Live Breathe Decor

After writing my post last night on feeling inspired by colour and wanting to get cracking on my little home office project, I decided I couldn’t wait any longer! I spent the next few hours clearing out the teeny-tiny room that was housing our linen and all my husband’s clothes (now I have to find a new place for them in our storage-starved house- but that’s a topic for another post!), and by night’s end I had set up a temporary office arrangement using an old pine bookshelf and our little antique silky-oak desk that I was storing in the shed for when the kids are older.

Not exactly an inspiring work space is it? Especially when your work is colour and fabric and beautiful rooms! Something must be done here. And yes, that’s a fabric sample hanging on the little window as my temporary curtain - so sad, I know. So here’s my plan: first, new paint. The wall colour (Dulux Stowe White) is way too creamy and warm in here, and makes the room feel smaller and boring. Plus, I am going for bright punchy colour and this wall colour isn’t the right backdrop. At first I thought I’d paint it black, but I think now I’ll go with my favourite of all favourites, grey. This room gets full western sun in the afternoon so I want a cool grey.

The next thing will be new furniture. Because this room was at some stage in our house’s history a little tack-on (that one day we will rebuild), the walls are not sturdy enough to mount any shelving on them. So I plan to hit Ikea with the Lack bookcase in mind, which I will use both next to the desk and behind the chair.

timothy whalen

bryn alexandra

I’d also like to pick up a very simple and fairly small plain white desk at Ikea. So, next thing is my chair. I have a pair of these that I have been meaning to recover ever since I bought them a few years ago.

In the past I have really enjoyed their wood finish but it’s time for a change. I’m going to paint one of them white to match all the white furniture and then recover it in something bright and fun. I hit the nearest fabric shop this afternoon and came across this:

It’s colourful but still incorporates grey to tie in with the walls, has a bit of a sheen to it and, best of all, has a great geometric pattern. Love it!

As a sidenote, while I was there I also picked up some brown and white greek key fabric. I used to have some of this exact fabric but I gave it away and always thought of it afterwards a little wistfully. And here it was, end of line and reduced to $6 a metre! Not sure yet where or when I’ll use it, but it was meant to be.

But back to my office, I picked up this hot pink fabric to make a blind for the little window. It has a backing which will keep that sun out in summer.

Next was trim: I got this grey grosgrain for a detail on the pink blind.

After the fabric store I went to Freedom on an unrelated mission and found these on their sale table: two large perspex storage canisters, and a bulk lot of 12 silver picture frames. These will look great on my office wall and will tie in nicely with the grey/silver in the chair fabric. I love a bargain!

Last stop today was the $2 shop, where I found a whole bunch of white cardboard storage boxes in different sizes (to put on my white Lack bookshelves when I have them!). I love these places that import cheap stuff from China - granted a lot of it is junk, but you really never know when you will find something that you can use and that will look great.

Soo, next up is a lamp that will fit on my teeny desk!