones and reds and also back to purple (I'm
getting more adventurous). I have never felt good about blue and have
so-so feelings about most shades of yellow. I can't explain it; it's
just a feeling.
(Note: my decorating colors have nothing to do with my clothing colors
-- I'm the queen of the mostly-black urban wardrobe -- but YMMV.)
My other suggestion is to keep an eye out *everywhere* for colors and
combinations that strike you. It doesn't have to be in a decorating
book -- I have friends who painted their living room the color of the
paper cups at a local coffee bar. They loved the color and took it to
a paint store and had it reproduced. Another friend has a necklace
that he bought in Malaysia and he took the color of one of the stones
in the necklace and had paint made in that color. We painted our
bathroom based on a towel we saw in a Pottery Barn catalog (it's a
sagey gray-green color).
>2. What brand is good for interiors? I read today that Benjamin Moore is
>the best--don't buy paint at Home Depot.
We like Benjamin Moore a lot. DH is a little fanatical and it's the
only paint he'll use.
HollyLewis
>wheel" stuff today, and I need practical advice.
Collect up a few of your favorite things. Dishes, comforter cover, sofa
pillows, decorative tchatchkes. Bring into the room you plan to paint. Get
the largest paint chips (or swatches of fabric or felt, or other form of color
samples which a paint store can match) you can find and hold them up where you
can see how they go with your "things" and how they look in daylight vs.
artificial light in that room. Pick your favorite swatch(es) and take to your
friendly neighborhood paint store. Buy a quart (or even a pint if they'll sell
it to you) of each color. Paint a three-foot-square section of wall up by the
ceiling, and, if you don't plan to leave the ceiling white, a corresponding
section of ceiling. Live with it for a few days, studying at different times
of day. Decide to go for it and buy sufficient gallons of the same paint to do
the room, or decide you need lighter/darker/bluer/yellower and repeat
above-described process.
Green can be a difficult color to get right, but it looks awesome when you do
(if I do say so myself). Get samples of different shades to see whether a
bluer, yellower or grayer color works best for you.
>2. What brand is good for interiors? I read today that Benjamin Moore is
>the best--don't buy paint at Home Depot.
Benjamin Moore is widely considered the best available paint, by interior
designers and such people anyway. You can go with something cheaper if you're
planning to cover, say, a yellowish off-white with a pale yellow, in a rental
apartment. :-) But if you're going from khaki to green, and you really want a
good job, I'd suggest springing for the good stuff.
You can buy paint at Home Depot if you want, but don't buy their cheap in-house
brand; get something better. If you have to buy twice as much paint because it
doesn't cover well, it's not so cheap any more! I advocate going to a *paint
store* -- look for the one the contractors frequent in your area -- because the
people there are usually really helpful and will do a great job of
custom-mixing colors, advising you about the right sort of primers to use for
what sort of job, and so on.
The real key, though, is not the quality of your paint. It's the quality of
your prep job. Excellent prep and crappy paint will look much better than
crappy prep and excellent paint.
>3. Any good magazines or books for simple decorating styles?
There are a number of them 'round here that focus on Arts & Crafts style, which
I vaguely remember perusing at the bookstore. :-) Not much help, I know. It
*is* hard to find magazines with your kind of decorating -- sounds much the
same as my taste, and I've been letting subscriptions lapse because they've all
been getting fussier and more antiquey.
The photos from our baby shower --
http://www.zing.com/album/?id=4293130013
-- show our green & blue paint pretty well.
You might actually look at the IKEA catalog. Some interesting design ideas
there. And other home/furniture catalogs -- Pottery Barn, Eddie Bauer Home.
Also try visiting open houses in your neighborhood.
Good luck!
Holly
Jan A. Cordes
> tend to be the ones that suit me at any given time. And my color
> preferences have changed over my life -- when I was little, it was all
> about purple, everything purple. I moved on to greens and subtle earth
> tones for a long time, and in the last few years I've started moving
> toward stronger earth tones and reds and also back to purple (I'm
> getting more adventurous). I have never felt good about blue and have
> so-so feelings about most shades of yellow. I can't explain it; it's
> just a feeling.
You sound a bit like me in the color thing. I was very into purple
when I was younger, did a sting with earth tones...rusts, browns, etc.
and then found my way back to purple. I'm not crazy about yellow at
all but I'm all right with blue.
--
jan(at)panix.com http://www.couchtigers.com
...................................................................
:Silicon Valley Friends of Ferals : CAT: A pigmy lion that loves :
: http://www.svff.org : mice, hates dogs, and :
:Mary Kay Cosmetics, Inc. : patronizes human beings.:
: http://www.marykay.com/jcordes : --Oliver Herford :
:.................................:...............................:
Jan A. Cordes
house sort of needs a revamp. There's so much to do that I don't
really know where to start. I'm lousy at decorating (and other "girl"
stuff). :^) But, I'm itching to make some changes. I'd like to start
with ripping out the carpeting that the cats have made a huge mess of
but I'm afraid of what I'll find underneath. Too bad I wasn't more
motivated to do this while I was off for three months. Seems when I'm
motivated I don't really have the time and money and vice versa.
Jan
Geri
>Speaking of decorating...how does one get started exactly. Our whole
>house sort of needs a revamp. There's so much to do that I don't
>really know where to start. I'm lousy at decorating (and other "girl"
>stuff). :^) But, I'm itching to make some changes. I'd like to start
>with ripping out the carpeting that the cats have made a huge mess of
>but I'm afraid of what I'll find underneath.
That sounds like a good place to start (however frightening it may
be). I usually concentrate my energies in the areas that either (a)
need something done to them (like your carpet); or (b) just bug me for
some reason (for example, our bedroom walls are just plain old
off-white right now and it's started to bug the bejeebers out of me!)
What would happen with me is that I'd pull up the carpet and deal with
either replacing it or doing something else to the floors and then I'd
be so happy about how that looked that I'd want to paint the walls and
recover the sofa and buy new curtains and and and...you get the
picture :-) Start with what *must* be done and see where it takes
you.
Usually with me, it then proceeds to get out of control. eg -- we
ripped everything out of our kitchen last week. Everything. We were
left with bare walls, a few pipes, and concrete sub-flooring. (We're
living out of a dorm fridge and a Mr. Coffee and the novelty of
*having* to order takeout has worn off.) We're having everything
replaced -- new cabinets, floors, appliances, granite countertops --
the whole shebang. Of course, I have now decided that the kitchen
looks so nice (even though all we have at the moment are upper
cabinets, a free-standing broom closet and pantry, and 90% of a floor)
that I'm gonna re-do the dining room when the kitchen is done. That's
how it starts...
Jan A. Cordes
> On 30 Apr 2001 23:42:00 GMT, "Jan A. Cordes" <j...@panix.com> wrote:
>>stuff). :^) But, I'm itching to make some changes. I'd like to start
>>with ripping out the carpeting that the cats have made a huge mess of
>>but I'm afraid of what I'll find underneath.
> That sounds like a good place to start (however frightening it may
> be). I usually concentrate my energies in the areas that either (a)
> need something done to them (like your carpet); or (b) just bug me for
> some reason (for example, our bedroom walls are just plain old
> off-white right now and it's started to bug the bejeebers out of me!)
Everything is our house (except my pink office) is plain white. I'd
really like to do something about that but don't really know what to
do. We have sort of a denim and animal theme going in our bedroom
(denim comforter, pictures of big cats on the walls). I'm trying to
figure out how to work with the theme and make it better. I also want
to get rid of the mirror tiles on the wall on both sides of our bed
but will definitely need to have a clue what I'm doing about paint
when I rip those down. I'm also totally jealous of my sister's new
fancy closet and want one of my own. Of course, her house has a walk
in closet with a door and ours has a tiny little narrow closet with
sliding mirror doors. The former owners were big on mirrors, they're
everywhere.
> What would happen with me is that I'd pull up the carpet and deal with
> either replacing it or doing something else to the floors and then I'd
> be so happy about how that looked that I'd want to paint the walls and
> recover the sofa and buy new curtains and and and...you get the
> picture :-) Start with what *must* be done and see where it takes
> you.
I was thinking I might start small with the front bathroom but the former
owner painted the tiles and bathtub and I'm not sure how bad they'll be
if I remove the paint. We're not ready to do a remodel there yet so I
guess I'm stuck starting with something else. Maybe I'll do my office
instead.
> Usually with me, it then proceeds to get out of control. eg -- we
> ripped everything out of our kitchen last week. Everything. We were
> left with bare walls, a few pipes, and concrete sub-flooring. (We're
> living out of a dorm fridge and a Mr. Coffee and the novelty of
> *having* to order takeout has worn off.) We're having everything
> replaced -- new cabinets, floors, appliances, granite countertops --
> the whole shebang. Of course, I have now decided that the kitchen
> looks so nice (even though all we have at the moment are upper
> cabinets, a free-standing broom closet and pantry, and 90% of a floor)
> that I'm gonna re-do the dining room when the kitchen is done. That's
> how it starts...
Wow! You are brave. We need to do a total remodel on our kitchen and
we're hoping to include the den in that remodel. I have a general idea
of what I'd like done to the den but haven't figured out the best way
to deal with the kitchen yet. We don't have a dining room so I have
to take a dining table into consideration when I plan the kitchen.
We'd love to add a second story when we win the lottery and can get
the neighborhood to approve it (blasted CC&Rs). I keep telling DH
that when we get the second story put in I'm going to knock out the
wall of his current office (which is on the other side of our living
room) and make a dining room area. :^) We'll just have to make sure
he has other office space somewhere.
Karina Sendt
: I was thinking I might start small with the front bathroom but the former
: owner painted the tiles and bathtub and I'm not sure how bad they'll be
: if I remove the paint.
I think that you'll have to repaint them if you remove the paint. As I
understand it, before they painted them they would have removed the finish
from the tiles and bath, so you'll have to apply another coat of finish.
Try typing 'refinishing bathtub' into a search engine to get an idea of
what this entails.
Karina
Geri
>Everything is our house (except my pink office) is plain white. I'd
>really like to do something about that but don't really know what to
>do. We have sort of a denim and animal theme going in our bedroom
>(denim comforter, pictures of big cats on the walls). I'm trying to
>figure out how to work with the theme and make it better.
Ralph Lauren has a little paint finishing technique booklet (I picked
it up at Home Depot) that includes directions for doing a
chambray-textured wall. It jumped to mind when I read the description
of your room. You can do it with blue paint and be really obvious, or
you can do it in a different color and be more subtle. It looks quite
nice -- interesting but not faux-finish overdone.
I also want
>to get rid of the mirror tiles on the wall on both sides of our bed
>but will definitely need to have a clue what I'm doing about paint
>when I rip those down. I'm also totally jealous of my sister's new
>fancy closet and want one of my own. Of course, her house has a walk
>in closet with a door and ours has a tiny little narrow closet with
>sliding mirror doors. The former owners were big on mirrors, they're
>everywhere.
Ack. Mirrors. My sympathies :-) Our former owner was closet-happy --
she either added or removed a closet from every room in the house.
Luckily, all but one of her changes was for the better (she added a
built-in china closet in the dining room; removed the double sink in
the main bathroom, made it a single pedestal sink, and added a linen
closet; added a wall of closets in the master bedroom; and -- the only
questionable decision -- removed the closet entirely from the second
bedroom. The woman was obsessed with closets.)
>> Usually with me, it then proceeds to get out of control. eg -- we
>> ripped everything out of our kitchen last week. Everything. We were
>> left with bare walls, a few pipes, and concrete sub-flooring. (We're
>> living out of a dorm fridge and a Mr. Coffee and the novelty of
>> *having* to order takeout has worn off.) We're having everything
>> replaced -- new cabinets, floors, appliances, granite countertops --
>> the whole shebang. Of course, I have now decided that the kitchen
>> looks so nice (even though all we have at the moment are upper
>> cabinets, a free-standing broom closet and pantry, and 90% of a floor)
>> that I'm gonna re-do the dining room when the kitchen is done. That's
>> how it starts...
>
>Wow! You are brave. We need to do a total remodel on our kitchen and
>we're hoping to include the den in that remodel. I have a general idea
>of what I'd like done to the den but haven't figured out the best way
>to deal with the kitchen yet. We don't have a dining room so I have
>to take a dining table into consideration when I plan the kitchen.
Okay, we're not *that* brave. We have a large kitchen by NYC
standards, but a small kitchen by just about everyone else's standards
(I think it's about 8' X 13'), so there's not a heck of a lot we could
do with it. So we didn't do any real remodeling -- we just ripped the
old stuff out and are putting new stuff in. The only addition is that
we had one wall that was empty and we've added a broom closet, pantry,
some glass-doored high cabinets and a small, narrow desk with two sets
of drawers. I was afraid the room would feel claustrophobic with the
additions, but they're in now and it feels great! I am so excited to
have the extra storage space. I will be even more excited when this
whole thing is over and I can unpack all of the kitchen stuff
(currently living in boxes in a corner of the living room) and use the
kitchen again.
My only advice is to go to a kitchen designer and let them have a go
at your space. We just used the woman who works for the cabinet dealer
(it was all part of the buying-the-cabinets fee), and she was great --
it was her idea to add the extra cabinets and closets; we never
thought of that, but she hit on it right off the bat and made a few
other small tweaks that really improve the room. It's amazing what a
detatched third party (who does this for a living) can come up with.
Now I must go clear a space in the room formerly known as my dining
room (now known as The Room Where Everything Lives Before It Gets
Installed in the Kitchen) for my new appliances, which arrive
tomorrow, but can't be installed until at least Wednesday, when the
grout on the floor will be dry. Argh. Why I thought I'd be able to
work full-time *and* coordinate appliance deliveries, general
contractors, Tile Guy, Electrician Guy, and Plumber Guy *and* keep
Friendly Dog and Party Cat out of the construction zone is beyond me.
At least I don't have to cook dinner ;-)
lissi
to paint our bedroom. Since this is really the first place I've been able to
do this without dealing with roommates and landlords, I am so excited!
There's no way I am qualified to answer any of the OP's questions, but I'll
give my opinions and also ask some questions of the group.
I am a graphic designer, which means that <ack!> I should be able to pick
colors. I've been trained to use a color wheel, and if anyone wants to know
the ins and outs of that, I'll gladly post, but for everyone else, it's
confusing and could be downright boring. If you want more decorating tips,
I've watched HGTV enough, and I have seen a great video that outlined how to
choose colors for your entire house, so I could post some of that info, too.
[about #1] My theory is that green (in almost all its forms) is a neutral
color, according to nature, so use it like you would a white, cream, tan,
beige, etc. So Leslie, you could pretty much do anything. Since it sounds
like a lot of your items are green, why not go with the blue on the walls
and then accent with reds and oranges or a burnt orange color?
[about #2] I have no idea what paint is best. I grew up in Cleveland, where
Sherwin Williams is headquartered, so I think I've been brainwashed into
thinking they're the best. Or maybe they are. I have no idea.
[about #3] I love Martha Stewart Living, Real Simple, even Better Homes and
Gardens. Not so much for the decorating *advice* but the pictures are always
pretty and you can get good ideas from pretty pictures. Someone in a
previous post mentioned catalogues, and I agree with that too. Once in a
while I will browse Metropolitan Home or even Architectural Digest.
Sometimes they're over the top, but sometimes I find things that I just
LOVE! Those pages usually get ripped out and put in a file folder to look at
when I actually own a house I can play with!
I am a HUGE fan of the Arts & Crafts movement. In fact DH and I ordered a
Mission style bedroom suite the week before our wedding. It's coming in two
weeks, and I am so excited! And that's also the reason why I want to paint
our room. I am thinking of either a taupe or ecru, or if I get ambitious,
maybe titanium (a sort of grayish purple blue color). Here's my question for
the group: one wall in our bedroom is exposed brick. How should I take this
into consideration when deciding which color to paint? I don't really want
brick red to be one of our "colors" but I also don't want to choose colors
and then have it look awful with the brick.
alissa
[Someone who gets way to excited about decorating]
--
* The big day is April 7, 2001 *
http://www.four-seven.com/wedding
Sarah McCusker
> This is great because I just told my (very new!) DH yesterday
Hey! Welcome back, and congrats on your new newlywed status! Isn't it fun?
Hope your w*dding went well, but we'll save that talk for another group. :-)
> that I wanted
> to paint our bedroom. Since this is really the first place I've been able to
> do this without dealing with roommates and landlords, I am so excited!
Oooh! How fun! I've been reading this thread with interest....I'll probably
tack on my own questions at the bottom too. :-) We're moving to a bigger
apartment later this month, and we're allowed to paint the walls there as long
as we return them to white when we move out. So we've seriously been thinking
about painting. We both enjoy painting, and after two years of living in an
apartment with plain white walls (we weren't allowed to paint there), we're
ready for something more interesting. We're not planning on living there
long-term though - a year or two, depending how the Future House Search goes
(standard disclaimers for long-term planning apply). So maybe it's not worth
it. But we really want to!
> [about #1] My theory is that green (in almost all its forms) is a neutral
> color, according to nature, so use it like you would a white, cream, tan,
> beige, etc.
That's an interesting way to look at it - I'd never thought about that before,
but I think you're probably right. However, may I tack on an additional
comment (about house exteriors) - NEVER paint your house green - at least if
you live somewhere with grass, trees, etc.. I have *never* seen a green house
that didn't look totally dumb. IME, any green you paint your house will just
clash with nature, and that's a *bad* look.
Okay, rant off. Back to green as a neutral....that actually explains, I think,
why I envision all the rooms in my house as being green. :-) I envision our
room as having light sage green walls (my current accent color is lavender, but
the wall color would allow many other possibilities that could change with the
seasons, my mood, the comforter, etc.). Our living room, OTOH, is pretty
eclectic, but the dominant colors seem to be hunter green and cranberry. The
cranberry is an accent color (it's what's in our futon cover, along with the
green) but I can think of so many colors that would look great with hunter.
> [about #3] I love Martha Stewart Living, Real Simple, even Better Homes and
> Gardens. Not so much for the decorating *advice* but the pictures are always
> pretty and you can get good ideas from pretty pictures. Someone in a
> previous post mentioned catalogues, and I agree with that too. Once in a
> while I will browse Metropolitan Home or even Architectural Digest.
> Sometimes they're over the top, but sometimes I find things that I just
> LOVE!
Oh, I agree. Victoria is another magazine I subscribe to just for the
pictures. It sounds like Victoria would probably be too frou-frou for many of
you (a lot of it is for me too) but I love antiques and lace and flowers and
someday, I want a big old colonial or Victorian house so I can do up a couple
of the rooms the way I remember my grandmother's house looking when I was a
kid. :-) But looking though magazines is really a great idea. I like the
ones that Lissi mentioned. They give me a great idea of what I DON'T like, as
well as what I do like.
> I am thinking of either a taupe or ecru, or if I get ambitious,
> maybe titanium (a sort of grayish purple blue color). Here's my question for
> the group: one wall in our bedroom is exposed brick. How should I take this
> into consideration when deciding which color to paint? I don't really want
> brick red to be one of our "colors" but I also don't want to choose colors
> and then have it look awful with the brick.
Hmm. That's a good question. FWIW, I know a couple of people who have exposed
brick in their homes - all are in the living areas, though, not in the bedroom,
but I think the same principles apply. One family has exposed brick an entire
wall of their living room. The room is done mainly in blues. The non-brick
walls are an ever-so-slightly-bluish white, the carpet is a taupe-ish brown
(I'm awful at describing colors), and the furniture is a patterned, dark blue
fabric with wood (I'm thinking walnut) accents. The coffee table, end tables,
and assorted other woods in the room are all stained to a medium color - not as
dark as cherry or mahogany, but certainly not light pine or anything like that
either.
In general, I think with the brick, you'll want to stay away from any "weird"
colors - I wouldn't paint the walls titanium, for example - I'd stick with
something more neutral. I think that if you stick with basic colors (browns,
blues, yellows, reds) you should be able to work around the brick without
having to *use* the brick color. I'd avoid purples, most pastels, and pinks.
Or, you could always paint the brick white!
Sarah
Sarah McCusker
> Okay, so we got the ceiling fan installed, and there's some patch work to
> do, and I decided I don't really like khaki everything, and we're probably
> gonna paint. I'm thinking of a pale spruce green in the bedroom, with a
> light mediterranean blue in the living room, both with white trim.
Those sound like they'd look lovely! We're thinking of a light green in our
bedroom too.
> I1. How did you (the ANCW) pick paint colors? I've been poring over "color
> wheel" stuff today, and I need practical advice.
Well, not that we've actually done any of this yet (ahem), but I basically
get an idea for a color (like, I want this room to be blue, and that one to
be yellow) and then I think about what's going to be in the room (yes, thus
far, I have totally decorated around my accessories, rather than
accessorizing to go with the decorating!). Then, I look for things that are
colors that I like....maybe a color in a photograph or painting, or something
in a magazine, or an idea from a house I've been to. Then, it becomes a
matter of matching the swatches/samples with a paint. :-)
Sarah
Sarah McCusker
> What would happen with me is that I'd pull up the carpet and deal with
> either replacing it or doing something else to the floors and then I'd
> be so happy about how that looked that I'd want to paint the walls and
> recover the sofa and buy new curtains and and and...you get the
> picture :-) Start with what *must* be done and see where it takes
> you.
Oh, that sounds like me. Of course, up till this point, my decorating
experience has only been in apartments where there isn't much I can
change. However, I know that once I own a place, I'll be just like this.
:-) Last year, I cleaned (I mean, REALLY cleaned) our bedroom and planned
on buying curtains (the windows had been bare, except for the blinds).
Well. Curtains turned into rearranging the furniture in the bedroom
AND the dining room; a new bedspread and sheets; a couple of new prints
for the walls; a total tchachke reorganization; getting rid of a couple of
pieces of furniture; totally revamping the organization scheme in the
closet....You get the idea. I shudder to think about what I would have
done had I actually had the ability to paint, knock down walls, etc.!
Sarah
Sarah McCusker
> Everything is our house (except my pink office) is plain white. I'd
> really like to do something about that but don't really know what to
> do. We have sort of a denim and animal theme going in our bedroom
> (denim comforter, pictures of big cats on the walls). I'm trying to
> figure out how to work with the theme and make it better.
Hmm. Hard to say without actually seeing it, but if by "big cats" you mean
lions and tigers (and bears...oh my!), maybe some sort of a forest/jungle
green? I'm thinking that some sort of of green, lionish-orangey-brown, and
denim scheme could work well? Or maybe not. I'm not sure. :-)
> I also want
> to get rid of the mirror tiles on the wall on both sides of our bed
> but will definitely need to have a clue what I'm doing about paint
> when I rip those down.
Ugh. Mirrors. Yuck. I feel your pain. :-)
Sarah
Sarah McCusker
decorating questions. :-)
1) As I said elsewhere, we're moving soon to a larger apartment. We can
paint as long as we return the walls to their original white before we move.
Now, we both enjoy painting (we're always first to volunteer whenever anyone
has a paint job they're doing) and don't really mind having to repaint it
white. We're BORED with white walls, after having had them for two years in
our current apartment and one year in our rental house before that. However,
we're not planning on staying in this apartment long - a year if all goes
according to plan (yes, yes, standard disclaimers) and no longer than two at
the very most. Would you bother painting? (If anything, we'll just do the
bedroom and maybe the office and/or bathroom - the living room/kitchen is all
open, and we don't want to have to deal with that - so we're not talking
about a terribly huge project)
2) We're planning on staying *light* in terms of color, mainly for
convenience when it comes to the repainting. The rooms are also not terribly
big, and we don't need to cozy the place up any more than it already is, so
we're avoiding dark colors. We're thinking of a light sage green in the
bedroom. Do you think we'd have much trouble covering that up when it comes
time to repaint?
3) Any other ideas/tips on how to personalize a rental apartment? We've got
lots of stuff on the walls, but beyond that, we're at a loss.
Thanks!
Sarah
Twinkle Toes
room.
ALWAYS buy a quart-size (or smallest available) "test" can of paint in the
color you think you want. Take it home, and paint a big spot of it on one
of
the walls--more than one wall if you have very different lighting in
different
parts of the room. Give the paint at least a day so you can see it in
different light during the day before buying more. Trust me on this: what
you like in the store may look NOTHING like what you get at home. We bought
a
small test can of a lovely light peach color for the kitchen/etc room (there
aren't walls between, so we're talking a roughly 20x40 ft room). Our lovely
light peach looked like frosted Holly Hobby/Baby Room pink in our kitchen!
All the windows we have made a BIG difference on the paint color. So, our
laundry room (which needed painting, but where color isn't an issue), is now
"Bee's Nectar" peach :)
We used Olympic brand paint from Lowes, and had no problems (other than our
own poor judgement on peach colors). Of course, our house is brand new and
had only a single coat of flat off-white paint to cover. We got a
satin-finish in a very pale grayish-blue color for the Kitchen (nixed the
peach idea...). It looks really nice, if I do say so myself :) Next is
FH's
office, in a deeper shade of the Kitchen color (sort of a denim blue).
After
the we**ing this summer, when we've got the new bathroom stuff we registered
for (either as gifts or from buying it ourselves), we'll probably tackle the
2
upstairs bathrooms. It will be nice to have walls that can withstand
getting
splashed with water.....(part of the motivation for painting the kitchen was
not being able to clean a spot off a wall without taking the white paint off
as well)
Besides paint, another easy thing to change when re-decorating is window
coverings. I suppose if you invest $1000+ per window then you won't change
them frequently, but I've never spent more than $50 on a single window
(including curtain rods, but that may change with a couple of large ones we
still need to do). I can't count the number of people I know who leave up
ugly-looking window treatments that came with their house and don't match a
single thing in their rooms. Hanging curtains is super-easy, and you can
find
reasonably priced casual ones at Kmart/Walmart/Target, etc, or even
moderately
priced ones from Penneys, etc that would make a HUGE difference in a room.
If
you can do even the simplest sewing (or just cutting and ironing, for that
matter), you can also make your own curtains--we're talking mainly large
rectangles of fabric, here, nothing you need real special skills for. Of
course, I'm pretty biased on this issue. I abhor plastic mini-blinds, and
have preferred to leave our windows bare (new house didn't come with
anything)
rather than slap miniblinds up everywhere (as most of our neighbors seem to
have done). We've been adding curtains and some fabric roman shades as we
go,
concentrating first on privacy (front of the house and our bedroom), and
branching to other rooms as time goes on.
Ok, that's my 4c on the matter (I gave a lot more opinion than I should, so
it's definitely more than 2c worth :) ). Good luck on your decorating
project!
--twinkle
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Jan A. Cordes
> "Jan A. Cordes" wrote:
>> Everything is our house (except my pink office) is plain white. I'd
>> really like to do something about that but don't really know what to
>> do. We have sort of a denim and animal theme going in our bedroom
>> (denim comforter, pictures of big cats on the walls). I'm trying to
>> figure out how to work with the theme and make it better.
> Hmm. Hard to say without actually seeing it, but if by "big cats" you mean
> lions and tigers (and bears...oh my!), maybe some sort of a forest/jungle
> green? I'm thinking that some sort of of green, lionish-orangey-brown, and
> denim scheme could work well? Or maybe not. I'm not sure. :-)
Two big posters over the bed. One is a pair of tigers, the other a
male lion. One big poster (all are framed) over the dresser. This
one is a leopard cub. A sage green or khaki type color would probably
work okay in here. I need to take some time and mull it over. I might
even grab some paint samples I can stick on the walls next time I'm in
the hardware store.
>> I also want
>> to get rid of the mirror tiles on the wall on both sides of our bed
>> but will definitely need to have a clue what I'm doing about paint
>> when I rip those down.
> Ugh. Mirrors. Yuck. I feel your pain. :-)
Yeah, we're certainly covering more than our share of the mirror
market in this house. We have mirrored closet doors, mirrored tiles
on the wall on each side of the bed and a mirror on the inside of the
bathroom door. We also have mirrored closet doors in my office and
DH's office, a huge mirror in the living room (which is behind my
china hutch for now...we actually like this one...makes the room look
bigger when the hutch isn't blocking it), and a mirror by the bar/
divider between the kitchen and den. Of course, we also have the
regular mirrors in the bathrooms.
Jan A. Cordes
> Besides paint, another easy thing to change when re-decorating is window
> coverings. I suppose if you invest $1000+ per window then you won't change
> them frequently, but I've never spent more than $50 on a single window
> (including curtain rods, but that may change with a couple of large ones we
> still need to do). I can't count the number of people I know who leave up
> ugly-looking window treatments that came with their house and don't match a
> single thing in their rooms. Hanging curtains is super-easy, and you can
> find reasonably priced casual ones at Kmart/Walmart/Target, etc, or even
> moderately priced ones from Penneys, etc that would make a HUGE difference
> in a room. If you can do even the simplest sewing (or just cutting and
> ironing, for that matter), you can also make your own curtains--we're
> talking mainly large rectangles of fabric, here, nothing you need real
> special skills for. Of course, I'm pretty biased on this issue. I abhor
> plastic mini-blinds, and have preferred to leave our windows bare (new
> house didn't come with anything) rather than slap miniblinds up everywhere
> (as most of our neighbors seem to have done). We've been adding curtains
> and some fabric roman shades as we go, concentrating first on privacy (front
> of the house and our bedroom), and branching to other rooms as time goes on.
I'm likely to be one of those people slapping blinds up instead of curtains.
Curtains in a house of 13 cats are not really practical. Vertical blinds
hold up better. At most, I might put up a valence or something like that
but, I have allergies and these things collect dust which is my number one
allergy. I have to keep that in mind when I'm doing any decorating.
Hey, I just got an idea for what to put in our bedroom (in addition to new
vertical blinds...there are these denim curtains at Target that are only
actually not really curtains. They're only about a foot or so long if I
remember correctly, they could go along the top of the window and stay
out of cat range.
Jan (who has a cat that managed to chew the cords on all of the horizontal
blinds in the house in half)
Kathryn Kula
> However,
>we're not planning on staying in this apartment long - a year if all goes
>according to plan (yes, yes, standard disclaimers) and no longer than two at
>the very most. Would you bother painting? (If anything, we'll just do the
>bedroom and maybe the office and/or bathroom - the living room/kitchen is all
>open, and we don't want to have to deal with that - so we're not talking
>about a terribly huge project)
>
Personally, I wouldn't, but then again, I hate painting. Two years seems
like
such a short period of time to have to paint the place twice.
--Kathy
Who still has "builder off-white" covering all of the walls in her house,
because we're still deciding what we want to do where paint is concerned.
The
nursery will most likely be the only room we paint within the first two
years
in the house.
HollyLewis
>paint as long as we return the walls to their original white before we move.
>
>Now, we both enjoy painting (we're always first to volunteer whenever anyone
>has a paint job they're doing) and don't really mind having to repaint it
>white. We're BORED with white walls, after having had them for two years in
>our current apartment and one year in our rental house before that. However,
>we're not planning on staying in this apartment long - a year if all goes
>according to plan (yes, yes, standard disclaimers) and no longer than two at
>the very most. Would you bother painting?
Would *I*? Hell yes. I hate off-white walls.
It sounds like you should too. :-) Hey, a weekend or two spent painting is a
reasonable price to pay for feeling much more at "home" for a year or two.
>2) We're planning on staying *light* in terms of color, mainly for
>convenience when it comes to the repainting. The rooms are also not terribly
>big, and we don't need to cozy the place up any more than it already is, so
>we're avoiding dark colors. We're thinking of a light sage green in the
>bedroom. Do you think we'd have much trouble covering that up when it comes
>time to repaint?
Not as long as you buy a good quality white and are prepared to do at least two
coats.
You might not have to repaint, you know, depending on what happens when you
leave. If you're able to communicate with the new tenants and they like the
green...
>3) Any other ideas/tips on how to personalize a rental apartment? We've got
>lots of stuff on the walls, but beyond that, we're at a loss.
>
>Thanks!
>Sarah
Faster and easier than a full repaint, and especially effective in an otherwise
white bathroom: Wallpaper borders. I've used the stick-on type that aren't
even really wallpaper. Or try some stenciling.
Aside from the walls, focus on things that are easy to remove and take with you
when you move: Area rugs. Large bookcases or storage/display units that look
built in -- either covering an entire wall or used as a room divider -- and/or
wall-mounted shelves. Window coverings. Light fixtures. Switchplate covers.
Doorknobs.
Just remember to save the original fixtures somewhere so you can put them back
when you leave!
Holly (who never left a rental without having to patch lots of screw holes)
HollyLewis
>maybe titanium (a sort of grayish purple blue color). Here's my question for
>the group: one wall in our bedroom is exposed brick. How should I take this
>into consideration when deciding which color to paint? I don't really want
>brick red to be one of our "colors" but I also don't want to choose colors
>and then have it look awful with the brick.
>
>alissa
If you want to leave the brick alone, try to incorporate the color *somewhere*
else in your decor so it looks like it belongs. A few toss pillows or
something in a print that has both the color you put on the other walls and a
bit of brick red will do the trick.
If you really dislike the color of the brick, though, you can cover that wall
with paneling, fabric or sheetrock. If there aren't any windows or doors in
this wall it's ridiculously easy to do, and not much harder to remove it later
if you do it right. Post if you want more detailed tips on how to do this.
Holly
HollyLewis
>have preferred to leave our windows bare (new house didn't come with
>anything)
> rather than slap miniblinds up everywhere (as most of our neighbors seem to
>have done). We've been adding curtains and some fabric roman shades as we
Ah, but I actually *like* the clean-and-simple look of miniblinds, particularly
in a bedroom, and cannot stand overdone fabric window treatments. :-) Perhaps
some of your neighbors feel the same.
That said, we do have simple tab-top panel curtains on rods with decorative
finials in the dining and living rooms. And I'm rather fond of the pleated
shades we have on the other windows in those rooms instead of miniblinds,
although someday I intend to replace them with white ones -- the current ones,
which were installed by the previous owners, are a beigey off white that looks
sort of silly now that the window moldings are white-white.
Holly
san...@socrates.berkeley.edu
>
>
>> I1. How did you (the ANCW) pick paint colors? I've been poring over "color
>> wheel" stuff today, and I need practical advice.
1) Holly's advice on what you have in your closet is good. Some
colors I love -- and others I loathe. The ones I loathe are *not*
in my house (think orange, pink, beige).
2) Kellie G (last time we had this discussion, IIRC) mentioned
thinking about your wedding colors, since they tend to be ones
you like, and have already "learned" to use and coordinate.
3) I also highly recommend a series of books called "Rockport's
Colors for Living" -- there's a bedroom, kitchen and living room
edition, and they come with great pictures, instructions on
replicating the color palette, as well as actual paint colors referenced
in the index.
4) Holly also mentioned getting pints or quarts, and painting...
I've tended to find scrap material, and hang it in a room to
get a "low-tech, low-mess" idea of whether I'll like it. While
I will be first to agree that texture of walls and reflectiveness
of paint can make a difference, the fabric swatch is helpful in
terms of narrowing various options (light green vs. yellow, for
example) and it is not messy.
Sandi
Leslie Deak
On 1 May 2001, HollyLewis wrote:
> > I abhor plastic mini-blinds, and
> >have preferred to leave our windows bare (new house didn't come with
> >anything)
> > rather than slap miniblinds up everywhere (as most of our neighbors seem to
> >have done). We've been adding curtains and some fabric roman shades as we
>
> Ah, but I actually *like* the clean-and-simple look of miniblinds, particularly
> in a bedroom, and cannot stand overdone fabric window treatments. :-) Perhaps
> some of your neighbors feel the same.
Whew. I was beginning to think I was the only one. In fact, the *first*
thing we replaced in the house were the hideous off-white heavy curtains
over the sliding-glass door in the LR. We bought white vertical blinds,
and I took down the curtain and put up the blinds the second week in the
condo while DH was at a softball game. Man, I hated those curtains!
There's a light blue valance that matches the wallpaper border in the
guest room, but other than that, it's all miniblinds for us. I've
considered other window treatments, but I know I'm not gonna be here for
more than 2-3 years, so I don't see why I should spend the $$$ on
treatments that might not fit the next set of windows. I'd rather spend
that money on furniture I'm gonna keep!
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On Mon, 30 Apr 2001, Lynn wrote:
> Leslie Deak wrote:
> > 2. What brand is good for interiors? I read today that Benjamin Moore is
> > the best--don't buy paint at Home Depot.
>
> Why not? All the paint we've used for the past three years in this
> house has been from there...and I believe we got paint there for my last
> house as well...we've never had any problems at all.
Just something I read. Huh. Well, since our good friend R (of R&J fame)
works for the parent company of ICI Paint, he can get us whatever we need
at $12 a gallon. Sounds good to me!
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On Mon, 30 Apr 2001, Geri wrote:
> When you think of describing yourself with a color/colors, which
> colors spring to mind?
Well, there's blue. And then there's blue. Did I mention blue? <g> I
gravitate towards blue and green when I go clothes shopping, and if a
kitchen accessory comes in blue, that's the one I'm likely to buy! After
some looking around, I thin I'm switching the colors. Blue will look too
funky with all the green in the LR, so I think we'll do a sageish green in
the LR (dunno whether it will go down the hall yet--we've got an open
floor plan). Then put the mediterranean blue in the BR.
> My other suggestion is to keep an eye out *everywhere* for colors and
> combinations that strike you. It doesn't have to be in a decorating
I did. I went to an open house a couple of weeks ago and lovedlovedloved
their paint colors and general decorating scheme. However, I thought it
was too weird for me to go back and ask if I could wander around and take
pictures....
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On 30 Apr 2001, HollyLewis wrote:
> friendly neighborhood paint store. Buy a quart (or even a pint if they'll sell
> it to you) of each color. Paint a three-foot-square section of wall up by the
Okay, so I've heard a lot about this testing thing. Perhaps I should try
that advice *before* I paint the whole room!
> doesn't cover well, it's not so cheap any more! I advocate going to a *paint
> store* -- look for the one the contractors frequent in your area -- because the
> people there are usually really helpful and will do a great job of
> custom-mixing colors, advising you about the right sort of primers to use for
> what sort of job, and so on.
Looks like we're going with ICI Paint. Ahh, friends with discounts.
> You might actually look at the IKEA catalog. Some interesting design ideas
> there. And other home/furniture catalogs -- Pottery Barn, Eddie Bauer Home.
> Also try visiting open houses in your neighborhood.
You know, I'd forgotten how much I like Ikea decorating. Some of it's way
too modern for me, but a lot of it is nice. DH, however, is not pleased
that I'm ready to replace the perfectly fine, but a little-too-small
dining room table.
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On Tue, 1 May 2001, Sarah McCusker wrote:
> our current apartment and one year in our rental house before that. However,
> we're not planning on staying in this apartment long - a year if all goes
> according to plan (yes, yes, standard disclaimers) and no longer than two at
> the very most. Would you bother painting? (If anything, we'll just do the
> bedroom and maybe the office and/or bathroom - the living room/kitchen is all
> open, and we don't want to have to deal with that - so we're not talking
> about a terribly huge project)
Eh. I don't think I would. I usually cover walls with posters, family
photos (I have a whole wall of family photos) and other artwork. I've also
got a lot of stuff I've collected from various trips, and they go on the
wall, too. I think that when it comes time to re-paint when you're
leaving, you might get a little aggravated (especially when you're
looking forward to decorating and painting the *new* place). I wanted
to paint our new place before we moved in, but there just wasn't any
time, let alone to do anything with the old place. But that's my opinion.
> 3) Any other ideas/tips on how to personalize a rental apartment? We've got
> lots of stuff on the walls, but beyond that, we're at a loss.
I find that our furniture and pictures do a lot for it. I've got a
collection of beer steins, mugs, and glasses on the mantle, and the top
shelf of the DR bookshelf is all display stuff. I've also found that you
can hang lighter pictures and stuff with small upholstery tacks (so as not
to make a big hole). Do NOT try this with heavy stuff, though. About
three months before we moved out of our first apartment in Fairfax, we had
a glass-framed poster pull out of the wall and shatter in front of the
fireplace. This is why I spent a LOT of time tracking down and cutting
plexiglass to fit DH's huge "Hoosiers" movie poster.
I found that when I was moving every year, there just wasn't enough time
between moving in and out to to any major decorating. We never painted any
of our apartments (DH lived in two before we moved in together, and we
rented two together). Lighting is pretty key. Right now, we've still got
the ubiquitous halogen floor lamps left over from college, but I'm trying
to figure out more ideas. I particularly like the soft glow of twinkle
lights, and they look really need stuffed in a glass vase or jar of some
sort.
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On Tue, 1 May 2001, Sarah McCusker wrote:
> Now, we both enjoy painting (we're always first to volunteer whenever anyone
> has a paint job they're doing) and don't really mind having to repaint it
Leslie begins looking for Sarah's phone number....and she's NOT
kidding....
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On 1 May 2001, Jan A. Cordes wrote:
>
> > Ugh. Mirrors. Yuck. I feel your pain. :-)
>
> Yeah, we're certainly covering more than our share of the mirror
> market in this house. We have mirrored closet doors, mirrored tiles
I nixed a place because of the mirrors in the MBR. Freaked me out. We do,
however, have mirrored sliding closet doors in the guest room. The room's
tiny, so it helps a bit, but PIL said it was weird to wake up in the
middle of the night to a mirror. I've yet to hear any other complaints,
though. Perhaps Hillary can weigh in on that one....
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On 1 May 2001 san...@socrates.Berkeley.EDU wrote:
> 1) Holly's advice on what you have in your closet is good. Some
> colors I love -- and others I loathe. The ones I loathe are *not*
> in my house (think orange, pink, beige).
Blue.
> 2) Kellie G (last time we had this discussion, IIRC) mentioned
> thinking about your wedding colors, since they tend to be ones
> you like, and have already "learned" to use and coordinate.
Blue. (sense a theme yet?)
> 3) I also highly recommend a series of books called "Rockport's
> Colors for Living" -- there's a bedroom, kitchen and living room
> edition, and they come with great pictures, instructions on
> replicating the color palette, as well as actual paint colors referenced
> in the index.
I'll give it a look!
> 4) Holly also mentioned getting pints or quarts, and painting...
> I've tended to find scrap material, and hang it in a room to
> get a "low-tech, low-mess" idea of whether I'll like it. While
> I will be first to agree that texture of walls and reflectiveness
> of paint can make a difference, the fabric swatch is helpful in
> terms of narrowing various options (light green vs. yellow, for
> example) and it is not messy.
I think I'm gonna do the testing thing--y'all have convinced me!
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
On Tue, 1 May 2001, lissi wrote:
> [about #1] My theory is that green (in almost all its forms) is a neutral
> color, according to nature, so use it like you would a white, cream, tan,
> beige, etc. So Leslie, you could pretty much do anything. Since it sounds
> like a lot of your items are green, why not go with the blue on the walls
> and then accent with reds and oranges or a burnt orange color?
I actually tried the service at cmyvision.com (you upload a pic of your
room, and can "paint" different sections, and decided blue in the LR looks
weird. So it will probably be a sage green in the LR, and blue in the BR.
That's what I'd originally thought, but DH thought the green couch, area
rugs, and walls would be too much. That, I learned yesterday, is called
layering.
> [about #3] I love Martha Stewart Living, Real Simple, even Better Homes and
> Gardens. Not so much for the decorating *advice* but the pictures are always
> pretty and you can get good ideas from pretty pictures. Someone in a
> previous post mentioned catalogues, and I agree with that too. Once in a
I'll check them out, and I paged through my latest Ikea catalog, and it
was a wealth of inspiration!
> I am a HUGE fan of the Arts & Crafts movement. In fact DH and I ordered a
> Mission style bedroom suite the week before our wedding. It's coming in two
> weeks, and I am so excited! And that's also the reason why I want to paint
Oooh, where did you get it, and are there pictures online?
-Leslie
Leslie Deak
> On Tue, 1 May 2001, Sarah McCusker wrote:
>
> > 3) Any other ideas/tips on how to personalize a rental apartment? We've got
> > lots of stuff on the walls, but beyond that, we're at a loss.
Oh, I forgot. Plants! They've really done a *lot* for our place. Made it
really nice....
-Leslie
lissi
news:Pine.LNX.4.10.101050...@me1.egr.duke.edu...
> I actually tried the service at cmyvision.com (you upload a pic of your
> room, and can "paint" different sections, and decided blue in the LR looks
> weird. So it will probably be a sage green in the LR, and blue in the BR.
> That's what I'd originally thought, but DH thought the green couch, area
> rugs, and walls would be too much. That, I learned yesterday, is called
> layering.
That website sounds cool. I'll have to check it out. I like the layering
idea. That can add a lot of depth to your room. I've tried monochromatic
before (not necessarily in decorating) but I tend to be such a color-lover
that it doesn't last long. It looks great when others do it, though!
> > I am a HUGE fan of the Arts & Crafts movement. In fact DH and I ordered
a
> > Mission style bedroom suite the week before our wedding. It's coming in
two
> > weeks, and I am so excited! And that's also the reason why I want to
paint
>
> Oooh, where did you get it, and are there pictures online?
>
> -Leslie
>
We ordered the bedroom suite from Thomasville. Here's the style:
http://www3.thomasville.com/Products/roomgroup.asp?CollectionRGID=77
We got the bed, chest, dresser with mirror, and one nightstand. We're
contemplating using some of our w*dding money to go back and get another
nightstand and the Santa Fe chair that they show at the end of the bed. I'm
just a little worried that every bedroom we live in will not be as spacious
as the one we currently occupy in our rental!
alissa
[who is ecstatic because the online photo of her new chest of drawers is
shown in a room with some exposed brick! here's the link:
http://www3.thomasville.com/Products/product.asp?ItemID=1047)
--
www.four-seven.com
lis_ng [at] four [dash] seven [dot] com
HollyLewis
>the LR (dunno whether it will go down the hall yet--we've got an open
>floor plan).
A hallway can be a *terrific* place to put a darker or brighter color. You
usually don't much care if a hallway seems a bit "cozy" and there isn't much
else you can usually do with it decor-wise -- other than hanging pictures or
artwork, which, depending what you have, can be nicely set off by a "look at
me!" color for background.
Consider a pale green in the LR and a stronger green in the hall. Just make
sure the hall color looks good with the color you use in every room that opens
off of the hall, and remember that the hall color will probably look a bit
darker anyway since there's less light (presumably).
But don't leave the hallway white or beige. You'll make it look too "chunky"
IMHO if the other rooms have more color.
Holly
Julie Hauer
says...
>1. How did you (the ANCW) pick paint colors? I've been poring over "color
>wheel" stuff today, and I need practical advice.
Everytime I've wanted to choose colored paint, I first look at the furniture and
the fabrics in the room. For the baby's room, we had a pinkish natural wood crib
and the crib set is in pale blue, mint green, rose, baby pink and pale daffodil
yellow. We decided to try and match the baby pink in the crib set to bring out
the pink tones in the crib. Then, at the last moment, I took the color card
(which has six shades of complementary colors on it) and went one shade lighter
than I originally was going to paint. The shade we chose was more lavender than
pink but it goes with everything in the room. If we hadn't liked it, we were
going to dapple the original shade we had chosen on top of it.
My general advice is to ordinarily go one shade lighter than you think you want
because paint can be so overpowering when it's actually on your walls.
>2. What brand is good for interiors? I read today that Benjamin Moore is
>the best--don't buy paint at Home Depot.
I haven't had any problems with most of the paint I've bought at Home Depot. Our
builder did our house using Duron paints and that's what we used at our last
house.
I just redid two wooden pieces of furniture using semi-gloss paints. One was
done using Ralph Lauren paints (Stadium Red & Regatta Blue) while the other was
done using Glidden (Pinky). The Ralph Lauren paint *sucks*. I used the same
amount of coats of paint and the same types of brushes on both pieces I did. I
used no primer since I was just repainting the bookcases in the same colors that
they were originally painted. The pink bookcase looks marvelous. The other case
is pretty bad and I'm going to have to sand it down and start from scratch. You
can see brush marks all over it and the paint settled in huge glops so there are
dark patches in places. When doing furniture, I tend to be on the stingier side
with the paint and would rather do more coats. There's no reason for the second
bookcase to look so bad. I don't know if their flat finishes are as bad as the
semi-gloss but I'm not going to try and find out.
>3. Any good magazines or books for simple decorating styles?
My favorite place for ideas is touring model homes. They don't mind if you take
photographs. Although I haven't utilized anything to date, I've put together
dozens of interesting ideas for a future date.
Julie
Julie Hauer
>I abhor plastic mini-blinds, and
>have preferred to leave our windows bare (new house didn't come with
>anything)
> rather than slap miniblinds up everywhere (as most of our neighbors seem to
>have done). We've been adding curtains and some fabric roman shades as we
>go,
>concentrating first on privacy (front of the house and our bedroom), and
>branching to other rooms as time goes on.
Our townhouse came with miniblinds in almost every room of the house and I hated
them because most of them were broken. You could either open and close the slats
or raise and lower the blinds, but not both. Because we knew we weren't staying
in the house that long and there were other more pressing matters requiring
upkeep, we left the blinds alone.
In this house, most of the rooms have 1" white wooden blinds. In the two
bedrooms that are meant for children, we used 1" vinyl blinds that look just
like the wooden blinds but they don't break as easily. We also have some
cellular accordian blinds in two bathrooms, the family room and the breakfast
nook. The non-bathroom accordians have light blockers on them so we don't have
light interfering with the entertainment senter in the family room. Our big
splurge was on some Hunter Douglas Silhouette blinds for the formal dining room
and they look beautiful in there.
Eventually, we may add curtains or valances around the blinds (when we actually
do some decorating) but for now, we have functional blinds that we enjoy looking
at.
Julie
Robin
> That's an interesting way to look at it - I'd never thought about that before,
> but I think you're probably right. However, may I tack on an additional
> comment (about house exteriors) - NEVER paint your house green - at least if
> you live somewhere with grass, trees, etc.. I have *never* seen a green house
> that didn't look totally dumb. IME, any green you paint your house will just
> clash with nature, and that's a *bad* look.
>
I read something interesting about green--wish I could remember where!
It was sort of like Holly's (I think) comment about it being hard to get
green "right". Something about people "tiring" of green quickly, so a
green you love one year you may find appalling the next.
I have to admit I think it's true. (Confession time) I know I loved
mint green when I put the carpet down in my bedroom, but a couple of
years later it didn't quite have the same appeal!
--
There's no need to e-mail me a copy of a follow-up; but if you do,
please identify it as such.
Robin
> Now, we both enjoy painting (we're always first to volunteer whenever anyone
> has a paint job they're doing) and don't really mind having to repaint it
> white. We're BORED with white walls, after having had them for two years in
> our current apartment and one year in our rental house before that. However,
> we're not planning on staying in this apartment long - a year if all goes
> according to plan (yes, yes, standard disclaimers) and no longer than two at
> the very most. Would you bother painting?
>
before we *really and completely* had all the boxes out of the dining
room. YMMV!
I find that "renter's walls" don't bother me much unless I think about
them (like this thread is making me do... grr...) on a daily basis they
don't really matter. Actually, when I walk into a house with painted
walls I find that "things look odd" before I put my finger on it--color
on the walls!
aMAZon
Kathryn Kula wrote:
> --Kathy
>
> Who still has "builder off-white" covering all of the walls in her house,
> because we're still deciding what we want to do where paint is concerned.
> The nursery will most likely be the only room we paint within the
> first two years in the house.
At least the walls got painted!
In my last apartment, when I was still single, I'd lived there for
about 5 years when I decided I wanted to paint.
It's a good thing I got primer; some of that sheetrock was untouched!
It sucked in that primer like a person dying of thirst would suck
in water.
As it turned out, to the best of my knowledge, that place was painted
*once* in 14 years. Other apartments in the building had lots of coats
of paint on them by that time. I did notice that I did stuff like take
off the switchplates and tape the edges, etc., but the "professional"
painters the landlords had in just rolled over *everything*.
--
aMAZon
zesz...@worldnet.att.net
"It's never too late to have a happy childhood."
Leslie Deak
On Wed, 2 May 2001, Robin wrote:
> I read something interesting about green--wish I could remember where!
> It was sort of like Holly's (I think) comment about it being hard to get
> green "right". Something about people "tiring" of green quickly, so a
> green you love one year you may find appalling the next.
Uh-oh. Well, I never thought I'd decorate in green, but I'm pleased with
the green futon cover and the area rugs. I guess the testing thing will be
a big deciding factor for us.
-Leslie
Megan
but then again I might just have mucked up the snipping as usual!
>Sarah McCusker <no...@none.com> wrote:
>> Ugh. Mirrors. Yuck. I feel your pain. :-)
>
>Yeah, we're certainly covering more than our share of the mirror
>market in this house.
You must have my share of mirrors then :-) When we moved in, I went
out and bought a 3.99 plastic framed mirror for the bathroom, so that
I would have something to brush my hair in front of and DH could shave
til I sorted something else (like a mirror fronted medicine cabinet or
something). Its still there.
At Christmas, DH bought me a very nice wooden framed full length
mirror, which we propped up in the bedroom whilst deciding where to
put it. In february DH came in late from the pub and knocked it over.
He climbed into bed with an "oh, f*** it I'll sort it in the morning".
Three hours later her got up to go to the loo and stood on it. Sigh.
Ex-mirror. Still haven't got around to getting the glass replaced.
So, after almost a year, we still have that 3.99 10"x15" mirror from
Woolies and nothing else!
Megan
--
Megan Farr Montgomery Wolverhampton, England
Lille kat, lille kat, lille kat på vejen
Hvis er du, Hvis er du
Jeg er sgu' min egen
- Piet Hein
Howboutmer
>>In the two bedrooms that are meant for children, we used 1" vinyl blinds that
look just like the wooden blinds but they don't break as easily.>>
You probably already know this, but be careful of blinds in children's rooms.
Unless they're fairly new, they may have "loops" either on the drawcord, or the
rope that holds the slats, that could strangle kids. The Consumer Product
Safety Commission issued a warning/recall on blinds recently (last year?). In
any case, they recommend never placing a crib near a window that has blinds.
Just my paranoid safety tip for the day!
-- Mary (mom to Aaron 6/13/00)
Kathryn Kula
I'm not Julie, but all of the blinds in her house are new (Oct. 2000?), so
if
new safety features are available, they probably have them.
Also, for those with older blinds, I have seen gadgets in catalogs that
gather
up the cords on blinds so that they don't pose a problem.
I think that I may go with pull-down shades in the nursery rather than
blinds,
just to be on the safe side.
--Kathy
Julie Hauer
says...
>You probably already know this, but be careful of blinds in children's rooms.
>Unless they're fairly new, they may have "loops" either on the drawcord, or the
>rope that holds the slats, that could strangle kids. The Consumer Product
>Safety Commission issued a warning/recall on blinds recently (last year?). In
>any case, they recommend never placing a crib near a window that has blinds.
>Just my paranoid safety tip for the day!
The blinds are extremely new (only 5 months old) and do not have any loops on
the cords. Even our wooden blinds just have straight cords with weights on the
end instead of a continuous loop. The only ones we have in the house with loops
are the accordians and they are attached at both the top and the bottom so they
are a continuous circle. I can barely get my hand inside the loop (and I have
small hands) because it's drawn so tightly. Each slat on our blinds is
individually threaded as well. This was an issue we looked into when we were
ordering window treatments and why we ended up spending about twice what we had
budgeted for the more expensive, non-looped blinds.
As for the crib, it's on a completely different wall than the windows.
That reminds me.....we're going to have to get some guards for the windows in
that room... The one drawback to these fancy new windows is that they only open
from the bottom. The windows start about 15 inches from the floor. When the
windows are open, there's nothing but a screen there and that would be easy for
a toddler to fall out of. Window guards aren't very expensive and will be worth
the investment.
Julie
Julie Hauer
>I'm not Julie, but all of the blinds in her house are new (Oct. 2000?), so
>if
>new safety features are available, they probably have them.
They were supposed to be October 2000 but ended up being December 2000 through
April 2001 :)
>Also, for those with older blinds, I have seen gadgets in catalogs that
>gather
>up the cords on blinds so that they don't pose a problem.
We've also gotten into the habit of taking the cords (which are not looped) and
hooking them over the valance so they rest on top of the windows. I can hardly
reach them at 5'4 so the baby shouldn't be reaching them unless she is really
trying to get into trouble :)
>I think that I may go with pull-down shades in the nursery rather than
>blinds,
>just to be on the safe side.
I know someone who lost a finger on a pull-down shade. Long story.
Julie
Kirsch
> I did notice that I did stuff like take
> off the switchplates and tape the edges, etc., but the "professional"
> painters the landlords had in just rolled over *everything*.
Yeah, I know exactly what you mean! The standard of paintwork in our place
was appalling, having just been freshly painted by 'decorators' before we
moved in - paint over all the switches, coving, skirting, wiring,
radiators - everything!
We've recently had decorators again for our kitchen (courtesy of the
insurance company - due to flood damage for the *second* time from the very
same neighbour-from-hell) & they did such a quick job, two coats in a
morning, and failed to tape up edges or switches, so where we cleaned up the
messy painted bits before, we now have fresh messy bits all over again! And
this sort of work is paid for? Makes you think of the saying 'if you want a
job done well, do it yourself'.
Kirsch
I'd give up chocolate -- but I'm no quitter!
Gretchen Shah
"Julie Hauer" <jha...@newsguy.com> wrote in message
news:9co0r...@drn.newsguy.com...
> >2. What brand is good for interiors? I read today that Benjamin Moore is
> >the best--don't buy paint at Home Depot.
>
> I haven't had any problems with most of the paint I've bought at Home
Depot. Our
> builder did our house using Duron paints and that's what we used at our
last
> house.
>
> I just redid two wooden pieces of furniture using semi-gloss paints. One
was
> done using Ralph Lauren paints (Stadium Red & Regatta Blue) while the
other was
> done using Glidden (Pinky). The Ralph Lauren paint *sucks*.
I second this statement. Our dining room has a white chair rail with a
goldish faux finish on top and red on the bottom (I call it scarlet,
everyone else calls it maroon--yuck!). The red paint is Ralph Lauren. It
took one coat of tinted primer and four, count 'em, four coats of the red to
cover the yellow that was underneath. Never again. If you see a Ralph
Lauren color you like, take the card to a Benjamin Moore dealer (or anyone
else) and have it matched. We used BM almost everywhere since DH is rather
fanatical about it. We did use Glidden in the bathroom (not sure why) and
it looks fine now, but I thought it was much thinner going on than the BM.
We also used Behr (Home Depot's brand) on our front door and shutters and it
was okay, but again kind of thin.
>
> >3. Any good magazines or books for simple decorating styles?
>
> My favorite place for ideas is touring model homes. They don't mind if you
take
> photographs. Although I haven't utilized anything to date, I've put
together
> dozens of interesting ideas for a future date.
>
> Julie
I was going to suggest this. I'm still trying to match the yellow paint I
saw in a show house about eight years ago. What I have in my living room
now is close, but not quite it.
Gretchen
HollyLewis
This is the main reason I would never pay painters. Good ones are hard to find
and ridiculously expensive. The usual ones do a piss poor job.
In our house, the sellers hired painters to come in and spray everything
off-white when they put the place on the market. We found pint on the
miniblinds. Not just the mounting hardware, mind you -- the blinds themselves,
which can be taken down just by lifting, no screwdriver required. Our next
door neighbor says they did the entire house in about 6 hours, so you KNOW they
did zero prep work. It took us 7 months to strip and repaint everything (well,
plus several other miscellaneous projects).
Holly
aMAZon
You perhaps can put blinds near a kid's window of you have the
safety widget that attaches to the wall at the bottom that
keeps the cord taut.
Or, as we did once, pre-Her Majesty, just "crocheted" the cord
to shorten it considerably. It was cheap and handy, and kept
it out of the reach of furry paws.
Leslie Deak
On Wed, 2 May 2001, Kirsch wrote:
> "aMAZon" wrote in message
> > I did notice that I did stuff like take
> > off the switchplates and tape the edges, etc., but the "professional"
> > painters the landlords had in just rolled over *everything*.
>
> Yeah, I know exactly what you mean! The standard of paintwork in our place
> was appalling, having just been freshly painted by 'decorators' before we
> moved in - paint over all the switches, coving, skirting, wiring,
> radiators - everything!
Our paint job is like that. The air vents and the electrical covers have
all been painted over, but only some of the switchplates!?!?!?! So, one if
the first things I did last fall was to buy a bunch of new switchplates,
and I replaced them all. Really cheap, yet effective.
-Leslie
Robin
> Jan (who has a cat that managed to chew the cords on all of the horizontal
> blinds in the house in half)
>
Fiji doesn't chew the cords, she breaks the slats. She likes to sit on
the other side of closed blinds, so she pushes them apart at the edge,
bending them at the first string support. Needless to say, cheap mini-
blinds can't take much of that and we ended up buying some new blinds in
our last apartment!