bathroom: before & after

my bathroom was looking quite sad ~too white, too sterile & zero personality. When looking at the apartment I was excited about the penny tile, chrome accents and (you cant see it in this photo) the big pewter doorknob on the back side of the door. 


But the bottom line was that this space needed a pick me up in a huge way. I had considered painting the vanity and mirror black (and I still may) and I would love to change out the terrible light fixture however the biggest issue was the very large and poorly painted wall glaring at you whenever you entered. 


And so the after: 

 A while back, I fell in love with this set of vintage scientific plates. Many of them are macro views of everyday objects, occurrences or phenomena. Their graphic quality and minimal wood frames give them a bold presences. Perfect for bringing some life and interest to a sad little bathroom.  


Some individual in 1958 carefully framed the entire portfolio and was kind enough to paste the description of each image on the back side. The second image down from the top on the left is of drosophila or fruit fly chromosomes. A detailed description is printed on the reverse and signed and dated by whomever put together these prints and framed them. I love the sense of whimsy and curiosity the evoke. Hanging a grid was no treat but im pretty happy with the results. 

kitchen cupboard: inside out

one of the things i love about living in apartments is their ability to change over time. I particularly love so many of the original features that still remain in this 1930's era apartment. Almost all of the san francisco apartments built around this time had ironing board cupboards built in. Somewhere along the line the actual board in my apartment disappeared and when i moved in all that remained was this very lovely but quite shabby ironing board cupboard .... i thought it could use a little sprucing up. I love the little bit of farmhouse appeal it adds  

 i also started stripping the little knob on the front of the cupboard thinking it would reveal brass or some metal..but to my glee and surprise it revealed a very old little cranberry bakelite knob. i can only imagine its original to the apartment 

open kitchen shelving

sorry for the lack of flower post this week, I have a large wedding on monday and I know there will be plenty of flowers after that plus my flowers from last week as still looking cheery. instead today i thought i would share a few more goings on around the house. 
sadly at some point the original kitchen cabinets (i estimate the building is from about the 1930's) were taken out and replaced with generic white mdf cabinets. but the good news, this has created a few little places for me to introduce some open shelving. over the weekend we installed 3 of these ikea shelves in the kitchen. one replaced a tired shelf that was already hanging over the kitchen sink and the other two are in a little alcove by the doorway. 

a little touch up is still needed around where the lines of the old shelf used to be but that will get done eventually. 

I love that i can look at some of my pretty bowls and glasses while sitting at my table... what do you think? 

i hope you all have lovely weekends. I will be whipping up some flowers for a wedding on monday, hitting the flea market and doing a few more house projects. see you monday

xx

blue note: before & after

im feeling pretty lucky to finally a landlord that is open to paint colors and other home projects! this weekend i tackled the door out to the patio - it is also the entrance we will use when entertaining and its viewable from both the patio and the living room when we have just the screen door open -

it was in pretty bad condition and probably hadnt been painted in a few years (like 8) also, no one had bothered to paint around the door hardware so it was also covered in layers of grimy off whiteish paint. 

first order of business was to get to the screws which were under said layers - a few goes of citristrip (*this stuff is miraculous and you can find it at lowes) and i could just about get to the screws to get the hardware off. after that was done i put the door knob and plate in a bath of stripper and just let it do its thing.

next i washed and lightly sanded the door to prep it for new paint & taped off the windows. its a bit of work but its worth it in the end. a few coats of benjamen moores exterior low luster finish in "blue note" & voila - new door! 

 oh! and i was thrilled to find nice old brass under all that paint, doesnt the doorknob look great - i sometimes feel badly about polishing old metal, like silver and copper, because the patina is so wonderful after so long but i never feel that way with brass - the older it is the more gorgeous and muted the color and texture - so a bit of brasso and a serious arm work out and the hardware was glistening. 

what do you think? now im wondering if i should paint the screen door too? and im thinking those steps need a new coat of white

white washed

happy monday! how did you spend your weekend? mine was spent with a lovely gallon of fresh white paint and lots of packing boxes. a little before and after of the new apartment. the walls were a rather unattractive muddy, hospital yellow. the color seems a bit better in the photos than it actually was in life. below area few before and after shots-  

because there are so many lines on the walls - a base board, chair rail, picture rail, vaulted tray celling - the space felt very choppy, so the best thing to paint the whole mess one color- delicate white in valspar signature, eggshell finish. the signature is great because it has a primer already in the paint so you can just roll away.

and voila! a new room. in the photo below you can see the tray celling - its still the old yellow, i was thinking it would be fun to paint it another color but after looking at the space for the last few days i think it too need a nice coat of delicate white. and what about that light fixture?? pretty nice huh? affectionately named the flying diaper - its very high on the list of things i will be changing out. 

In with the Mid Century Modern : the finished product

im so! excited to share the sequel to In with the Mid Century Modern 


you all may remember that i found this chair in the back of a salvage truck on the street in san francisco. literally sitting atop a mountain of junk being removed from a basement somewhere around hayes valley. after a brief chat with the driver of this truck and a few eye rolls from SOS the chair was mine. 

and then the dilemma began. what?! was i going to use for fabric, what style cushion, what size cushion, welting or no welting. i must have looked at 50 different fabric and changed my mind 200 times. you can see my progress in this post. and in the end i chose exactly what i thought i didnt want at the start and i couldnt be more thrilled with the outcome. THRILLED!

 i took a risk (well risk for me anyway not for some) on the fabric choice. one day it was just like bam! sitting there at the fabric store right in front of me and i knew that was it. from there i let the fabric and the line of the chair guide me as far as cushion style and size. im so excited. 

i hope you enjoyed this little series and i would love to hear what you think.


 P.S. i picked up a new project last night and will be starting another little series on that. 

In with the new : before and after

first, let me welcome you to my new blog!!!!

when i first started blogging 2 years ago the blog title i wanted wasn't available - so i patently waited and kept checking - and guess what santa brought me for christmas - the COTTAGE FARM BLOG!!!

can you tell im excited?

so just in time for 2011, i will now be blogging from here. cottagefarm.blogspot.com - its nice to have all my ducks in a row.

and now without further ado. a before and after to ring in the new year.purchased at the salvation army for 10$

hand sanded first with 100 grit sand paper (3$ for a pack of 4 sheets and 2 were used) and then sanded again with 350 grit sandpaper (3$ for a pack of 4 sheets and 2 were used) **wear a mask when sanding and painting.

next i primed using a large can of rustoleum's grey primer (aprox 6$) and two cans of rustoleum's glossy black enamel paint (each aprox 4$)

and voila! these will be replacing some green ikea chairs i had previously painted for the kitchen.