The Barneys Chairs

My wildest chair dreams came true! We've been on the hunt for a great pair of vintage chairs to recover for a client and one of my amazing girls, Kayla, stumbled on a listing for a pair of floral chairs and sent it right to me, thinking they'd be fun for the studio. Her Craigslist sleuthing skills are unreal!

Do these chairs look familiar at all? They're custom green floral linen Le Corbusier chairs that I posted a photo of here. Barneys apparently had two made for every store location a couple years ago and now they're changing things up. (Isn't that mannequin hilarious?)

We called on the listing the second Kayla found it and sure enough it was a display person at Barneys that had listed the chairs. She said she'd had a ton of response to the listing and that the price had been bid up. She said the chairs were now $60 each. LOL, right? I was like, "Erm, yeah, that's totally fine."

I drove right over to Barneys and they showed me into a restaurant area on the top floor that had been closed for renovations. The chairs were there, along with a couple of rugs and display cases they were selling (nothing as great as these chairs though).

Honestly, it felt a little fishy at first, being whisked away into a closed section of the store to show me super underpriced Le Corbusier chairs! But they had an invoice from Barneys all ready for me and they ran my credit card instead of asking for cash, so I felt like everything was legit. :)

I still can't believe our luck on this one! I'm SO happy with how these chairs look in the studio. They're just the right size. And they're green floral. And they were $60 - the price of a pair of socks at Barneys! COME ON! It's all too good.

Have you had any major Craigslist scores lately?

Studio Updates and a Holiday Give Away from Poppin

Remember when I got that really beat up desk at Goodwill and made it over? That spurred a whole series of updates to our studio space. We're getting really organized and I think everything looks so clean and pretty now!

I'll be sharing some tutorials soon, but I'm sure a few of you long-time readers will be able to spot a few of the big changes off the bat!

We wanted to both add and take away color from the room. This new inspiration board is probably my favorite colorful addition.

I had a piece of homasote board cut down to fit the wall space between the window and the wall and then (just like in this project) I upholstered it in pale mint linen.

We're also working to streamline our filing system and to declutter our office supplies. I am a big believer in making the every day stuff as pretty as possible, if only to help mundane chores feel exciting. :)

Poppin sent us a few new office supplies this month to help with the makeover. I love everything Poppin makes - and have for a long time! Everything is modern and beautiful, and it all works so well! Their pens are my very favorite (with their all-white scissors being a close second place!).

They also make a new heavier-weight pen (mine's in chrome, below) and it's beautiful. They make it in a really pretty gold too!!

Poppin has generously offered to give away two $100 gift certificates today! Their products make the perfect stocking stuffers or gifts for office mates!

Their new line of metallic notebooks are perfectly classic, but so holiday-worthy!

Entering to win one of the $100 gift certificates is super easy - just visit Poppin's site and browse their beautiful offerings and then leave a comment here. Contest runs for one week and the winner will be selected at random and emailed.

PS Poppin is running a promotion through the 6th, where you get a free tote when you spend $50 or more. Check it out here, and don't forget to enter the give away too by commenting here! Good luck!

DIY: Fabric Decoupaged Office Chair

For our little homework station project, I wanted to find a really inexpensive option for the girls' desk chair. I bought the vintage wood desk at a store called Another Man's Junk here in Phoenix and I love it's simple lines, but I wanted the chair to feel a little more fun and youthful. I poked around online trying to find a cheap upholstered office chair to recover in a pretty fabric when I stumbled on these $20 chairs at IKEA. I thought they would be a good candidate for a decoupage project (this one has really stuck in my brain!).

I pulled out some pretty, lightweight cotton fabric from my stash. I had bought several yards of this gauzy cotton Nani Iro for Kokka Fabrics at Purl Soho for a client project a few years ago. We ended up choosing another fabric, so I kept the yardage and I'm so glad I did! It worked perfectly here.

Before we started with the decoupage, we sprayed the chair legs gold with Design Master's Gold Metal and the chair back with a coral spray paint from Krylon which is supposed to work on plastics (and seems to be doing a good job of holding up).  

I started by brushing on a pretty generous coat of matte Mod Podge on just the front of the chair back. I left the edges of the seat alone for this part and just worried about the front face.

I had figured out the pattern placement and cut out a section of fabric before I started glueing that was several inches bigger than the chair on all sides. I carefully placed the fabric on top of the Mod Podge layer and used my hands to smooth out all the bumps and wrinkles. It takes some work and time, but it's really not all that hard to get a taut, smooth surface with the fabric.

When the upper chair back was smooth, I repeated the same process on the chair seat. Again, I left the edges dry at this point and worried just about the big surfaces.

If you do this project using the same IKEA chair, you'll want to leave just a bit of fabric bunched around the curve of the seat (where the little hole in the back is).

Once the seat and the seat back were all smooth, I trimmed the excess fabric a bit more, just to make things more manageable, and then I brushed Mod Podge onto the face of the edges and started the same process of smoothing.

The corners and curves are really the only tricky part. I cut out some of the extra fabric in a triangle shape until the fabric sat perfectly smooth around the corner edge and then I glued it down with Mod Podge.

A damp cloth really helps smooth everything down and was a big help with the edges especially.

I cut away more fabric for the curve and the hole in the back of the chair before gluing the fabric down. Mod Podge is so easy to work with. It is so forgiving and can be repositioned for a long time.

Once the Mod Podge had dried (about an hour or two later), I ran an X-acto knife down the inside edge of the back. And then I brush on another little bit of Mod Podge along the edge to help seal the fabric and prevent fraying.

Once the whole chair was done and dry, I brushed on two thick coats of satin Polycrylic sealer on top of the fabric. This changed the look and feel of the fabric a bit - it sort of looks like laminated fabric now, or like the chair is made from a textured, printed plastic maybe? But the surface is solid and waterproof and easy to clean now, so I'm cool with it.

Still pretty cute, right? I love how it looks from the back especially, with the pop of coral!

It feels pretty indestructible and my girls love it. Win-win. :)

Copy Cat Design: Raul Martins' Library

Here's the lovely and talented Colleen with our next installment of Copy Cat Design. And it's a good one!

This little library by Raul Martins is chock full of great design ideas, so let's get started!

1. Antique Brass Reed Small Chandelier; Bellacor, $420

Replace the shades on this chandelier with black shades, to repeat the black and gold motif.

2. Clear Crystal Ball with Crystal Stand; Crystal Company, $70

A grouping of crystal balls on a bookshelf looks ever so chic.

3. Steel Commercial Shelving Unit; Home Depot, $65

Look closely and you'll notice these shelves are industrial shelving units, topped with a black marble slab. Such an excellent storage solution!

4. "Studies for a Capital" Framed Poster; All Posters, $100

Framed architectural sketches are so fitting for a library. Botanical diagrams would be lovely too.

5. Solid Marble Obelisk; Wayfair, $67

More intriguing objects for a grouping!

6. Klismos Dining Chair in Chocolate; West Elm, $99

I firmly believe a library shouldn't have too-comfy chairs, otherwise you end up snoozing more than reading. It's for your own good!

7. Penguin Classics Fitzgerald Short Stories; Amazon, $16

A book on which to place an obelisk.

8. Odyssey Dining Table; CB2, $199

You could buy a Tulip Table with a black marble top, but I actually prefer the contrast of the white table.

9. Stone Trellis Wallpaper in White and Beige; Decorators Best, $76.75/roll

Here's another brilliant design trick: the wallpaper pattern mimics the one on the rug, but it's low contrast, allowing the rug to take center stage. Repetition: your design friend.

10. Castleberry Area Rug; Home Decorators Collection, $350 for 7'x9'

A high contrast geometric rug punctuates the repetition of black throughout the space.

PS More Copy Cat post here.

Thinking about my home office

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Do you work from home like I do? A ton of my friends and their spouses do, too. And here's another question: Do you work from home... on the couch? Be honest! I do sometimes even though we have an office space here at the loft. Sometimes I even work from bed when the kids are playing loudly and I need some quiet. I used to work really long hours in a more traditional office setting, so I know how lucky I am to get to answer emails in a sea of feather down and soft cotton (that is, until one of my arms falls asleep and my back starts rebelling!).

For the first time in almost seven years of working from home, when we move to Brooklyn I will have an office space that is very separate from our living and sleeping spaces (on it's own level, and in a room with a DOOR!). While there are trade offs there too, it will probably be better for my mental health and productivity levels to have more separate work space. It's just time, I think. Working in the loft's office for the past two years has been great, though. It's pretty and functional and I like that the look of the space compliments the living room and rest of the house, which is all open to each other.

Anyway, all this to say, I've been thinking a lot about the idea of home offices, or maybe, more like a home base, where you can keep all your office stuff and maybe even sit down at when you really need to get things done.  One of my consulting clients has an adorable, but teeny apartment in the cutest neighborhood. She sometimes works from home, so we had to carve out a niche for a desk/console table that also functions as a dining table. That's a hard-working table! And it looks great! It really is possible to fit in a work space into even the smallest city apartment. I'd love to share some ideas, but first, I'll lay out some completely-biased-and-probably-not-fair-to-all-of-you personal opinions.

What I think you need in a home office:
- A pretty desk, with a place to put away your computer
- A cool-looking filing cabinet or other storage piece with large drawers (love the look of this one)
- An armoire or cupboard for storing your printer/scanner (vintage preferred - scour your craigslist!)
- A comfortable chair that provides good support (if you must have an "office chair", invest in something good with a name like Miller/Eames)
- At least one lovely and interesting table lamp (sort of obsessing over this one)
- A rug to keep things soft underfoot
- Inspiring art

via

What I think you don't necessarily need in a home office:
- A boxy, cubicle feeling computer desk unit with a million drawers and cubbies
- A cheesy, gooseneck "desk lamp"
- A rolling office chair
- A rolling chair plastic mat thing
- An inspiration board.

I can feel your eyebrows raising over the inspiration board comment. :) I think inspiration boards are cool. I even put up a couple cork boards in our old office. Here's what I discovered though. It was just one more thing to keep up with. I never ended up changing or adding to the things on the board and I never really used them for work ideas. Looking back, some beautiful, inspiring art would have been a way better choice for me. Also, there's this thing called Pinterest... :)

So, here are some options for you, depending on your space constraints.

via

If you have no floor space to dedicate to your home office, you can use your dining table to work on during the day. This wall-mounted laptop storage unit would be really helpful for putting everything away at night and keeping organized, and it requires absolutely zero floor space. I would paint the wall unit the same color as your walls so it blends in nicely.

IKEA also makes this great little laptop desk with a drop down, perforated bottom drawer. Cute as is in gray, or would paint up fabulously like any of the colorful options above or maybe try the DIY inlay painting?

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If you have even just a little bit of floor space, try using a secretary desk!

 
Elle Decor/Carrier and Co

I am a huge, huge fan of the secretary. Especially for us laptop users that like to roam around the house. Write a blog post during Conan and then shut that laptop away for the night. Out of sight, out of mind. 

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Hopefully, you also have space to keep a comfortable, upholstered side chair next to the secretary when not in use.

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I also like what Jordan and I came up with for her SF apartment.

If you do have room for a desk in your living room or bedroom, try adding a beautiful, leggy writing desk with just a couple drawers for lighter storage.

Sara Tuttle in High Gloss

Style at Home

Make the desk a focal piece instead of an eyesore. I would opt for a vintage or antique desk, something like these:

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Also don't forget the bedroom as an office option! Try using a desk as a nightstand, just make sure you have a place to tuck away your work at the end of the day. It would be miserable sleeping next to a big pile of stress-inducers!

House and Home

And if you have an extra closet, by all means, have the hardware store cut you a piece of thick MDF to size and make a desk nook! This is an especially good idea for less-organized people. Just shut those doors when you want the mess gone.

Elle Decor

Domino

What's your home office set up? Did I miss any small space/home office tips?

If you work from home, do you feel like it's necessary to actually have a home office? Or are you more relaxed about your set up? One of my blogger friends technically works from home but she goes to a cafe everyday for a few hours to get her writing done and for a little change of scenery. What do you do?