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sources: chair: vintage // desk: IKEA // wall cabinets: IKEA // green chevron curtain fabric: Etsy // all other accents & fabric: vintage
The completion of this room has been a long time coming! It's nice to finally be able to share it and to be able to enjoy it in person in a more complete state instead of it being the catch-all-dumping-ground it's been for the past year or so. This room is the tiniest of our three bedrooms (about 120 sq. ft.) and played home to Cooper and Campbell's nursery. Once Campbell outgrew his crib, we decided to let them share a room and this room became their playroom.
It was a big F-A-I-L.
The playroom that is. For some reason, my boys only like to hang out in our living room, or wherever Mommy and Daddy are. ; ) I know that will change one day. It's funny because even in our tiny house you'd think we've sent them to the DUNGEON or something if we ask them to go play in their bedroom. You can literally hear them down the hall. They aren't going to know what to do with themselves when we have a bigger house. It's going to be a learning experience for sure. (I can imagine many an "I'm scared!" if they're on a floor all by themselves, much less a room down the hall. Sigh.)
sources: all accents: vintage unless otherwise noted // needlepoint purse by me: DIY & pattern here // kokeshi pens: Ebay // kawaii stationery items: Yozo Craft // little japanese anime figurine: the mall // butterfly perler bead glass vase "sleeve" made by me
I found the hanging light above on Craigslist and then had the idea to add giant pompoms to it. I've had those poms for a while now and finally attached them to the shade. I don't think I realized just how HUGE they were, but I really, really love the way it looks.
After we realized the "playroom" wasn't going to work out and that the room was essentially being unused, that was the greenlight for me to move all of my crap my "Studio" into the room. (You might recall that my "studio" was a designated corner of our living room.) I was very happy to have all of my girly stuff out of the living room since it's one of the first rooms you see when you walk into the house. Now the boys' large bookshelf occupies that little corner.
I found this hutch on Craigslist and it needed loooots of TLC. For some reason I neglected to notice that the thing WREAKED OF SMOKE. Yikes. I went to town on it with this stuff. And it really worked. I took out the glass in the outer doors and inserted matte board that I cut to size and covered with wallpaper. I store quite a lot of stuff in this hutch, and it started to look messy, so covering two of the doors really helped, and also helped to break up all of that wood color. Eventually I'll replace the knobs and maybe even add some wallpaper in small areas at the bottom. Not sure yet how this hutch will be used when we move one day.
I saw the string ball lights on Oh Happy Day a while back and had to have some, but she bought her's in Paris. So I did some googling and found some on Etsy. At first I was confused because I was like "are these handmade?" and then later on I saw that the shop had been taken down, no doubt because they are mass produced. But i'm sure if you did some Googling you could find some that would ship to the States or elsewhere.
I mentioned these super cool comics that you see here framed on the wall in this post if you're interested. I bought them in this shop and I see that she has more listed! I found the plastic mint colored frames at a dollar store. We took down the original doors to this closet (really disfunctional sliding doors) a long time ago and hung a curtain instead. This is a twin sized vintage sheet. I backed it with a white cotton shower curtain since the sheet was see-through. You can find the "I Play with Dolls" decal that I designed sold in this shop.
Continuing around the room, there's a chest of drawers with my dollhouse sitting on top. I changed out the original knobs last week with some new knobs that I DIYed. I bought the plastic flowers from Land of Nod because they screamed the 60's to me, not really knowing what I wanted to do with them. Then I had a light-bulb moment and adhered them to some hardware store-bought wooden knobs that I spray painted. I had to sand down the knobs first because they were a bit of a rounded surface. I love how they turned out.
Here are some peeks at what I store in this dresser.
And some more peeks inside the dollhouse.
As you move around the room you can see the built-in cabinets around the windows. We were lucky that this room came with these cabinets, but unlucky because of the shoddy doors that covered them. So, out they went and I sewed and hung curtains. They are attached with velcro to the wood. The astrology themed fabric is vintage that I found probably 7 years ago. I was thrilled to finally find a use for it!
The It's a Small World Avon girls will be moving to our bathroom because I finally found the perfect shelf for them to sit on. I store all kinds of junk supplies behind these curtains, but here's a small peek of some fabric. It was about the only spot that didn't look a mess. ; )
Hopefully you can read all of my chicken-scratch on these photos. As you can see, I used curtains to hide lots of unsightly things. The curtain underneath the desk is truly loved. Who wants to see all of those cords?! Mine are a hot mess, too. The scalloped valance hanging at the very top there, is actually hiding another built-in cabinet. This curtain is one of my absolute favorite items that I found for this room. It's vintage from a seller in Sweden and I couldn't believe how perfectly it fit up there.
These original ink drawings have a whole other story to go with them that I've been meaning to tell you for months. Just need to find the time! They were created for a newspaper in New Orleans, LA by an artist that later moved to Atlanta where she died. I found them at the Estate Sale that her family held. I feel quite honored to have these drawings of her's. More on that later.
And last, here are some more close-ups of things sitting on top of the wall cabinets, hanging on the wall and inside the hutch.
As you can see, this room has been a labor of love. It was a kick for me to be able to go all out with everything that I love. Not that I haven't girly-fied the rest of our home just a little, but I didn't have to hold back at all for this room. And I love it. Ethan even likes it! He spends time on that computer, too. (I think he's just glad I finally got rid of all the sh*t crowding the floor. ; )
I think in a lot of ways, this room reflects me in very transparent ways. I like to think of it as what my bedroom might have looked like if I was a teenager living during the '60's. (alas, I wasn't alive then, but came along not too much later, in the '70's) With bright pops of color and bold graphic patterns everywhere. In some ways, yeh, I might be making up for the fact that I don't have a little girl - maybe her room would've looked like this? But let's face it, our kids have opinions and tastes of their own. I'm not sure I would've been so lucky to impose my kookie vintage tastes on her.
At least I have this studio to indulge myself. Thank-you for letting me share it with you!
THANK-YOU for the comments on the pool post! They have been invaluable to my husband and I! The consensus seems to be that they are totally worth it. Not as much money and upkeep as you think. And that is really cool to know. I don't think we'll be getting that house with the pool, in fact we're in the process of looking at another house, sans pool, but you never know! One day we might indulge in a pool. For now we'll have to count on the neighborhood pool. ; )
