Grit, Grime, and Gilding.

Rose Cumming had her "ugly room," my mom and I have a studio space.

Rose's was filled with furnishings rejected by clients; ours was overrun with a variety of non-integrated projects and wispy flyaways that failed to "work" elsewhere.   Harmless enough, until, at some point, a line was crossed.  What was once a halfway house for homeless decor morphed into a life-sucking vortex that took victim many an unwitting decorative element.  An overhaul was utterly necessary.

We attacked the space with great zeal.  So great, in fact, that we only realized after the fact that there wasn't a single "before" shot to be had.  Such is life.  Perhaps, I justified after the fact, it's better this way, for the sake of preserving an aura of mystery.  But no, I'm certain it would have been better had you seen the truly pedestrian junkiness of the space beforehand.

In shelter mags, some decorating maxims seem to pop up ad nauseum.  One that has always perplexed me is the "build a room around a carpet" philosophy.  Sure, that helps with cohesion, but why a carpet? Much more wall shows than floor, and seeing as I'm not acquainted with any carpet weavers, a painted wall hanging allows us much greater control over the general atmosphere of a space. So, we decided to tie the entire room together with a dirty, dank, aged (looking) tapestry-inspired hunting scene.

I should let you know, I have my own decorating mantras. First and foremost: Nothing pulls a room together like grit, grime, and gilding.  At three canvas panels wide, my mom painted this "tapestry" to knock out the entire (previously dark wood paneled) wall.  My other favorite oft-repeated mantra? Go big or go home.

Big? Yes. Extravagant? Always.  But, we really pulled together this studio space with spit and glue.  In fact, there is not a single new piece of anything in this room, at all.

Trick #1: Layering carpets.  Behold the floral carpet that I've LOATHED for years, deeply buried (oh, thank the lord) under an Oriental carpet found extremely inexpensively on eBay.  The catch? A large part must have been damaged, because the thing arrived surgically stitched together, and well, the pattern doesn't exactly match up.  But hey, when you're layering, these things are minor details.

Trick #2: Covering the plastic sofa. Oh my, I cannot believe I just admitted that under this lovely wool blanket, exists a brown, PLASTIC beast of a Chesterfield sofa in a rather ideal shape and size. 

Trick #3: Using old fabric remnants.  Make pillows from them. You don't want your guests to see the plastic sofa, and you don't want them to feel it, either.  Actually, the curtains are old panels as well, and the lampshade is embellished with remnant ribbon.

Trick #4: Covering the paneling with canvas. We even went so far as to cover the cabinets with stenciled gold/ black damask (and ended up liking it so much, we made another panel of the damask for the wall).  It's very easy to attach with cornstarch/water paste, and doesn't do permanent damage, so foreseeably, you could change your rooms daily if you felt so inclined.

Trick #5: Working with old pieces of furniture.  Recognize the stalactite table and the velvet secretary? All of these pieces were thrift-store finds, reworked or painted, down to the faux-marble accent table.

QUICKIE IN THE BATHROOM (Before and After)

PROJECT BATHROOM!!

THE CHALLENGE: Makeover a tiny shoebox-sized bathroom (4'x6'!!!!) that has mahogany paneling, 50's turquoise fixtures, and faux marble floors. GOD AWFUL.
BUDGET: Uh, practically nonexistent?
This guest bathroom went largely unused for a long time, if only because it was truly a dark, dank hole with a weird turquoise toilet, sink, and exposed mirror lights, all original from the 50s. Time and again, family and friends advised the fixtures be removed and replaced with something more "in date." "At the very least, replace those awful lights!!," they insisted.

To be sure, there are some really fantastic bathroom fixtures out there in the grand world, but not so much on my budget. And the way I see it, there's nothing less exciting than a generic fixture. I'd rather chance it with the showgirl lights and turquoise toilet and sink than go the local hardware-store route. No one could possibly accuse them of lacking character, after all.


So what did I do?
1. Painted the dark paneling glossy white.
2. Moved the old mirror to an adjacent wall and replaced it with an old, baroque wood and plaster thrifted gem. Two walls covered in mirror are better than one.
3. Went wild stacking paintings, prints, silhouettes and old photos (you can find these very inexpensively on ebay, for instance) to increase the sense of height in the tiny room. All of those mirrors have to reflect something.
4. Used black and metallic accents for texture, to play against the turquoise. The only new item is the towel (from Target). I think it does a nice job of tying in the baroque details in the room while picking up the black accents.

Time this took: a day and a half, only because the paint was asphyxiating me.


And the result? Not too shabby. In fact, I think I've fallen in love with the classic exposed dressing room mirror lights!!! It would have been a HUGE MISTAKE getting rid of them; in the right setting they remind me of showgirl dressing rooms in the 40s. Ditto for the turquoise sink.