I did a little shopping around my house to give my new wall unit a little style.
I don't really think accessories are my strong suit. One of my favorite parts of my old job was photo styling—especially rooms—but for some reason I struggle with styling my own house. But I'm trying to channel that old photo-styling mind set while also trying to keep the decorating meaningful. I don't like to just have a lot of "stuff" lying around. This time I'm happy with the end result. What do you think?
Here is a closer look at what I found lying around my house:
My Grandma's old Polaroid camera that I found tucked away in a closet. I actually checked these out on eBay to see what it was worth. Turns out everyone had one and they aren't worth 10 bucks. Oh well, it looks cool and it reminds me of my Grandma and her penchant for photography.
A desconstructed typewriter print that I purchased from 20 x 200. Tom doesn't get it but I find it fascinating and love the graphic look of it. Plus it goes awesome next to the vintage typewriter I bought from our family auction.
Some old photographs of my Grandpa and Grandma that were tucked away in the bookshelf we removed. I displayed the photo book I made of Tom's Grandma Elva. If I ever get around to making more photo books like I would like to, this is a great place to display them and entice people to pick them up and look at them. Don't you think?
My dad bought a bookshelf full of Reader's Digest books in our family auction. He didn't have a place in mind for them—he just liked them—so they have been boxed up in our storage room until now. The patterns on the covers are really fun, so I decided to display a few purely for cosmetic reasons.
My random chair collection has always felt a bit disjointed before, but I actually really like them all displayed here together.
My little Target acrylic lamp was an impulse buy but has always been a bit of an orphan. I never had the perfect place for it. I like how it ties into the glass hourglasses here.
Finally, a stack of Pottery Barn design books needed a home. I removed all the dust jackets for a unified look.
The whole living room feels much more put together now, even though there are many more projects to do.
This wall is next:
I had a console table there before:
Removing the console table (I'm hoping to unload it on Craig's List for a few bucks) allowed me to open up the furniture layout in the room, which was great. It does leave a large blank wall, however, and it feels a little empty after getting used to having furniture there.
I have other plans for the photo hanging on this wall. Not that I don't love it. I would love it anywhere. But I have a place better suited for it. On this wall I plan to hang my gallery wall of family photos. I may purchase more frames to fill this wall even more. I'm hoping just the weight of the frames will balance out this room without actually having furniture against this wall.
Now to strip more wallpaper. (It isn't as intimidating now that I've done one wall!) And of course paint. But I don't want to go to crazy painting more walls until we are able to scrape the popcorn off of the ceiling, texture it, and paint it. I'm not quite sure when that will happen, so don't expect any photos of this project too soon.
After the room is painted we will replace all of the baseboards to match our basement (most of them are missing anyway where the heat registers were removed), replace the sconces (not my style!), and change the window treatments. The flooring will be replaced eventually also.
And . . . whoa. I'll stop there before I get ahead of myself. At least I have one wall going in the right direction!