New Chair Love
Today I noticed this curvy chair on Apartment Therapy in a post about painting concrete floors. Not only is the painted floor in this picture gorgeous, but so is the curvy chair!
Love this room!
Funky Chair Love
I loved this picture when I saw it. I’m not sure why, but I did. I wouldn’t want a chair (seat) like this in my house exactly, but still, it’s charming!
“Funky Chairs at the Surf Shack,” by Dharma Communications. Simply funky.
Chair Love Remake
Well, I did some hardcore spring cleaning yesterday. But, I will have to post about that later. For now, I stumbled upon this gorgeously shaped chair. It is beautiful in all its shabby glory, but even more beautiful after Cat remade it. This before and after comes from design*sponge. Cat used the doily technique and spray painted this cute little find:
Tomorrow is all town garage sale day in my little home town, so wish me luck as I try to find such a great chair to spruce up! 🙂
Kitchen Inspiration
We are currently preparing to do a bit of kitchen renovation in our house. While I have a pretty clear picture in my head of what I would like to do I have also been scouring the blog world for some inspiration and creative ideas. We are trying to do this on a very tiny budget, so I am also searching ideas in that area. Today on Apartment Therapy I found one of my favorite kitchen pictures.
I just love the little swinging door. It reminds me of old western saloon doors. I am wanting one for our kitchen. I’m just not sure that every kitchen could pull this off. Maybe that will have to go on my “someday” dream list. For now we are thinking more basic remodel in the kitchen. I would like to sand and paint all of the dark wood cabinetry a glossy white. The cabinets are outdated and mismatched. This will also allow us to fill the holes from the old hardware and add new pulls. These are the pulls I am thinking of, bin pulls:
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_wmc3cgAjw0k/SHeOWPk3S3I/AAAAAAAAAOc/sp4juB_wHwA/s400/IMG_6026_bin%2Bpull.jpg&imgrefurl=http://theletteredcottage.blogspot.com/2008_07_01_archive.html&h=266&w=400&sz=12&tbnid=1nyLQKGa76QSAM::&tbnh=82&tbnw=124&prev=/images%3Fq%3Ddresser%2Bwith%2Bbin%2Bpulls%2Bpicture&hl=en&usg=__noAFFwDt8FmB3VYpI7taTYFlhEQ=&ei=zCHRSb_kJMSInAfzwbhq&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=4&ct=image&cd=1
I have also been reading that it is possible to safely paint laminate countertops. Since paint is a much cheaper alternative to replacing the countertops at this point I would like to paint these black. Here is inspiration for a black and white kitchen with warm hardwood floors:
Chair Love Again
This week I have been slow. But, it just hit me. My daily Apartment Therapy email just came in, and there is was, this amazing industial looking chair. I do not know much about the chair itself, but Atelier 154 in France is the shop where this baby can be found, and the stylists of this blog that contains manygorgeous photos other photos are Elodie and Karine Kong. See them here: http://bodieandfou.blogspot.com .
Just simply beautiful.
P.S. I think that my weekly chair loves are so random and different because they tend to match my mood for that week (or day). I just noticed that as this chair even kind of matches the outfit I am wearing today. Casual, but classic, but also unique. Anyways…
New Old Shade
Its official. I am sick of our curtains. All of them. Every room. I knew they were bad from the day we moved in, but now I am at my breaking point. So, on my day off yesterday I did some work and started plunging into our curtain situation.
I thought I would start off small. There was no shade over the large window in our kitchen door. Our neighbors could see right in! I decided to take the old white roller shade from the dining room door (since it also has a curtain) and refinish it to go in the kitchen. I wanted to stick with the black and white theme. I used some swirly scrap-book stencils I had and a paint pen ($3 at Wal-Mart). I laid the stencils out where I liked them, traced, and colored in. Now, viola!
What a simple , inexpensive project with such great results! This weekend I plan to get some black material and sew a valance at the top, as well as simple black curtains to replace the strawberry ones in the kitchen window. Then on to the rest of the house…
P.S. Yes, there is a cute in the shade. The landlord has mis-cut part of the shade. I didn’t want to try out my new paint idea on a new shade and ruin it. We like it well enough that I will soon go through the time and effort to reproduce this on a new shade!
Owls Make A Comeback
I recently found a necklace in a box of childhood stuff that I used to use as dress-up jewelry when I was a kid. The necklace is a large owl. It was so weird and interesting when I was little that I had to get the necklace out and do some research. Come to find out, the necklace was very popular in the 70’s. Many designers had versions of the owl pendant necklace, each looking a bit different. The sad part, however, is that my owl is missing it’s feet. The parts are connected with rings, and mine has fallen apart. I have the body, but need to reattach it. Maybe with some more searching I can find his poor missing feet. Here is what mine currently looks like.
I think the necklace is so cool even without the body that I am determined to wear it! Here is a vintage owl with his whole body intact, but in a more silevr color:
A little more research led me to find that these necklaces are regaining popularity, both vintage and reproductions. Etsy has some versions for sale:
Ebay also has many versions for sale:
So, go ahead, jump on this owl bandwagon- again! 🙂
More Chair Love
This weeks chair love: a recent find of Apartment Therapy reader Alex. Alex found this chair and is now asking the Apartment Therapy readers to help him identify it. Some of the readers think it might be a Gastone Rinaldi chair from the 70’s, worth quite a but of money if it is genuine. To me, money or no, it is really cute. I think it could be even cuter with some new funky fabric or leather cushions (which is what Alex is thinking about doing).
If you know anything more about the chair or it’s style, check out the post and let Alex know the scoop. Otherwise, if you are like me, just sit there and drool away.
Need Your Expertise
On Sunday Tony and I visited my grandparents. My grandma gave me some dishes and also two antique picture frames. She didn’t know much about them, except that they are old. I’ll say! The back of one picture has some writing on it that says 1898! I know the frames are cross corner with leaves, and that they used to be quite popular. Do you have any more information on these frames or the pictures inside?
This is the writing on the back of one picture. We can't make out all of the words, but we can read 1898!
I would love to know more about these, so if you know anything, let me hear it!
Make Mine Eclectic 
