department of the interior: home decor

if you're 80% rugs and there's no significant damage to any of the flooring, and you're on the fence about it in the first place then I would leave them as is

the only reason we did our floors is because the floors were stained with dog pee and all kinds of stuff from the previous owners, and it was kind of a headache

Just to be clear, we're doing the floors regardless -- some of them are in horrible shape, some of them have stains, and some are under disgusting filthy carpet and we're guessing they don't look great. It's just a matter of whether we do them with stain (color) or without (just polyurethane). The floor in the living room happens to look ok, although it has a lot of discoloration that doesn't show in the photos.

You're stripping them and refinishing? Pick a color you like. Nothing wrong with the natural oak but something darker (browns and/or greys) looks more modern and tends to contrast better with modern furniture/decor.

We have natural oak hardwood floors (found them that way in good condition and left them alone) and I'm vaguely sick of them, don't match anything else we've done with the place.

In general I have a hunch that when people say "modern" they mean like, in this 5 year period and not for the longer term. Dark floors, are those still "a thing" or are we over them yet?

i like this dude's wood floor

http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/09/11/david-karp-is-tumblrs-reluctant-technologist/?_r=0

I think I'm just gonna go no stain since (1) saves money by not paying extra for stain (2) saves time, which saves me more money by being able to move earlier and not risking getting hit up for a month of holdover rent and (3) seems like a crapshoot how it will come out either way, and I've seen plenty of pictures of natural floors where I like the look

I really dig those floors where the wood is of strikingly different tones

oh and also because we're doing a lot of area rug coverage due to toddler running around and making noise and co-op rules

If you're stripping the floors anyway, I don't know that staining would add that much time or expense. Probably only adds one day to the project (which is multi-day anyway, you need multiple coats of poly and time for each one to dry).

If you don't like the overused modern cliches of chestnut and espresso, you could try a grey or even a whitewash, which would give you more of a natural feel without recreating the traditional honey oak color you're sanding off in the first place. That would also help highlight/reveal any variations in the wood color or grain, something like this: http://glittersparkleluxe.blogspot.ca/2013/04/white-wash-stain-and-pickled-wood-floors.html

Can't wait to own a home one day. One thing is certain, it will never be too stuffy or warm and always have blankets should anyone feel too cold, which is more likely. Why is it always hot at everyone else's house?

Welp, turns out we're not staining -- flooring guy says he doesn't really recommend most of the water-based products for floor staining and things we won't be happy with the result. So we're just doing a semi-gloss poly. I think it will turn out fine.

fwiw if I ever get to do new floors, I really love wide plank with reddish hues

so this is the EIK now

http://imgur.com/q80FbJV

Basically happy with it. It looks a little less orangey in person. Two things I sort of wish I did differently: (1) the rail looks like super-super white, so I wish I either didn't do it in semi-gloss or did it in a more muted white. (2) The adjoining room is grey. The grey looks awesome, but it kind of doesn't "flow" with the orangey colors, so they become more jarring from the other room.

We have a red rug that we may put in the adjoining room, so that might help it "transition" or whatever.

There's one other thing that's driving me crazy, which is that we did our bedroom in "misty gray" and I swear to god I can't see the difference between the color and the white on the trim.

sry
http://i.imgur.com/q80FbJV.jpg

Wow, that is very yellow. Re the white rail, I think you'll find once there are furnishings and some other colors of stuff in there, it won't come forward as much.

On the whole, a cheerful room!

Yeah it's the photo, it looks WAY less yellowy/orangey in person. Also the bulbs have a yellowy light so we can always change them.

Stopped by tonight and saw the whole place with bare sanded but unfinished floors. Man it looked so much nicer already.

http://imgur.com/ICM5LA1

So this is a better pic of the paint colors as well as the finished floor, which looks a little more rough than I though it would but I'm pretty happy with it overall.

http://i.imgur.com/ICM5LA1.jpg

Mmm nice floors. Looks very natural, lots of variety in the grain, not a honeyed glaze at all.

yeah the floors under the carpet were better than I expected too. The only unfortunate thing is that there were TONS of staple holes. Area rugs will probably mask most of that.

Sooooo, we kind of hate the EIK colors as it turns out. May wind up repainting it something more neutral.

lol

Apartment websites love to tell you to get all your painting done, shelves hung, etc before you move in. I always wonder what universe they live in that this is even an option, first of all, given the pace of the rental market and the necessity of moving in and out of places on the same day or paying double, and then second I always have to live in a room for a while before I know what it needs. Have to see the light, see how I tend to use the space, etc. Maybe real designers can look at a place and apply their acquired knowledge on the spot, but I can't.

what you need is more orange

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_vlwtUxWWMlU/Sf5uRF9YcTI/AAAAAAAAA8I/PDdO66xHVzg/s1600-h/orangecoral.jpg

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_vlwtUxWWMlU/Sf5uRF9YcTI/AAAAAAAAA8I/PDdO66xHVzg/s1600-h/orangecoral.jpg

ah fuck it

in other news i got a stussy doormat

http://i0.wp.com/hypebeast.com/image/2013/05/stussy-livin-general-store-welcome-large-mat-1.jpg

radical

good adjective for it ;-)

Apartment websites love to tell you to get all your painting done, shelves hung, etc before you move in. I always wonder what universe they live in that this is even an option, first of all, given the pace of the rental market and the necessity of moving in and out of places on the same day or paying double, and then second I always have to live in a room for a while before I know what it needs. Have to see the light, see how I tend to use the space, etc. Maybe real designers can look at a place and apply their acquired knowledge on the spot, but I can't.

― Tottenham Heelspur (in orbit), Thursday, 5 December 2013 23:23 (Yesterday) Permalink

This is all true, in terms of how best to make decisions, but in terms of practicality, especially with a toddler, it's 10x easier to just have everything done in a span of a couple of weeks when the apartment is empty and you don't live there. But it's scary because you're spending more money than you've ever spent in your life, and you have to make a bunch of decisions at once, even if you're not fully renovating -- how/whether to refinish the floors, colors to paint, even small things like do you want a dimmer switch in this room, do you want olde-fashioned or decora switches, what kind of blinds/shades do you want to put up, rugs (co-op so floor has to be heavily covered), rug PADS, etc. Also buying makes you feel a little more invested in how it looks. Current apartment we didn't even think about painting, just fuck it lets keep the off white for whatever 12-24 month period we will probably live here (which was true).

I just spent more on a rug than I think I've ever spent on any furnishing -- every single piece of furniture we own is either craigslist or hand-me-down with the exception of a gift couch (although you wouldn't know it from our awesome taste, ha). But I wanted a friggin huge rug for the bedroom to make sure sound isn't a problem with the downstairs neighbor and the co-op board, and I guess I wanted it to be nice.

I think part of the problem is I just don't like that EIK space that much -- If we have the money down the road, I might want to just partially open it up so it's not all symmetrical and cute

dropping some $$ on a rug you love is worth it. we bought a beautiful wool rug when we first bought our house and I still look at it occasionally and go, yep that's an awesome rug...it was crazily discounted to like 80% off the original price and it was still more than I'd ever paid for a piece of home furnishing, lol

We had like two months to work on the house before we moved in and it was awesome and awful and it taught me that even though I am mostly capable at doing home repairs I really don't like it all that much. We ran out of time to redo the floors before moving in which is my biggest regret as having to move all our shit into the kitchen, bathroom, and garage for a week would be a huge pain.

We also painted our bedroom a blue that was much too dark, then a nice tan color that turned out to look much more old lady rose color on the walls before getting it right.

I've just replaced all our crappy living room furniture with stuff that's more open but now I need to find some nice forms of storage - mixed sized boxes, some lids necessary. I've got a few places to check out this weekend but if anyone can suggest some good stores who might sell this kind of thing, that would be awesome.

(No wicker or cane unless it's particularly unusual or vintage)

almost done with my bathroom remodel, pictures forthcoming!

it now has hexagon white porcelain floor tile, white subway tile up the wall (one wall to be finished) and I'm prob buying a new vanity/sink soon

oh yeah, and PAINT

Have been repairing our couch over the past couple of days. Not sure how it's going to turn out
The couch is cheap, a few years old. It's a recliner, some parts leather, mostly vinyl (like I said, cheap). Anyway part of the vinyl on one of the footrests has worn down and has a tear in it about an inch long. I toyed with the idea of sewing it, but I'm not a great hand stitcher and it could end up looking like a horrific frankenstein scar so I went and googled around for repair kits instead. The one I got is for cars - it allows you to fill and paint the tear, rather than just patching over it.

You get backing fabric that you can poke inside the tear, then you apply adhesive to the backing and the tear and glue it all together. Then you fill whatever gaps with more adhesive, which dries hard and smooth. You can do that a few times til you've got it filled to your satisfaction, and then you paint it and then heat-cure it.

I'm still on the filling stage. A bit concerned about the heat-treating stage...some reviews say that part doesn't work right, that the tool they provide is garbage but we'll see.

Funniest thing to me is half the instructions are solely devoted to mixing colors ie "BLUE and YELLOW make GREEN, BLACK makes colors DARKER, WHITE will make colors LIGHTER'

luckily I don't have to go down that road, my couch is black :D

Feeling pretty pleased with the way the new living room is shaping up

http://i.imgur.com/1xQzP5t.jpg

Couch looks much nicer without sheet draped over it, but you know, toddlers.

neat! that looks really cozy!

i want to post pics of my living room - it's the most "nested" and content with a space that i've been. It's 99% there, just a little more art to hang, and one piece of furniture on the way. oh man, PLANTS - they've made a big difference. except i'm having trouble keeping some of them alive :/

I dislike when furniture is lined up against the walls and prefer conversational groupings that use more of the inner floor space, but again, toddlers.

I hear you. We tend to move things when we have people over.

I kind of like the way these modular orange shelves have become a mainstay for us, like we'll probably just keep reassembling them and shifting them around as needed and never throw them away (could eventually go in kids room e.g.).

The light coming in the window looks beautiful tho. Bright rooms speak to me.

All right I'm back!! I'm in a new space and I have to pull together a living room and a bedroom this time.

Both are currently dirty white, so they need repainting even if it's just "white" again.

What to do what to do.

I'm not really into the "purity IS my statement" of all-white, but the room faces north and there's a tall building across the st that blocks some light, so I want to keep it as airy as possible. It just seems like such a waste not to use ANY color. Maybe I can get a very vividly colored sofa/rugs later on?

it doesn't have to mean purity