I always have a project going on at home. For the past few weeks I’ve been working on our master bedroom renovation. Now I’m going to pack a lot into this post, so try to stay awake.
Let me give you a little background on this…..we have 3 bedrooms upstairs since we converted the pseudo attic access into the third bedroom we needed. I currently use our foyer as my office, which isn’t bad but not ideal either. My vision for the upstairs was to add the 3rd bedroom (done) redo the other 2 bedrooms, and renovate the bathroom. We have gone through many changes to that original plan including moving the laundry upstairs and plans to add a second bathroom by taking away a closet that is between the 2 main bedrooms. After much debate and budget analysis we decided to scrap the 2nd bath idea. In that time my daughter decided she wanted to move into the small front bedroom, so plans were revamped yet again. You have to roll with the punches!
Back to what we have been doing…….I knew I wanted to add carpet to the bedrooms for 1 really important reason: sound absorption. Every time my daughter moved upstairs it sounded like a herd of elephants going through, so I found an inexpensive low-pile carpet and used a medium grade pad. Getting it installed was another issue. Since we really had no place to put all the furniture, it is now being housed in our enormous hallway. CarpetOne was very accommodating and let me have my carpet installed in 2 visits. Thank God!
After the carpet was installed in the first bedroom, my daughter moved into her new room and I got to work on the master. Since we eliminated the 2nd bath plan I decided to add a much-needed 2nd closet to the master. As we took down the moldings and trim we discovered a couple things:
Unlike the rest of the house we actually had drywall on the wall separating the 2 bedrooms. We also noticed that the crown molding ran under that wall. Clearly, the wall was added at a later date, so does that mean this was a 1 bedroom home???? Strange things are discovered when you renovate!
Here is the room after we have pulled moldings and trim.
Because this is the only room in the house where the trim is different from every other room, window casings and door casings had to be replaced.
And here is Shawn adding the closet, he is a good man.
We had louvered bypass closet doors on both closets and I was determined to reuse them, so I cut a panel of luan to cover the slats on both sides, installed molding around them so it gave the impression of a raised panel, and installed dummy doorknobs that matched our original doorknobs in the home.
While we have someone taping and mudding the seams in the room, and while Shawn works on the trim, I snuck out to buy the wall color paint. I have been dying to paint a room dark, I mean really dark, since seeing it in a magazine years ago. This is going to be my chance. I have a complete vision for this room and it includes deep navy paint. I have on occasion suggested to clients that they use a deeper hue. Since most people are afraid of bold color I usually get pushback, but when I have won them over, it always works. It usually goes like this:
Here is the color I want to use.
Client: Which one? Me: The darkest one. Client: OMG, no, really? Me: (sigh) yes, really.
If we move forward (mind you, this has only happened a handful of times) we usually get to this stage…
And then there is some apprehension, skepticism, maybe tears. At this point I have to say, “please don’t look at it now, wait until all furniture and accessories are installed.”
*A little bit about accessories: sometimes it’s just 1 accessory…..a comforter, a pillow, a painting…..that is the inspiration to make a change, or a renovation. In my case it was these little wood drapery rings that I found in a thrift shop over 2 years ago. I got this whole bag for .99! And so it began*
I had no idea what I would do with them at the time but I knew I loved them. They inspired the drapery fabric, that inspired the paint color and so on.
A few days have passed and we are so close to the finish I can almost taste it. But since this is where my husband usually runs out of gas and the project goes into hiatus until I lose my mind and try to finish it on my own, I am taking some pics and posting this.
As I said, drapery rings were the inspiration, then I looked for draperies but couldn’t find any I loved so I bought fabric and made the draperies. The trim still needs to be installed on the windows and the door and we still need the ceiling fan installed but here it is……mostly done and pretty awesome. My favorite part may be the paint color but coming in a close second is the fact that the ceiling is now flat!
I am so happy with it and now I can’t wait to get started on my office! OMG, did I just say that out loud????
