department of the interior: home decor

Do you find that the plates above the stove collect aerosolized oil and need washing every few months?

the plates have only been there for a couple months and we honestly don't do as much cooking in the summer, so idk, they are a bit dusty but that's it

anyway i will stop spamming the thread, you can see more stuff on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/eo2/sets/72157627327172741/

My word, I love that your kitchen is CURATED, which is basically IS, and everything is so dear. But what about a photo of the overall layout??

elmo your kitchen is awesome! We always have grand plans but never get round to doing anything.

the kitchen is basically the result of 4 years of frequent thrifting and yard sales etc etc. laurel i will try to get some wider shots when the kitchen is more tidy than it is now!

oh i didn't get any photos but you should know that we keep plastic animals in the fridge, iirc there is a t-rex guarding the butter dish right now.

your kitchen is so adorable, elmo! aw! kitchen of love and cute

Apartment Therapy routinely makes me huff and roll my eyes, but two different tours today have given me really specific ideas for making things work WAY BETTER or look way cooler in my room.

http://gallery.apartmenttherapy.com/assets/0279/5694/Shannon_Kaye-005_rect640.jpg

This is a thrifted piece of furniture, I think a dresser, with cabinets added above it later and painted to blend into the wall. So ODD if I think about it too much but really perfect for making the shelving not LOOM OVER YOU when it's so high.

http://gallery.apartmenttherapy.com/assets/0279/5874/Shannon_Kaye-0023_rect640.jpg

And this technique of painting large squares on the walls and leaving the corners white? GENIUS for my entryway.

And this is not, like, the world's greatest stroke of genius or anything but I like the wine bottles as boot trees. :)

http://g-cdn.apartmenttherapy.com/2738064/IMG_2245_rect640.JPG

Also the pic with the dresser + shelves reinforced to me, via that closet door on the right, that the crappy cheap contemporary woodwork in my room is going to be painted the same color as the walls so it will recede, while the old, ornate, original woodwork is getting a fresh coat of semi-gloss white.

Painting the trim around my (modern-day) closet in the wall color will keep that whole area from being WAY too busy. Cos there's a closet with trim around the frame but no door, and above it, a storage cabinet with more trim around it, and a door is that isn't the same color as ANYTHING else. It's all going grey.

I am loving grey so much these days. Were it not for an opinionated cohabitant, this whole damn house would be various shades of gray (except for our bedroom, which is gray-brown).

I love love grey walls and spent about 6 months trying to pick grey paint for my bedroom. But then I kept looking at apt. therapy for inspiration and got exhausted by all the grey bedrooms. I kind of compromised and did a benjamin moore blue with grey undertones.

Now I just want some kind of saffron/yellow color duvet cover or possible bright plaid. And am also looking for a huge leather reading chair that I can fall asleep in. Something chesterfield-y.

Years ago this apartment in warm gray tones in Martha Stewart Living BLEW MY MIND and it still does. Love the coffered dining room ceiling especially. Gustavian furniture is always a good look.

http://www.marthastewart.com/photogallery/home-tour-eric-pike-apartment

totally agree about gray! i had been looking lately at some pale gray things for whenever i finish up this loooong process of getting rid of stuff/paying off credit cards and can move to a nicer apartment

that place @ martha stewart is amazing

grey comes into fashion in uncertain, disconcerting times, because it is the colour of stability and security

i have a lot of grey clothes. and a grey couch. but i think painting my walls grey is, personally to me, not a good idea.

i just want to paint my walls cream or something

I am a sucker for primary colors, so I love how all colors look against a grey background.

Yeah, I want to sneak in some kelly green, as it happens.

Bought a detail sander today, the rest of everything I need can be picked up at Home Depot!!

Step 1: Spackle holes in walls, wood-fill wooden trim, sand.
Step 2: Prime all.
Step 3: Paint ceiling.
Step 3: Paint woodwork & trim.
Step 4: Paint walls.

This is the plan, anyway!!

you are an inspiration

Let's hope I don't end up as a object lesson or any other kind of cautionary tale.

haha i doubt you will!

I have a lighting problem. I want a pendant lamp on a long plastic cord for swagging from the ceiling and hanging down wherever I want light. Problem: I don't want to plug them into a wall outlet, I want the other end to have a SCREW-IN attachment that can go into the original ceiling socket, like a light bulb.

All I can find are ones that plug in. Help?

The reason is that one of my rooms has ZERO outlets but two very attractive ceiling sockets.

OMG I FIGURED IT OUT. Will take some jury-rigging, but will use something called an "eyeball socket adapter" and one of those cheap IKEA drop-light things, probably!!

http://www.commerciallightingsupplier.com/mm5/graphics/400/EYEBALL-SOCKET-ADAPTER-NRA-11_1.jpg

you could also turn off the circuit/power to that light/area in the house and proceed as: http://www.wikihow.com/Replace-a-Ceiling-Light-Socket - undo the wires to the light socket, not so hard - also as in like http://www.do-it-yourself-help.com/installing_ceilingfixtures2.html

Thank you! Yes, I could, but the one in the ceiling now is a) ornate and kinda pretty, and b) presumably original to the building. I don't want to take it out, I just wanna screw something else into it.

ah, i see!

I really want

http://images.craigslist.org/3n73ma3od5Y15Z45S4b8t62bfdd132a8b1d56.jpg

Yeah, it's a little crazy. I want it anyway. And it's FREE!

But I don't have a truck or access to a truck and so far no one has volunteered to loan me their truck, so another awesome deal down the tubes.

I am renting a truck this weekend, but it will be in DC/VA and not NY, sorry :(

Said truck will be picking up restored pressed tin panels from a 1909 high school gym ceiling. We're gonna do our dining room in tin! Anyone know how to install this stuff?

i love tin ceilings! no idea how to do that but best of luck & post pics!

Thanks, elmo, will do!

I'm trying to picture *my* high school gym with presed tin ceilings. I wish!

pressed, even

Laurel, here's what you need:
http://www.acetogo.com/photo/product/3273497.jpg
About $2 at any good hardware store

Then again better to change the plug to a socket, so gravity won't allow the lamp to fall out of the socket. Ask someone with basic electrical skills to do this, it's quite easy

Department of the exterior: anyone have any experience in choosing exterior paint for a house? Particularly any horrible mis-steps I could make?

LEE, I love those! That's perfect!! A much neater solution that the one I was considering.

No ideas about exterior paint; sorry, kk.

I had to get some exterior paint matched to the current color for some repair work; beyond that I have zero experience. If it is anything like interior paint, it is worth the money to get something of high quality imo.

Yeah, see, we're trying to kick our old color to the curb. Our current paint is a worn-out, dirty, barn red on top of cedar shingles.

Do you have to re-paint? I love weathered natural cedar, if that's an option.

We considered it, but would prefer to cover it up with fresh paint. It would be a lot more complicated to strip the current paint off.

Oh god, sorry, of course. Thought you were replacing the shingles or something. Definitely paint.

Well, no, I mean, it's a good suggestion! Someone I was talking to said that the raw cedar look is a selling point for some, so it might pay off in the end to do it. It's just that we have a lot of other stuff on our plate, too.

hmmm, I moved from downstairs to upstairs and didn't tell this thread! the horror! we moved a year ago, and had a month before moving in to paint everything, which was awesome. On the weekend, we sanded, primed and painted our living room table from green to black to match the bookcases I linked to upthread!

painted table! we are going to buy a piece of glass to go on top, and probably put pictures between the table & glass. probably will encourage friends to leave behind ticket stubs, etc. I also have a few hundred I could stick under there 0_o
http://s3.amazonaws.com/imgly_production/1929676/large.jpg

corner of living room - there are those bookshelves!
ALSO: when painting, be SURE the grey paint you selected is not a very deceptive green because it will look so weird in your apartment if every other wall is a shade of blue! ;_; tell guests that your husband picked it (but only when out of earshot, as he warned you the grey swatch wasn't right and you said 'grey is grey')
https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/310084_10150302778433578_516053577_8022629_5602951_n.jpg

I also found a badass dresser on the side of the road and am using it as a sideboard in my dining room to store all the platters etc that we received as wedding presents. People like to give platters! I probably got 20 or so, many handmade and ceramic, a few plastic, tin, etc. It's crazy. Platter party!!
http://s3.amazonaws.com/imgly_production/1930472/large.jpg

I need a better solution for my bird cage. Who wants to come mount it from the ceiling? Laurel? Bueller??

oh man, weathered cedar shingles are the best thing ever. i want a cedar-shingled geodesic dome, even. xps

this side of the room is cooler

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-I7KNk9MioUc/Tlj7VsFKBqI/AAAAAAABJZo/-2A56dtgD7k/IMG_9457.JPG

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/308453_10150308567103578_516053577_8076647_6547776_n.jpg

not so sure about the picture frame on the right but I wanted to get pictures up on the wall before the photographer came to shoot the boys getting ready (as above) for our wedding :P

I was recently in a vacation spot with a lot of cedar-shingled houses and cottages and with it's combined with white batten-boards and white window and door frames, it is pretty much the cutest, freshest look going. If you can get another however-many years out of your existing shingles with just repainting, though, yeah I mean there's no rush to sell, right?

I feel like color issues depend more on the style of the rest of the house, its era, the surroundings. Can you gis for a similar building?