Work in Progress: The Master Bedroom, Part 1

If my boss is reading this (hi, Shelley!), please don't judge my inconsistent capitalization in the post titles. I can only follow the rules so many hours a day. Outside those hours I am a major rebel.

Ahem, so. Sorry no post yesterday - we went to see The Lion King at the Orpheum. That is to say, we saw half of The Lion King. Joanna, my stepmom, had ants in her pants by intermission (okay, so did I) so we left before the second half. How do kids sit through a nearly 3-hour theater production?!

Today I wanted to share some photos of the master bedroom. Our room occupies the entire 2nd floor, and has a little "getting ready room" and the "sleeping room." I'm splitting this up into two posts because I have about 1.8 million photos.

This room is probably my least favorite right now. The decor is tending toward French country/shabby chic and that's not really where I wanted to go. It's pretty and soothing and it's not like I'm going to rip everything out tomorrow, but when I have the resources to redecorate, that room will be #1 on the list. It just feels a little disjointed from the rest of the house, which has a distinctly eclectic-vintage-mid-century feel.

The before and afters are better than the kitchen's, if I do say so myself. And I do.

Here's the before, as you've just come up the stairs:

Please note the globe light fixture, weird laminate elf door on the right, and paneling EVERYWHERE. Oh, also, the house was wired for Life Alert so there were phones, wires and buttons on every wall surface upstairs.

And as you round the corner to the left, here's what is now the getting-ready room:

If you look at the ceiling you can see the gorgeous acoustic tile. I mean, perfection.

This is what that space looks like now:

At some point that banister will get replaced, probably when we refinish the floors and drywall the walls and ceilings. Much better, though, right? Don't mind that weird pop-out thing over the mantel. There was a lot of slap-dash carpentry done up there; we'll fix it eventually.

The biggest improvement, for me, was the ceiling. We used this textured wallpaper from Lowe's to cover the acoustic tiles. Thank GOD my dad is so experienced with wallpaper. He had this up in two days, with me as his assistant. It still needs some touching up, but it's such a difference from the dingy commercial ceiling.  

In case you were wondering, the globe light, sadly, was discarded and replaced with this $5 pendant from the Habitat for Humanity ReStore near our house:

It reminds me of an earring. I thought it was pretty and it was certainly the right price, so up it went! 

You may have noticed that beautiful mantle. Pete rescued it from the trash pile on one of his jobs in NYC, and we hauled it here with us when we moved. It's by far my favorite part of the upstairs:

What sort of fool would throw that away?!

 To fill in the center of the mantel (you know, where a fireplace would usually go), I  used some scrap wallpaper and pasted it to a section of the cardboard box in which our bed frame was delivered. Pete attached a leftover piece of molding from the kitchen so the bottom looks a bit more finished. That little project was free. Love it.

Close-up of the detail on the mantel.

Plant-less planter, gilded photo frame and glittery silver bird procured from thrift stores and TJ Maxx.

Thrifted vases and little wicker purse.

My dad gave me that book when I was 10 years old and I still read it and love the illustrations. It's The Random House Book of Stories from the Ballet. The primitive stool it sits on was $6 from a thrift store and I love all the chippy paint.

Little vintage cup and saucer set from a shop in Kansas City.

Busted-ass chair also from the store in Kansas City. I had big plans to repair the seat, but I kind of like it as-is. I hung a vintage Whiting & Davis mesh drawstring purse from it. If I could carry that purse everywhere, I would. It's like jewelry in which you can carry your phone. 

 And to wrap this all up, here are some shots of the junk sitting on or hanging above the dresser I got on Craigslist before we even owned a house to put it in (you can see it peeking out on the right side of the first "after" shot):

Thrifted brass tray for my perfumes, and a votive holder I got from TJ Maxx for $0.30.

Pretty silver bowl from a thrift store - it holds my bracelets.

I use the votive holder to stash my rings when I'm not wearing them.

Pete brought this thing home from somewhere. God only know what it's made out of. It weighs about a million pounds. He does a great job of holding me necklaces for me.

The engraved brass lamp and deco beaded purse are from - where else? - thrift stores for $8 and $1.50, respectively.

Here's the mirror I hung over the dresser. It was $6 from TJ Maxx. It's not really big enough for that spot, so I filled out the space a little with antique backplates from my dad's house in Ashland. I love having them up there.

That about sums up Part 1 of the bedroom tour! I'm sure you're all waited with bated breath for Part 2. I mean, I know how excited we all were for Part 2 of The Lion King.

Oh, wait...

xoxo,

Leigh

P.S. - If you've seen drop-cloth curtains on Pinterest and wondered how they turn out in real life, without seamstress skills or complex stripe-painting or any other nonsense, they look awesome. And are much heavier and expensive looking than comparably priced "real" curtains.

I ironed a "flap" at the top that's about 18" tall - no hemming or sewing involved, just a lot of time with an iron on its highest setting and lots of water to steam the wrinkles out. You will want to wash and dry the cloths before hanging them. They stink.

Shot of the awesome drapery clips I used to hang the curtains. They hold on tight and slide really nicely over the rod. Man, I could totally write romance novels.