Thursday, June 30, 2011

Min's Room Makeover

I just started unpacking Min's closet last night and sorting her various articles of clothing into different storage bins. This may take a while, that girl has a ton of clothes! Anyway, I figured this would be a good time to begin posting about her room makeover. Since I'm doing this in real time, don't expect daily updates. It's going to take a week to clean out the room, another half a week for the sanding and painting and another few days to get everything back in the room, but I will post as I go along.

Okay, let me preface this post with this picture. This is the closest visual example I could find on-line to explain the look I'm planning to do in Min's bedroom makeover. As simple as possible, pale walls, wood floors with pops of color in the furnishings. In more detail, I'm going for a Swedish folk look. Traditional Swedish farm houses would have pale walls to reflect light because the winters are so long and dark up there. They would also add pops of vivid colors to make the pale rooms cheerier. Notice the little red stand on the far left. I found a white stand very similar to that, that I will paint red.

That said, I think I mentioned in an earlier post that this pillow I found in IKEA started all this. I could not walk away from it and I was especially attracted to the red color in it. I immediately began envisioning re-doing Min's room with bold reds. The modern slant on the traditional bed ticking on the back of the pillow also inspired me. I wanted to bring in elements from a 1920s-30s farm house and use traditional ticking in the bedsheets and embroidered and crocheted blankets.

Here's an example of the ticking I'm referring to. For those of you who can remember, or if you've seen it in movies, old mattresses and pillows used to be done in blue/cream colored ticking stripes. Since I wanted to use that in the bedroom, I began searching for just the right sheets last year. I started early because the blue ticking is easy to find and still in use in a lot of bedding today. I of course, having to be different, wanted red stripe ticking. I found just a few examples on-line and they were all _very_ expensive. Also being the cheapskate I am, I had no intention of paying that much. So for at least 6 months I searched on-line and in every store I went into. No luck. I was either going to have to fork over the big bucks (over $100 for a set of sheets) or alter my design. I chose to alter the design and go with solid red sheets from K-Mart on sale. They were horribly thin and wouldn't do.

Then, after I'd given up hope of finding red striped ticking within my budget, I visited a local buyout store we have here, Ollie's. Here I finally found a close approximation of the type of sheets I was looking for, for around $20, and they're actually very nice quality sheets. Yes! Success!

So I decided on Swedish folk for the room. Min already had a traditional Swedish Dala horse in her bedroom for me to pull other ideas in. I like the colors painted on the horse and did research on Swedish Kurbit flowers to incorporate them into the design as well.

Here's an example of the Swedish Kurbit flower. This screams Swedish Folk, but it's also a VERY bold statement and could too easily take over a room and make it kitschy. So I've decided to keep this to a minimum. I will only have two examples of this in the room.




The first example will be on a small wooden bookcase that I will paint red and have Kurbit flowers going up the side, and the second example will be around the heart in this blanket rack. I will paint the rack red, and the Kurbit design will lend itself to wrapping around the heart cutout.














Speaking of red furniture. I knew I needed to find a small bedside end table, but it needed to be period accurate, you know, older in style, not modern. I went looking for that as well. I found this at the local K-Mart, but it was nearly $160. Besides refusing to spend that much money on a little end table, I also planned to paint it. No way was I going to drop that kind of money on something I was going to slap paint on!



Then, like magic, Voila! The redecorating gods and the yard sale gods got together on my behalf and presented me with this perfect table for $3. Can you say BARGAIN?! So obviously, this is going to be painted a vivid true red, and I plan to remove the wooden drawer pull and replace it with a glass drawer pull.













Here's an example of the drawer pull. Remember the glass door knobs in old houses? This knob is reminiscent of that. I'm also planning to remove all the wooden knobs and drawer pulls on Min's built-in cabinets and replacing all of them with glass knobs as well. Oh, so I guess this is a good place in my descriptions to actually show you pictures of Min's room "before" so you can see what I'm talking about.


This is your first view of Min's room as you approach. You immediately see the side of the ceiling-to-floor built-in cabinets, along with her collection of license plates.



















As you walk in the bedroom door, you're immediately confronted with the full-sized bed that takes up most of the room. I don't like the placement of the bed like this because it interrupts the flow of the room as you walk in and it dominates the room. I plan to move the bed over into the far corner up against the wall to free up more floor space. We couldn't do this previously because of a wicker desk we had in that corner that I've since given away.










This is some of what remains in that far corner, Breyer horse statues, horse tack, trophies, and ribbons, along with supplies for the room makeover and tons of books I moved out of the office and don't have a place for just yet.


This is going over to that far wall and looking back. Obviously this is a very small room, but it looks smaller because the bed is in the middle of it all. Notice the wall colors in the room, the blue on the bottom and the yellow on the top. I was debating on whether to paint at all because I planned to use blue on the bottom and yellow on the top anyway, then I decided I should re-paint so it will be fresher and cleaner, plus I plan to go with a much paler blue and a much paler yellow.

Next let's take a look at the built-ins. Min likes them because they look like barn doors and that fits in nicely with the horsey theme of the room. I don't like them because they look like barn doors. I'm going for a farmhouse look, not a barn look. I plan to sand these cabinets down and then white wash them so they will bring a lot more light to the room but you'll still be able to see the wood grain in them.


Take a closer look at these drawers and cabinets. Notice all the colored wooden knobs on there? As I said earlier, I plan to replace all of those with glass knobs. However, since the wood will be whitewashed, I'm worried clear knobs will get lost. I'm thinking of going with either a green depression glass or blue glass so they stand out. Remember the walls will be blue. Which one do you think would look better? I'm leaning toward the green because it's softer and looks more period authentic.























































Oh, and let's not forget the rug, the lovely green rug. Traditional wooden floors with an area rug or throw rug are what goes in a traditional Swedish farmhouse, not matted green rugs.

Not matted, stained green rugs, that got that way because no matter how many times Min was told to clean her saddles and tack outside on the porch, she ended up doing it in her room, thinking we wouldn't smell the oils and soaps and that an oily bottle placed on the rug would never be noticed. Uh-huh. Needless to say, we're ripping out the rug. There are hardwoods underneath.

Lastly, here are some of the pieces I've already got to put in the room. I have a lot more to pick up, but I'm getting there. This is the red afghan I had my mom crochet for the bed.

This is the traditional embroidered quilt I found for the bed.

And here are other assorted objects I picked up for their color value. What do you think?


































































This last item is an IKEA chair I hope to put in the room with a matching ottoman if I have room for it. There's a skinnier, straighter version of it at IKEA, but it doesn't have the look I'm going for; I want it to be a big comfy reading chair that just calls to you to come sit down and get lost in a good book. I'm hoping this will become my new favorite reading spot.

11 comments:

Knock knock - it's cancer! said...

I love the ideas. And I love the clear drawer pulls - that is what is currently in my daughter's bedroom. She loves it.

I also think taking the green rug out is a good idea, lol.

I can't wait to see pictures when you're all done :)

VV said...

So on the wall of cabinets, clear, green or blue drawer pulls? The clear will stand out well on the little red end table, but they might disappear into the whitewashed wall cabinets. What do you think?

nbrsspot.blogspot.com said...

Glad to know I could inspire you to do another post.. LOL.. I love the colors adn I love the afghan your mother made Min. I am using the yarn you gave me to make myself a sweater..I will post it when I am done..

Larena said...

I just bought a green drawer pull to use on the lid of my crock pot. they are so elegant but expensive ! I paid 4 dollars on clearance for this guy! a whole room full would break my bank !
my white knobs in the kitchen (that J loved & I hated) got ferns painted on them when I came home in march. :) concider painting a knob or having a local starving artist do it....or finding a sticker type transfer of part of that swedish pattern on them. clear on white may not be as invisable as you think...
I love seeing how you took your insiprations and build on it from pillow out keep every thing somewhat on theme yet everything will hold its own .... it is going to be a wonderful new reading spot can't wait to come see it in person !
my living room chairs are not that full but I will tell you they are comfy and they recline 2 levels ! but take up a much smaller foot print than a big fluffy chair. I think I have pic on the blog of them I will go look see if I can send you a tag. christmas 2008 has some pics with presents in one and my Mom in another I got them at JCPennys. can't waitto see the finished room wish really I could come help with it.
style is way different, but an idea anyway..

VV said...

Hi Larena, yeah, I've been researching the glass knobs for months too. I found some on-line for about a third of the price of most other places. I'll need 20 of them. Then I'll need 4 doorknobs, I think. For the 2 wardrobe doors I wanted to put on doorknobs with metal plates behind them. Those are ridiculously expensive, but luckily I found small narrow plates and handles cheaper than full-sized knobs, which will look better on these doors anyway. Oh, and watch for a post in the coming days to see what M got me for my birthday. My mom says she spoils me (which is true) but I say, don't I deserve it? :-)

VV said...

Oh, I almost forgot, I have a friend who is a glass blower and I'm going to ask her to do glass pegs to replace the wooden pegs under the shelves on the walls in different shapes and colors if she has time, if not, I'll be buying glass lamp finials and making do. Will you be able to come for a visit and try out the room?

OldLady Of The Hills said...

So...I take it that this is no longer Min's room and will be a room for you to do whatever...Am I wrong? I kept thinking...'How does Min feel about all theee changes that are going to happen in HER room?' If indeed it is no longer her room I can see that you are doing what YOU want and having a ball doing it....lol....!
I LOVE the idea of the Glass Knobs. I've always liked them, especially when I have seen them in the Dentists office---all those wonderful little drawers with Glass Pulls....! The RED will be great!

VV said...

Hi Naomi, yes, this is no longer Min's room, even though she still has most of her stuff in there. We're going on 4 years since she moved away from home, plus I have her blessing for all the changes, with the exception of the red chair. She thinks a wicker chair and cushion would look better. I considered that but haven't found any I liked yet and I won't know until the end which chair I will put in there for certain because it will depend on how much space is in there after everything else is done.

maeve said...

Well, well missy aren't you the interior decorator of the month!!! I actually love all your ideas!! Want to come do my bedroom next!! Good god I don't think I will post before pics of my bedroom!! I ripped off wall paper last year right before I got sick and the room is still is disarray!! I keep on saying THIS MONTH!! BUT first I need to get a new point and shoot camera as I posted on my blog. I THINK I actually found the one I want!! Give me a holler if you come north to visit grandma P!!

VV said...

Marilyn, we're hoping to get up there this Fall, sometime Sept-Oct I think. Will call.

Anora said...

All stuff of your room is very good. Interior room decoration is remarkable..
Tank Top

CK, here’s the tattoo

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