My brother moved to North Carolina a few months ago and rented an apartment there. Between his obsessive cleanliness and the existing white-on-white-on-white color scheme, it looked much like a sterile hospital (his friend's words, not mine). That's really not his style, but he's not one to fix it if it isn't broken. So Mom and I decided that he and I needed a little brother/sister bonding time to make his home a little more homey.
The
Before Pictures:
Luckily, when picking out his furniture, he chose these great chocolate brown leather pieces.
About as bland as it gets.
His bedroom. You can see his desk chair in the right side of the picture and his desk is on the wall opposite his bed. He doesn't have a headboard and although he does have a comforter, it's the one he had in college and it looks like it and he never uses it anyway.
The kitchen. He bought the table set. Quite out of place in an all white kitchen.
When I asked him what he was looking for in terms of style he said he wanted it to look like Barney Stinson's apartment, from How I Met Your Mother. Barney is his idol. I looked it up.
So essentially the complete opposite of what his current apartment looks like. Great.
I took from that that he wanted it to look masculine, rich, uncluttered and mature.
He also added that he wanted a dry bar. Now, that I could do. After looking at probably 20 different styles, we found this bar to inspire us.
He really liked the vintage aspect of it. Like you'd pour yourself a drink before going out to smoke a cigar. It helped solidify a nod towards vintage, big band-esque style for his place.
Then we started rounding up artwork. Again, after looking at lots and lots of options, we found an artist we both liked: B.J.Schonberg.
His stuff looks vintage while pushing the envelope of inappropriate, which makes it perfect for Tim.
Since getting color into his apartment was key, these were the wall colors we chose. (I adore Sherwin Williams paint.)
For the living room:
Naval SW6678
For the kitchen:
Sunflower SW6678
And for the bedroom:
Lime Rickey SW6717
Tim wasn't 100% on aboard with all my color choices at first, but he trusted me enough to move forward.
The
After Pictures:
The navy walls were a bold choice, but I'm glad we did it. Little details make all the difference. It's hard to tell in this photo, but the lamp is supposed to look like an old wooden tripod. It's very cool. With navy and white, the room could very easily have gone in a nautical direction, but the artwork and the accessories, like that lamp, keep it old school vintage.
We mostly just hung artwork on this side of the living room and the shelf could use an accessory or two, but it's a definite improvement. And there's his dry bar, complete with a few bottles of liquor, a bottle of wine and wineglasses. We made several changes to the bar, so I'll fill you in on that... in another post.
I love the color of the kitchen. It's so cheerful. That gameboard is actually from the 40's. I bought it at a vintage store for $12! All the pieces and directions were included, so if he ever wanted to, he could take it down off the wall and learn to play... but I doubt that will happen.
We flipped the bedroom completely around. I'm one of those people who believe that a bed should to be situated opposite the door and it wasn't, so that needed to change stat. We also added a headboard, nightstand and bookcase (you'll see in the next picture) in maple to match his existing desk. Tim chose the bedding, which pleasantly surprised me. We were already planning on painting the bedroom green, but in the picture attached to the comforter, the wall behind the bed was green, so I think that sealed the deal for him. At that point he could visualize how it would all look.
The other corner of the room looks a little bland in comparison, but when you're in the room, it's not such a contrast. We added an IKEA bookcase to store Tim's textbooks and he set up his desk at the foot of his bed again.
And just because I LOVE seeing the before and after pictures together:
Seeing the pictures this way always makes me laugh because with the exception of the bedroom, it almost looks like the before pictures were taken in black and white because there was just NO color.
Although the colors are certainly bold, we kept them to only a few walls so it wouldn't be overwhelming. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out and, more importantly, Tim is too.
No comments:
Post a Comment