PROgress for the sake of Living Room PROgress

Tweet this!

Does anyone remember the scene in Harry Potter 5 when EVIL Dolores Umbridge says "PROgress for the sake of PROgress MUST be discouraged?" Well, ever since then, the word PROgress has been pronounced with a very dominant "PRO" in my household. And by that, I mean just me.

Anyway, I'm sorry to break the spell yesterday's naked apartment tour cast on you (I know, you're in love. It shouldn't have taken its clothes off on the first date. Bad apartment. Bad). But, the apartment decided to get a little more dressed up. Well, some of it, at least.

Disclaimer: This is by no means finished. It's PROGRESS. So keep posted for the decor - because I just spent my life savings on Etsy. And by life savings I mean not really. But still a lot. The mail room delivery people are starting to hate me, I can feel it.

<--- Enter the Living Room!

As anyone who's ever moved can tell you (so... almost everyone?), the simple act of adding furniture can make an apartment feel much less nude. We brought in our new couch (in gray, on the left), which I'm sort of obsessed with still. 

I'll take more images to highlight why exactly I'm in love with a couch. But in short: Clean lines, retro feel, and those legs! Ha.

Sidenote: Yes, that would be me watching Avatar on my first night in the new apartment. It's just so pretty!

You may also notice the black futon from the old apartment. It seems to play well with the new couch, too. They both have tufting in the seats and a similar era feel with clean lines.

By the morning after furniture placement, we were semi cleaned up. We decided to swap the gray pillows from the couch to the futon to tie the corner together a bit better.

This retro side table was already at Justin's old place. It wasn't getting much glory there, because there wasn't a purpose for it, but here, it fits purrrrfectly.

To top it off? For now, a few funny comic books, A Book of Luminous Things (Poetry from my Uncle Toby on my birthday), and a random stick I painted bright colors.

See that TV? Yea, it's special. That was my first big girl purchase after getting my first big girl job. It's been sitting in my bedroom at my parents' house ever since (because the Wicker Park apartment was so small that an oversized TV would have made it impossible to breathe).

And this wonderful credenza is also a wonderfully special piece. It was my first huge furniture purchase. After perusing Craigslist for weeks, I finally stumbled upon Department Chicago. It's run by a young couple that finds old pieces (mostly mid century modern from what I've seen on their site) and fixes them up (cleans them and makes sure they're in working order) to sell. So, this is a true 1950s piece of furniture. Most 1950s credenzas are going online for $1,000-2,000, but we snagged this for the upper $400s. Thanks to Department Chicago for getting us such a great value.

Stay tuned for the rest of the apartment!

Wicker Park Apartment Re-Vamp

Tweet this!

What do you do with 220 square feet?

Location: Wicker Park

Size: 220 Sq ft living/dining room (750 Sq ft total)

Post-makeover, the apartment now balances geometric attributes, combining the crisp, straight lines of Aaron Blackall's artwork with the bold curvature of Herman Miller's Setu Lounge Chairs.  When I said balanced, however, I meant it; this combination would not be effective without tidiness and organization. When it came to knick-knacks and accents, we tried to take a second to really evaluate each piece and ask, Do I really love this, or is it just crowding the space?

 


Another strength in this apartment is the boldness of color.  If Roy G. Biv were a real man, he would be mighty proud of us.  Around the table, the presence of color owes its dues to the bright red color of the Eames Shell chairs and the variety of vivid colors used in Aaron Blackall’s artwork. To pull color into the front of the room, we used the bookshelves.  When randomly spread throughout such a tall bookshelf, the color of the books could have easily been missed. To avoid this, we grouped books by color, allowing the purpose and organization to be obvious and eye catching.

Challenges: This space is crooked. Check out the image taken of the front door with tall shelving on either side and you’ll see what I mean.  It’s hard to create a clean-looking space without having clean, straight lines to work with. In the end, a few wedges to slightly prop up furniture were just about all we could to do solve the problem.

Room for Improvement: We focused on the main body of the apartment, leaving the kitchen area and bedroom in need of a bit of TLC.  While thrifting for the colored glass bottles, we came across a beautiful spice rack that will be going up shortly and will likely inspire a whole host of kitchen re-vamp brainstorming sessions. We’ll also be installing an Ace Hardware-inspired colorful coat rack shortly. As far as the rest of the space goes… well, I guess the wave of inspiration is on its way. :)

Before And [Happily Ever] Afters:

Before: 

See how the widest piece of furniture in the room, the kitchen table, is taking up space in the narrowest part of the room? Not very conducive to the traffic of life, is it? The initial inspiration for this entire project came from the need to move this table. It was, at first, placed here in order to accommodate the ceiling light fixture and fan, but, at the end of the day, when you've got a ceiling fan in the middle of a tiny room, it's just not worth ruining the floor space in order to keep things semi-centered. 

After:

We ended up moving the table into the back corner, where it's out of the way and frees up a lot of walking space. Its old "home" is now filled by a sitting area that allows for easily movable lounge chairs and makes the space feel more fluid.

Before:

Ah! So messy.

Also, please note the lack of legitimate, lounge-able furniture. How's a girl to sit back and... do whatever people do when they... relax?

After:

Ladies and Gentleman, meet Herman Miller's Setu Lounge Chairs.

Before:

Thumbs up for the Eames Table with Round Top and Segmented Base.

The chairs, while obviously functional, were ten years and a civic center banquet old. 

After:

Along with moving the table into a more functional space, we added red Eames Shell chairs with wire bases in a color that pops out of one of the focal art pieces in the room (Artwork by Aaron Blackall via Unwithered).  

Before:

C-l-u-t-t-e-r. Disorganization. Last but certainly not least, a visible, open air, college dorm style "pantry" like means of shelving food.

After:

The bookshelves? I'm in love with them. Why, you ask? Because Justin organized the books by blocks of color. To the right of the door, oatmeal and bread and bags of brown sugar are no longer out to play. Instead, we swapped the furniture around to place these enclosed cabinets next to the kitchen. The swapping of furniture also lead to a more efficient stacking plan (the furniture was in stackable segments), which helps add more height on both sides of the door, making the space feel "higher" and larger while also freeing up floor space.

Want the rest of the tour?

Instead of a Christmas tree (we toyed around with it but ditched it in favor of this gem), we ended up with these metallic branches in thrifted colored glass vases. Adding a handful of baby red ornaments helped legitimize the desire to go alternative when it came to Christmas decor.  Check out this post for a tutorial to make your own.