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How To Paint Striped Drapes (a no-sew)

by on February 26, 2012

I found these Ballard Design striped drapes on Pinterest that would work perfectly for my client’s living room makeover. They are no longer available through Ballard  but the look was just the inspiration I needed.

(Source: Ballard Designs via Remodelaholic)

Remodelaholic knocked off these drapes using ribbon, but painting is easier for me so I decided to give it a try.

I started with two cream-colored painter’s drop cloths sized 6′x9′ from Lowe’s ($14.00 apiece), that were first washed, dried and ironed. (Make sure to get matching drop cloths. In this case they each had one vertical seam down the middle.)

I laid out the drop cloth on my kitchen island after everyone had gone to sleep so I could work in peace more quickly.

Since the bottom of these drop cloths aren’t exactly straight, I had to create a straight line across the bottom where I wanted my first stripe to begin. I began my first line at 8″ up from the bottom, accounting for the crookedness of the actual fabric.

I knew that I wanted four stripes like the Ballard drapes, but that I also wanted the entire striped portion to take up 1/3 of the total drape height. So I measured my stripes to be 3″ wide each with 3″ between them.

Then I could finally begin rolling on the paint. This is a flat latex wall paint that we chose to match the client’s chocolate brown sofa. I used a Sherwin-Williams 6″ mini roller …the same one I use for painting walls for a nice smooth finish.

It took two coats of paint to get the stripes absorbed evenly. I kept newspaper underneath the fabric so it wouldn’t bleed through to the countertop.

Immediately after the second coat, and while the paint was still wet, I peeled off the painter tape. The lines weren’t perfect, but they were pretty darn close.

The first panel took me 3 hours but the second panel went a little faster…about 2 hours total.

The paint dries a little crispy but once hung, the fabric drapes pretty well. You can train the canvas with clothespins to fold in specific places if you wish.


Here’s the final product.

Whatcha think? Here’s Ballard’s $180 version ($90 per panel):

And here’s our painted version.

Since I already had the paint roller, it only cost $15 for the quart of paint + $28 for drop cloths ($14 apiece).

Total = $43.

More importantly, Becki loves them in her newly transformed living room. I will be posting more about her makeover soon!

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Family Room Makeover

by on January 10, 2012

Our house has a “Bonus Room,” which is North Carolina’s term for an extra finished room upstairs that doesn’t have a closet so it doesn’t qualify as a bedroom. (I’d never heard the word until I moved here.)

Anyway, our bonus room is the family hangout space, and this is how it’s been looking for awhile as we try to decide what to do with it.

An office? A TV room? Yoga room? Kennel? (For the record, Lundy the Lab loves his crate. The door stays open and yet he always wants to “cave out” in there.)

My husband did enormous amounts of behind-the-scenes work to lay a new floor, install new baseboards, fix electrical wiring and bury the cords for the surround system. (Long story but the previous owner didn’t have this room built to code. UGH.)

Can you believe I married him BEFORE I knew he had mad skills?  LUCKY, that’s what.

So, this became my inspiration photo for the color palette. It is Tobi Fairley’s creation of a sitting area within a master bedroom.

(Sidebar: If you want color inspiration and a solid education on good design technique, you must MUST visit Tobi’s blog. Hers is one of the few blogs that I read. every. single. day.)

Anyway, I fell in love with her tangerine orange and light blue color combo. Alas, I couldn’t afford her oversized houndstooth fabric which I am APE for, nor could I find funky end tables like hers anywhere close to my budget.

I wanted our family hang room to be airy, cheery and comfortable…where cottage charm mates with modern. I also wanted to use as many “old” things as possible so the room didn’t look purchased out of some catalog.

So, here’s the before:

And here’s the after:

The room color is Sherwin Williams’ Blue Horizon in flat–a nice breezy pale blue. Best of all, the toile pillow in the middle was handmade by my very talented and dear dear friend Shelley Williams whom I have loved since the day we met in the 6th grade. It is the focal point for the room and ties together the blue walls, tan carpet and white sofa all in one gorgeous piece. I love its traditional look set up against the funky dimensional tangerine pillows ($12 at Homegoods). I’m so happy to have this little piece of my sweet friend here in my hang room. :-)

Here’s the TV wall before:

The TV wall after:

The window wall before:

The window wall after:

Check out the How-To for my custom drapes.

The white sofa end tables are the $14.99 dorm room-type tables from Target. I’m still deciding whether or not to spray them tangerine.

Since the tables were too low, I used a set of books to heighten them and I love the comfortable homey-ness of the look. The black and white Ouzo bottle we brought back from Greece, and it remains one of my favorite things to this day. Its design is retro and modern at the same time. Here’s the table on the left:

And here’s the table on the right:

In my imagination, that clock has been passed down for generations in our family and now holds the place of honor on my new end table. In reality, I bought it at Homegoods last week for $15.The blue and white gingham baskets beneath used to be in Little Guy’s nursery.

The lamps were my splurge at $50 apiece (also Homegoods), but they make JUST the statement I was looking for.

Another before:

And after:

The room feels at least 50% bigger.

You can see that our door trim isn’t quite finished, but I’ll post about it soon. I have plans for the wall above the blue chair too

Remember the ribbons on my Christmas tree? I knew I’d find a home for them…

And let’s be really clear. While this room was in progress, HERE is what the rest of my house looked like:

Feel better?

Let me tell you…potty training a toddler is some KIND of fun when you can’t even find a path to the bathroom!

Okay, back to the pictures that don’t make me crazy. Ahhh….

Yes, a coffee table or ottoman will come in time. For now, this is one of my favorite before and after projects.

I would love to see your blue and orange decor combos!

 

 

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DIY Custom Drapes

by on December 29, 2011

We’re in the middle of a room makeover and not quite ready for the big reveal, but in the meantime I want to share this cheap and easy way to create your own custom window panels.

I saw these on Etsy and loved them, but I couldn’t swing the $115 pricetag.

I decided instead to make my own with $3.00 fabric paint and a $5.00 damask stencil.

I started with this pair of $30 panels from Target:

After ironing the panels, I laid each one out and began working the stencil.

I only wanted to cover the bottom third of each panel.

The first panel took about 2.5 hours, but by the second I’d gotten the hang of it and it only took about 1.75 hours.

Here’s the finished piece!

More to come on this thrifty room makeover!

 

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Tree Branch Dresser Makeover

by on November 7, 2011

It all started with this lovely $499 Bird Chest from HomeDecoratorsCollection.

After seeing it, I began hawking Craigslist for a dresser with similar curves and features, finally landing on this:

It was $90 which is more than I would typically pay, but I needed just the right shape and structure in order to make this work.

First up was removing the knobs and applying several coats of off-white paint.

I switched out the hardware for something more feminine and modern (about $50 total), and then my amazingly talented neighbor Diana brought her free-hand painting skills to create the trees and branches.

I am in LUUV with the finished piece.

You can see that the trees even extend onto the top of the dresser and then subtly fade out.

Here’s the side-by-side before and after comparison.

This piece was for my sweet friend Denielle, designer of The Soulful House website and owner of Green Mango Studio. (Check out the site. Really beautiful stuff!)

Okay last time. (I’m nuts for the before-and-afters.) Here’s the $499 piece:

And here’s my $140 look alike.

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