The Room That Will Never Be Finished

Posted on October 13, 2013 by lucy

Well, the room that will never be finished has inched closer to being finished. Which is a bit ironic i suppose.

It’s been quite a while since i fully repainted a room on my own. The last was probably the now flattened conservatory at Tullyroan, but even then i had enough sense to forgo the woodwork. However opting for the all-white look creates certain obligations, for example not having chipped, yellowing gloss-work.

Applying the wall paint was no bother. I kept thinking it was just like painting with double cream, such was the colour and texture of the paint. 3 coats were required to remove all traces of the sunshine yellow. I decided to do the woodwork in the same white as the floor, a grey-tone as the perfect antidote to yellowy gloss. After an interlude to go on holiday to ireland in August, i dragged my heels over restarting on the room until the end of September, when i finally donned my paint suit and got to work. Egg-shelling the shutters, window frames, fireplace, door frame and bookshelf constituted hours of work, during which i signed a document to myself stating i would never paint a whole room myself again.

Although probably not noticeable to anyone but me, it was worth it in the end as the whole room now has a crisp, fresh feel, with the gentle white on the walls contrasting the grey tones and softening the overall look.

Now to the fun bit – accessorising and styling! Even for me (ie high ideals and uncompromising when it comes to maintaining a sense of coherence in a room), a strict white palette seemed ambitious, plus i had already spent copious hours making the soft furnishings last year. I decided to add colour but still work towards a theme – bright antique florals in rich pink. Against the white, the colours do seem to ‘pop’ (as they say in the photography world.)

I have collected up a variety of antique linens and where else to showcase them but here. Of course the ubiquitous scatter cushion makes a key appearance top and bottom of the bed. I also swiped the vintage eiderdown from Tullyroan as it goes perfectly in the scheme. I still remember snuggling up with this as a very young child. Bringing in a sense of history to our home is important.

The french gray distressed cabinets, floral roman blind, and magazine/lever arch files have all previously been featured on the blog.

Newer additions and updates to the room include this vintage chippy filing cabinet, colour coded book display, and the recently re-painted victorian leaf table. The vision behind the white theme was primarily inspired by the volume of light this south-facing room receives, and nowhere does it become more obvious than when sitting of a morning at this desk, bathed in warm sunlight. Seated there, I’m in my happy place.

The walls are decorated with these fine vintage floral prints, recently found in a charity shop. The fireplace holds the original inspiration print which i found a few years ago and had hoped to expand upon. A couple of vintage mirrors cast a bit more light around the room on a sunny day.

The fireplace was previously boarded and sealed up with ugly chipboard. With trepidation I burrowed through to the other side and found a very respectable but draughty fireplace, but with no surround. Ideally, i’ll get one cut for it. (One of these days.) Meantime, a good place to display canvases and pictures.

The last major task is transporting and restoring two old 7 ft haberdashery cabinets from Leith, formerly from a wool shop. They are in terrible condition, with drawers missing, oil soaked (currently in use by a car garage), and filthy. They will be ideal for storing and organising the expanding Calvert sporting goods collection. All mine of course. Wonder if a kite-surf will fit in the drawer?

I love stripping

Posted on September 4, 2013 by lucy

It’s been a long number of years since i undertook a proper stripping and sanding project. And having just finished this cabinet, now i remember why.

As i started work on this latest piece earlier in the summer, i was remembering the first desk i stripped and sanded in Edinburgh. We found it on Dalkieth Road the year we got married; a beautiful traditional school desk in need of some love. I convinced Malkie to help me (those were during his days of innocence), and together we did the whole thing by hand down in the shared garden of our flat overlooking the Hibs Stadium near Easter Rd. Why on earth i hadn’t thought to buy a mouse sander back then i don’t know. Perhaps it was the gritty authenticity i was after, in those our days of young love.

I had been looking for a glass cabinet for the bathroom wall, and came across this piece in one of the many antiqueries along Causewayside. As it was in the slightly mad shop of Alan Jackson, rather than the nice but overpriced alternatives on said street, it was a decent price at £35 (post-bargaining). The previous owner had attempted a paint effect reminiscent of the morning after several pints of vodka. Gratefully, it seems they used acrylic or some sort of hobby paint, as it came off fairly easily with the judicious use of a paint scraper and avoiding the need for chemical solvents.

I think the cabinet is oak but it seems to have been made up of a number of different bits and hence once sanded back, it was lacking coherence as the wood tones differed throughout. I therefore ended up staining it in order to bring up the natural colour. Having got pretty bored with the scraping i decided to paint the inside bright white, to coordinate with the bathroom and help the contents stand out. And save my sanity.

Weeks later, and today i finished off the job by completing the doors. The glass was in poor condition so i removed the panes, scrubbed them up, and refitted them.

Then comes the fun bit – putting pretty displays inside!

The essentials: a vintage first aid kit collection. (Hey, i am a doctor).

And more upon more tins and to put things in. Like make-up. And glass jars, for no purpose at all.

Just need to find a nice joiner to put it on the wall and we’re all good.

Hot charcoals

Posted on July 31, 2013 by lucy

Sometimes, life doesn’t go quite the way you expect nor hope.

Sort of like many of my sewing and painting projects, which of late have proven to be both blessing and curse. A blessing when you are able to make a nice homemade personalised gift for a friend. [Insert nice picture of tweed patchwork quilt or nappy pouch, recently made but hastily dispatched before being able to take a picture]. A curse when you realise you don’t actually know what you are doing, or why the project is going so wrong.

Such is the case with my latest curtain escapade. Having contracted with myself never to do any more curtains after the drama of the living room ones (still unfinished), somehow i ended up doing another set for the bedroom. It’s the gift of those rose tinted glasses i often wear. i was thinking, it’s surely just a matter of cutting out some big rectangles and sewing them together. And these ones don’t even require the tricky business of joining panels together, so its gonna be a cinch. What can go wrong? Ha!

I found this luscious charcoal velvet on ebay, and some good quality lining fabric. Cutting out went swimmingly. To sew the linings, you make a big tube out of the outer and inner fabrics, turn it inside out, and then sew on the heading tape at the top, and hem the bottom. What i was blissfully unaware of was the difficulty in sewing some very heavy fabric, namely velvet, to some lighter fabric, the lining. Enter: Tension Problem. No amount of twiddling the blessed dials on my machine would allow me to successfully make these two fabrics happy bedfellows. Whilst the velvet would create a tight stitch, the lining would do the opposite, resulting in a twisted mess that hung at about 30 degrees from the traditional vertical inclination of an obedient curtain. After about 5 sewing and ripping out sessions, i bundled the haberdashery offenders up in my sewing room and forgot about them for a few weeks until inspiration hit: forget sewing them together, just join them at the top and leave the two hanging separately.

This proved a success and after a short stint at the machine i was hanging my velvet curtains like we were best of friends. Here they are looking swanky in our bedroom.

Staying with the charcoal theme, i decided to paint the shelves at the end of our bed in a similar moody hue. I have previously lauded Farrow & Ball paints here before, and in this latest project I was busy congratulating myself on my daring choice of “Downpipe’ eggshell. Especially as the subject was this beautiful handmade oak shelving unit, which could have easily contented itself in it’s former unadulterated solid wood state.

This didn’t last, once i realised that failing to use the appropriate primer underneath (a cost-saving initiative on my part) affects the finish and drying time of F&B paints. These shelves took around 4 days to dry, and even now my delicately placed trinkets tend to stick fast to the surface.

Here we have shelf one decorated by me, with pointless items such as vintage shoe inserts and bricks. Shelf two is carefully crafted by Malkie, with items such as…. shoes?! What daring functionality!!

Ercol-our

Posted on June 5, 2013 by lucy

Mid-century is of course the must-have furniture era these days. Ercol or G-plan for the everyday but quality items, and maybe an Eames or Jacobsen chair as a statement piece. I love Ercol chairs and managed to pick up 3 for £10 in a sale room in the Borders a few years ago. I had previously held them in such esteem that painting them was out of the question, even though they were not in great condition with a lot of water stains. I then decided life was too short to hold any chair in great esteem, and was inspired by a friend to try some spray painting.

The pictures in this post are taken with my iphone; spray paint and expensive DSLRs don’t make merry bedfellows. Plus i am experimenting with different picture styles for the blog as it has recently proved tricky to photograph every project i undertake.

I started with some primer, a lovely grey shade that i quite fancied! Having sprayed the whole chair in about 30 seconds, i instantly decided i was going to be a big fan of spray painting. It was dry in 30 mins, so i got straight to work applying the red.

Normally its a whole day job to paint furniture, waiting for each layer to dry, and removing any big globs of paint before doing the next layer. When the piece is not going to be distressed, it helps if the finish is really pristine and super smooth. Spray painting seems just the ticket for getting this kind of finish. I got the paints from eBay, and chose a satin finish. Its quite fashionable now to have glossy paints in bold colours but i haven’t quite recovered from my youth whereby lots of things in our house were painted white gloss; not very attractive (but quite functional i suppose!)

The red layer went on in about 5 minutes, and again was touch dry in about 10. True to form, it only occurred to me afterwards to check the surrounding area for rogue paint dispersal. I was working just outside the flat and there does now appear to be a red tinge to the side of the house and the gravel but no matter! Perhaps a better set-up would be advisable, with covers all around the working area, as these modern spray paints are designed to emerge as a very fine mist hence it does kind of go everywhere.

The finished article has a lovely finish, so smooth and uniform! Sadly i think we sat on them a bit prematurely and a lot of fluff seemed to gather on the seats after a few days, as well as a slight peeling noise when disengaging one’s derriere. I subsequently re-sprayed the chairs and applied a wax layer to the seat in order to make them more durable.

I’m really pleased with the results, and am glad to have taken the plunge into bright colours, my usual style being mid-tone greys, greens etc. Many people ask me how i have the time to do so may projects (and in response always point out the lack of little people in our house), but this project made me think of all those mums out there longing to do creative projects but lacking the time and energy required to see it through. If so, spray painting is for YOU!

I would say however that the one disadvantage of spray painting is the limited color range. If it’s a basic bright colour you need, eg hot pink, scarlet, you can easily find these but having worked with F&B paints mainly, and appreciated the fine attention to tonal range within these paints, i think there may be limited opportunity for more spray painting for me.

Having really embraced the red theme in the kitchen, i am now feeling inspired to search out more red highlights and delights. This evening i was checking out this website of vintage kitchenalia; probably a dangerous endeavour as i have now gathered a whole host of new collection aspirations. I was interested to read how popular brightly coloured vintage pyrex and melanine are becoming, as well as ‘Skyline’ utensils, of which i already have quite a few. I can feel a red vintage kitchenalia fetish coming on….

Bettering the bathroom

Posted on May 29, 2013 by lucy

I’ve been spending some time working on the bathroom lately. Its was fairly recently fitted when we bought the place so there wasn’t really an argument for replacing it. (Unfortunately). I decided to just do some ‘tweaks’ to make it a bit more homely. Sadly i forgot to do any ‘before’ pictures so perhaps this doesn’t quite tell the story. If you were really interested, the home report is still available online; glancing at some of the pictures now its nice to see the place transformed a bit from its former slightly drab self.

Beginnings occurred in the usual way, ie getting some furniture painted up. I recently wrote a post about furniture painting with Annie Sloan chalk paint, which i would like to now refute completely as i have wholeheartedly changed my mind and gone back to Farrow & Ball. It is simply much better quality paint, gives a tough, satin finish, and comes in the most delicious color range. I was previously limited in choice by Homebase’s rubbish range but then (dangerously) discovered an F&B shop in Stockbridge, with every colour always in stock. It was a bit like a sweetie shop for grown-ups. I managed to escape from my first visit with just 3 different tins, which should see me through the next few weeks of projects.

This shelving unit originally came from the salvage yard in Musselburgh. It has been reincarnated a few times, being a shoe rack for a while, and nearly a planter when it first came into the house. I painted it in ‘Vert de Terre’, a fresh apple-y grey green.

The colour choice came about serendipitously, through this fabric which i wasn’t too sure about initially. It was a scrap of slightly shiny material which i reckoned would do well for a steamy room. I removed the doors from the under-sink cupboard as they were a bit boring and rickety into the bargain, and replaced them by making this curtain. The bathroom fitter appears to have added a wine rack to the left of the sink unit; rolled up towels are about the only thing i can think to put in there!

I also covered the top of this storage box which i found on the street a few years ago. It also got the F&B treatment…

These shelves came from Tullyroan and I have been quite pleased i stole them as they have come in handy in a few different places. Again, though not very obvious in this picture, they are also painted to match. Here you can see one of my collection of vintage first aid kits. Hey, what do you expect from a vintage aficionado doctor!

The panelling on the side of the bath was pretty ugly before – grey tiles poorly fitted together with sealant bulging out at every angle. I got this tongue-and-groove panelling done, to bring a….surprise surprise….country feel to the room! We also had the dreadful lino lifted, and sanded down the floors to reveal the beautiful golden pine beneath.

Its taking shape, but still a few bits to do including replacing the Ikea shelving with a glass wall cabinet (when i find one), and some pretty lighting to follow. And that should do it for a year or two!

Spring happenings

Posted on May 11, 2013 by lucy

The problem with having about 40 ongoing projects is finding the time to document them all, something i enjoy doing here for interested others to but also as a kind of ledger of my (at times frenetic) activity. I thought, maybe if i group them by time, my blog output might improve. So here’s what springs has brought to The Gardens.

I bought this antique footstool at my first auction experience in Bo’ness. I’d say it was a classic first time buyer’s piece – paid too much, not in great nick, and sort of regretted since. However in Hailes Street it worked well as a wee perch for little people if they had a TV breakfast at the coffee table. Sadly the fine beadwork didn’t stand the test of time, and Kath and I spent more time hoovering them up than possibility benefitting from them through decorative appreciation and foot support. The new living room here appears to be moving in a pink direction so i decided to reupholster it and cover up the tired red.

I realised that this fabric is another Sanderson print, for which i seem to possess a homing device. I purchased a black binbag-full of it at a Stockbridge ‘colonies’ sale for £1, not knowing it was high quality stuff which had originally been made into a sofa slipcover. I combined it with some pink velvet, and linen piping. Then its a simple matter of attaching it on using a staple gun (strictly speaking, not an upholstery technique, but a great shortcut.) The stool works well as a mate for the two window chairs.

Sticking with Sanderson, my vision for the living room, with it’s wonderful new sofa.com, is to create a laid-back but traditional floral feel. Here’s another Sanderson remnant i picked up in a charity shop.

Yes, i know there are too many cushions already, but i do have a longstanding penchant which sadly cannot be assuaged by mere logic alone.

Not satisfied, I made another one with the leftovers from the footstool.

I make most of these kinds of things at sewing night on Mondays with Kath. We used to do it at Hailes Street and have worked, at times against the odds, to keep it a regular commitment.

Vintage maps are fast becoming the must-have decorative item these days. Lucky for me, my husband loves maps so this latest wee project is something we can both enjoy. I found this 1961 map of Northern Ireland in a lesser visited but very delightful charity shop in Leith called St. Columba’s, where my pal Jules used to find all sorts of envy-inducing things when she lived nearby as few years ago. I handed over my 50p (everything is 50p…apart from on that day this rare Piquoware kettle at £65, which I unwillingly resisted). The frame came from the salvage yard, an ugly gold affair which i reincarnated with a lick of white paint. The map was pretty badly creased so I spray-mounted it onto the board. Whilst Malkie took great pleasure examining the alternative driving roots to the M1 which wasn’t then built, and the source of the River Bann, I admired my £5.50 design piece now adorning the hallway!

The other major work of April was re-arranging the kitchen to accommodate a dining table in the window. After a long but futile search for the usual rickety old victorian, turned leg, pine affair, I happened upon this Ikea offering. Having rid myself of nearly every other gratuitous Ikea piece within the house (apart from the actual kitchen, obviously!), it was with reticence that i went to buy this one. However i reasoned that it was the perfect size, was sturdy, had a mid-century feel, and an interesting bamboo top. One flat-pack later, and we were sunning ourselves at breakfast, feeling quite pleased that sacrificing the beautiful handmade oak shelves originally in their stead to the bedroom had been worth it. I have a couple fo Ercol chairs which bring it more towards the mid-century look. This week i am going to be pushing out the boat and painting the chairs scarlet red. I usually opt for fairly safe greys and whites for furniture painting, but at the risk of an entire house full of French Grey, i’m taking the plunge…

Painting Blitz, Now & Then

Posted on April 6, 2013 by lucy

I’ve been awaiting the coming of spring with anticipation. Yes, to escape the Siberian trade-winds, and plant flowers, and drink tea outside, but mainly so I can re-paint my front door. It was black gloss originally and whilst this might look good at 10 Downing Street, I felt it wasn’t giving a warm enough welcome. Yesterday it was beautifully sunny on my route home from work and so by 6.45 i had the first layer of undercoat on the door. I was half tempted to re-consider my colour choice having seen how good the slate grey undercoat looked….

But I had my heart set on Country Green, and wasn’t disappointed when it came to the moment of truth the following day (ie the moment you first discover whether the paint therein looks remotely like the front label).

Ok, so we don’t live in the country, but that’s just semantics. A very delightful afternoon was thus spent painting the door and reminiscing about all the painting Gemma and I (and Ryan) used to do when we were kids. I was thinking how we have whitewashed the entire farmyard at least 3 times over the years. It was great fun (initially) as there’s no careful brushstrokes involved, you just get a big massive horsehair brick of a brush and slap the lime paint on, or near the stonework walls. Very messy and fulfilling. Then there was the time right before my wedding when we branched out and painted all the green tin roofs. I recall sitting on top of the green roof with Ryan drinking tea and talking about the best way to get efficient coverage with a paint gun. As an aside, writing about this has just made me go in search of the photos. Please indulge me…

Here we are in 2005, doing what people do just before a family wedding…

Not even visitors could escape.

Nor 96 year olds! Nanny wasn’t to be outdone by all the hard work going on in the yard.

When i was 15 i repainted my bedroom, choosing yellow for the floorboards, orange for the walls and purple for the skirting and woodwork. Let us return to the present and see if i have managed to garner any more taste since then….

Having finished the first coat on the front door, i felt so pleased with the whole affair that i got all paintbrush-happy and impulsively decided to neaten up all the surrounding paintwork. I found an ancient old tin of red doorstep paint (as one does); applying this glue-like substance didn’t even threaten to dampen my mood. I then undercoated all the door and fan-light frames, the first step on the journey to ridding the entire house of yellowing gloss-work, which sadly is everywhere.

My little helper Ruby make a cool sign for the postman.

Not satisfied with all that, i proceeded on to the next project, these little bedside cabinets for the guest room. I figured it would be good to see what all the fuss is about this Annie Sloan chalk paint, so I did them in ‘French Grey’. On reflection, i wish i had bought some slightly classier hardwood pieces than these chipboard items. Its probably true, in this case, that you can’t polish a turd.

I reckon its almost a rite of passage in furniture painting, having a towel rail in distressed grey. Walk into any vintage/gift/shabby chic shop and there you will see one, i guarantee it. Not to be left out in the cold, i did one for the guest room, again in Annie Sloan French Grey.

I’ll go down to Anthropologie tomorrow to get some fancy knobs, and at some point distress the cabinets. In the meantime, i’ve had a new distraction! See subsequent post for details…

After the blaze

Posted on March 16, 2013 by lucy

We have now finished redecorating our bedroom post-blaze, so thought i’d do a wee tour. In a deliberate attempt to move away from the usual vintage/floral/junky look, i decided on a blue/grey theme with some attention to texture and detail. The overall aim was a simple but indulgent, luxury look.

We painted it in two Farrow and Ball colours, the chimney breast and recessed press are ‘Oval Room Blue’ and the walls are ‘Light Blue’.

My husband is a tolerant guy but i reckon i might be pushing him to the limits with this undeniable cushion overdose. I wanted to introduce different textures and shades within the colour palate, so tweeds, velvets and natural linens are good contenders. As you can see, tweed cushions make great bedfellows, i made all the covers and the bedspread is from Tullyroan. Poor Malcolm makes the bed every morning and indulges me by placing them all as below! Putting 3 alongside make the bed appear bigger (common hotel trick).

I picked up the gold gilt mirror in a charity shop, which links in well with the traditional brass filial bed. The blue bowl is from Tullyroan, and is filled, usefully, with fairy lights. The picture was £1 from the salvage yard. Malcolm frequently says he doesn’t like it but i think the attraction for me is because it reminds me of walking the shores of Carlingford Lough at Rostrevor, where some of our family live. I’d love to paint the drawers a grey shade but its a bit of a moral dilemma proposing to cover over lovely stripped antique pine.

We invested in this traditional bed from Feather and Black a few years ago, and haven’t regretted it.

We have gathered up some great pictures in recent years. These two both came from the CCE Art Exhibition which i administrate. The first is by a friend Miriam McWilliam and suits the mood of the room perfectly. The next one we bought last year, its by local artists Alan Kay and is the exact scene where we got engaged, at St. Leonard’s Bank.

And a few vignettes. Not sure why i have 3 non-working pocket clocks but i like them grouped together. The press is full of knick-knacks picked up over time. My current favourite is the pair of wooden vintage shoe trees. Followed closely by the enamel shoe polish box, which i picked up beside a bin.

Onwards to the dressing room. This was a big seller for us when we viewed the flat. Basically, there is no denying that i have a lot of clothes, and to fit them all into a shared wardrobe would simply be a recipe for marital disaster. As well as physically impossible. I painted it in a Crown shade called “Rosy Cheeks’. I wanted a dusky pink and surprisingly, F&B didn’t have much in their pink palate.

Essentially the whole color scheme is based on this vintage Sanderson curtain fabric.

I re-upholstered the chair in the same fabric. The shelving was a bit inadequate so i added a few extra to house all 50 of my cardigans. I still need to paint the apple crates in grey, and they are stuffed with scarves (another of my excessive fetishes).

Vintage tins feature everywhere in this house, including here, where i keep my ‘daily’ make-up.

I blogged about this old type-drawer before, which i turned into a rather decadent earring display/hanger.

Just need my beautiful charcoal grey velvet curtains to arrive from the seamstress (not me this time thankfully) and we’re all set!

(With thanks to Heather McMurray for lending me a decent lens for this post!)

Chair Lift

Posted on February 23, 2013 by lucy

There seems to be a revival happening in the world of painted furniture, but its not like the good old ‘changing rooms’ days of the early 90’s. I recall aged 13 painting my first two-tier table. By today’s standards it would be viewed as positively twee, but back then it was all about the pattern (stencils? everywhere, please), shine and colour. For this particular project, I stripped both the table tops, did a strawberry vine hand-painted decorative border on each, painted the legs gloss forest green, and finally varnished the whole thing. This gets 3 black marks by today’s standards. The ‘chalky paint’ look has come to dominate the scene, the more unfinished looking the better. When painting furniture, one must try their best to miss as many corners and edges as possible, if not achieiving this then attacking your carefully painted piece with a healthy dose of sandpaper and strategically positioned chips, the more the better. As my pal Ali said the other day, don’t forget to start off with a truly gawdy colour which you then allow to peek forth, reminiscent of some long-forgotten era where green gloss and strawberry vine might actually have been considered fashionable.

Painted furnitiure is quite handy for the thriftily minded like me; buy an ugly old thing cheaply and liberally apply some Annie Sloan paint and wax til it wouldn’t look a bit out of place at any French brocante. Of course, Farrow and Ball or indeed the recently discovered Craig and Rose 1829 range will do just as nicely but for the purist, the chalkier the paint finish the better. I haven’t done a huge amount of furniture painting within the current trend but i recently did this project and i think its given me the bug! Mainly because of the joy in working with the beautiful paint range and textures from Craig and Rose. I have prevously used Crown or other standard range eggshell finish but working with a more finely made paint makes a remarkable difference for both durability and overall look. Not to mention the simple pleasure of reading the paint charts (sounds almost as appealing as watching paint dry, but read on….). For example, choose Porcelain Blue and you will discover that it is ‘a colour inspired by an Adelaide Alsop Robineau 1865-1925 porcelain vase.’

This bentwood chair was a street find. This doesn’t happen often so when it does i get all a-flutter. Harking back to the good ol’ days again, we had a series of Bentwood chairs at home in Tullyroan, mum had painted them all white gloss (same mistake as me it seems) and i remember being less than fond of them. So here i am investing an afternoon’s work in doing just about the same, but 25 years later. The apple doesn’t fall far…

Firstly i applied a layer of standard undercoat, i have skipped this in the past but you end up wasting more of your actual paint by having to do additional layers, so best to do this when working with untreated wood. If you are impatient like me you can thin it down to make it more workable, but make sure to use a nice attractive tin of pomodorini cherry tomatoes for doing so in case you suddenly decide to take pictures of the whole operation.

Here we have the chair at stage one, drying in sub-zero temperatures outside.

I then applied lavishly in two coats this delightful colour given to me by Gemma called Moonstone Grey. (“Originally named after a semi-precious stone from Sri Lanka”). Its a classic ‘of the moment’ shade; grey and blue and green all wrapped up in one.

Now here’s the bit that i rarely get around to. Go over all the edges and corners with fine sandpaper to create a distressed look. I fought my anti-commercialist tendencies and bought some of this Annie Sloan soft wax, this protects the finish against proper wear and tear chips which annoyingly never look that good or intentional.

I am not a fan of distressing the hell out of the item so as you can see here it’s quite subtle. In fact, come to think of it, you can’t see it at all but we’ll just blame the photographer for that.

Not satisfied with just one chair, i decided to re-vamp a former project which didn’t quite stand up to the test of time and community living. Incidentally, i bought this chair for 50p at an auction so not much is lost if it all goes wrong. I followed the same procedure again and then replaced the seat cover. All you need for that is a staple gun and some nice fabric.

I love this material by Colefax & Fowler, I picked up a scrap in a charity shop and have been trying to make it last ever since.

Whiskey Cabinetry

Posted on October 7, 2012 by lucy

My latest project was one of the first things i bought for this house. It was a few weeks before we moved and i promised Malcolm i would find a whiskey cabinet that appealed to us both. We were headed out to North Berwick beach and we stopped off at Sam Burns place in Prestonpans. I frequent it less now than i used to as it seems to have been ‘discovered’ by a wider group and more often now i come home empty-handed, which rarely happened in the good old days. But on this merry occasion, i happened upon this delightful vintage glass cabinet. We searched around for an old bottle to make sure it would accommodate said item. This is more than i would usually do but my pal Ali brought some essential pragmatism, as is often the case. We established that bottles fitted neatly on the top shelf.

Having no measurements for the new place, i took a chance on the cabinet in terms of the overall dimensions. I was certain it would fit beautifully to the left of the fireplace. I was eating my proverbial words when we discovered shortly after moving in that it was wide by about 6 inches. Alas it was merely an issue of height in that if 4 inches shorter, it would fit if tucked gracefully underneath the mantle. So it was that on day 4 when my bro came to stay for a night he found himself issued with a hacksaw and a tape measure, tasked with cutting the ornate claw feet off (the word ‘butchering’ was used but i chose to ignore such blatant overstatement).

The cabinet looks to be mahogany, with the most stunning vintage floral paper inside. Its quite weathered so i reckon it is the original decor.

Once slotted into place, it was immediately evident that the cabinet needed a little lift, something to help it stand out from the crowd (of other vintage friends in the room). And there’s nothing like a bit of moody lighting to raise the tone, add some class…..

A few Ikea spotlights later and the cabinet really does shine now. Here you can see my clumsy wiring lurking in the background (just like the Lord Calvert, but that’s another story), waiting to be tidied up. Plus evidence of further power-tool action. Poor little cabinet! So, anyone for a wee dram?

Salvage Sisters

Join us in our apparently inherited insatiability for resurrected relics and design on a shoestring…

Category Archives: furniture