Re-working My Home– From Conservatory to Library

You have all followed the décor of my Conservatory.

My wonderful framed intaglios, (Dave hanging them just right), my crystal and mercury glass holiday decorations, landscaping the gardens beyond. But, what you may not know, is how little this room has been used over the past year.

You see I believe this is one of the most beautiful rooms in my home. I used to love to sit with my children and listen to them practice scales and new songs. But alas, homework, sports and friends have distracted them and sadly I am giving up every Mother’s fight “You need to practice your piano!” – They have moved on to other things and finally so must I.

So what to do with this room? My husband has always wished for a library. A wonderful wood paneled space to work, read and relax. So we have decided to say goodbye to the piano and hello to a new library.

Here are some of my inspiration photos. This is Christie Brinkley’s Great Room of her Tower Hill home. Not quite a library but I have always loved the light wood and the detailing on her crown molding. The room is beautiful, and with windows on two sides the light is similar to my Conservatory.

This has been in my files for a long time. I found this wonderful room on MLS. I adore the wood ceiling, leaded glass bookcases and glass arched door.

This room, from Mrs. Howard, really shows the type of wood I want. I love the paneling, although this room has much higher ceilings and is much more grand than my smaller space.

These light tones are perfect, but I do not like so many knots in the wood. This room also from Mrs. Howard.

I am sure you remember my adoration of David Easton’s library in Aspen. This light wood is limed and then washed with grey antiquing glaze. This is interesting as my painted doors will need to be stripped and a glaze may make the new wood and the old wood much easier to match.

If you look closely you will notice I only have one wall for bookcases to the right. It is also very narrow from wall to door molding. The Conservatory is very open to the Living Room right now, so I will need to add some doors. I want to keep the light coming in and do not want to lose too much space with swinging doors. I love pocket doors but I am afraid it will close off the room too much. However, it would give me another area for more bookcases. Hmm – lots of choices to make.

These glass does are similar to what I want. They slide over themselves so I won’t lose any space, but I prefer them to have glass to the floor.

I like the arch over the bar in this library. It mimics the arches of my French doors. I wonder if my wall with the intaglios should have an bookcase with and arch.

Here is a wonderful arched window in a library just being built down the street from me. The bookcase is straight, even though the main window has an arch.

I love the niche in this library for the couch. If I create a niche I think I would place Dave’s desk in front of it but should the niche be arched? I think this niche would have looked great with an arch.

This Library from Fairfax and Sammons is a bit closer to what I was thinking, but the arch is much too deep for my space. It would definitely need to be scaled back.

I am hoping to have the sketches done by the end of November, but as you can see we are still in the design phase, so let me know your thoughts! Light wood or darker wood? Stained or Glazed? Glass sliding doors or closing in the room a bit with pocket doors? Arched bookcase or straight? This is turning into such a fun project! Excited to hear your thoughts!

My New Kitchen Slipcovers!!!

Back to school and back to projects that needed to get to done! I am so excited to share with you my new kitchen slipcovers!

Let’s start at the beginning, with two teenagers, a big, hairy dog and an Italian family who loves Marinara sauce; my kitchen was not a perfect environment for my linen, upholstered chairs! We’ve been living with dish towels draped over the seats to catch any spills– not very pretty. I needed some washable slipcovers and I needed them pronto!

As always I had an inspiration photo to show my wonderful seamstress (Photo: Things That Inspire). These were close to what I envisioned. I liked the straight lines and the overall length. I wanted something to cover the chair but not be too fussy.

I also needed the slips to be washable. I found these wonderful oversized napkins from French Laundry Home. I like their “grainsack” look and feel. They were big enough to cover just the seat, so we needed something extra for the skirting piece.

You might remember my wonderful linen blend curtains I found on sale last year at Country Curtains.

I bought extra fabric for $6 a yard and had these wonderful slipcovers made for my club chairs. Read all about my Family Room redo HERE. Fortunately I had enough fabric left to use for the skirting.

Here is the chair before…(not pasta friendly!)

And here is the slipcover after! Large enough to handle any spill and simple to throw in the wash!!

I love the back – I didn’t want any ties.

The hidden Velcro does the trick of keeping it neat and in place.

The bench also needed a bit of covering up. As much as I loved the Antique printed grainsack I bought from Kym Fraser of 3 Fine Grains, it was much too valuable to be stained with hot fudge!

A quick call to my dear friend, Wendy Lewis of Textile Trunk, and a more reasonably priced antique grainsack was on its way. We took out the stitching on both sides, sewed in the corners and added the ties. Look closely and you can see the fold (that was the bottom of the sack) still in the cover.

An indestructible and beautiful slipcover!! You can also see the chairs with their new, pretty dresses peeking through!

The lighting was not the best when I took the picture this afternoon, but I wanted to show you how wonderful the new slips look in the Breakfast Room!

Sometimes it seems daunting to live with linen or all white furniture. Slipcovers are the secret! Your kids can eat hot fudge and still live in a beautiful room without worry.

Do click HERE to see the wonderful new stock of antique fabrics available from Wendy at Textile Trunk. She just got back from Europe and you will go crazy!! And get ready to see some kitchens I have been working on, some reader’s renovations I am thrilled to share and some more personal and professional projects I am starting for the Fall!!

So happy to be back!!

(all photos and content copyrighted by Willow Décor and not to be copied with out written permission)

My Toy Room to Teen Room Transformation!

My children are entering the teen years now. As they grow and change the needs of our home have changed as well. One of the bedrooms over our garage had been a "toy room", filled with plastic Little Tikes Kitchens, Legos and Trains- a place for forts and building castles. My teenage daughter suggested that we re-decorate the "Toy Room" to be more Teen Friendly. I agreed and so (sadly for Mom) we have said to goodbye to Pokemon and American Girl Dolls.

Here is the room Before (actually we have two identical rooms above our garage, they are mirror images of each other and this photo is of other side). Like all decorating projects we had Goals, Restrictions and a Budget. The Goal was a room for for sleepovers, a place to do school projects where they could spread things out (and not be near their parents), and a place to hangout with friends and watch Movies and I-Chat! Our main Restriction was the doorway size. It is only 27 inches wide. And our Budget was $2500.

Here is the room after we ripped up the old carpet. Then we painted the trim BM White Dove and the walls BM Lighthouse Landing. Paint cost $4o. Paint, as always is an immediate improvement!

The kids were allowed to choose everything in the room and I treated them like clients on our shopping trip. We found this great, thick wool rug at HomeGoods for $600. (did I mention how much I love HomeGoods for rugs??) The kids liked the Pottery Barn feel and the blue and brown color scheme. While we were there the kids scouted some great pillows that matched and two small microfiber ottomans. All together we spent $800.

Meanwhile at home, my sister, who LOVES to organize, came over and sorted through all our arts and crafts supplies and organized everything in the old bins which used to hold plastic food and Matchbox cars. Now it is a perfect go to space for all the supplies we need for projects at school.

Thank you, Sandra! Cost - priceless!

We couldn't let go of the blocks, (well I couldn't) so they stayed put and we moved an old bookcase into the walk in closet for extra storage for paper and other supplies.

Dramatic drum roll.... Here is the Before.

And the After! We found this thin couch at Macy's and once we took the feet off it fit through our tiny doorway! The sectional microfiber couch was $1400 and the bar table and leather stools $199. at Overstock.com.

Inspirational artwork was $50 on clearance! Bookcase, side table, and TV we already had!

The total Teen Hangout Room Makeover cost was.....$2489!!

We still had money left over for a Movie and some snacks!! We found some wonderful bargains, stayed with in our budget and came out with a great room! The kids are thrilled and call it their "Hang Out Room" - I call it a success!!

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Also a heartfelt thank you to the many, many kind readers who sent me get well wishes and prayers. I am truly blessed to have so many friends in blogland. I was beyond touched! xoxo

(all photos Willow Decor and not to be copied without permission)

My Breakfast Room and Family Room Reveal

When I bought my house I knew we would need to enlarge the kitchen and family room area. The previous owners were empty nesters and although the layout worked for them, it was not appropriate for our growing family.

This before picture was taken during our home inspection. At this point the previous owners had removed much of their family room furniture - all that remained was their small kitchen table and some odd chairs. You can see that the wall of windows was about 3 feet beyond the solid wall. A larger table would have ended up looming into the Family room space. So, when we were ready to renovate we pushed back the wall and added an additional nine feet to create a dedicated breakfast room. Here is the breakfast room after!

We recessed the ceiling and added beadboard and crown moulding to match the treatment we added in the kitchen.

I vacillated for months over the light fixture, but finally decided on the Niermann Weeks Italian Chandelier with an antiqued silvered finish. (Actually I vacillated over spending the money or not spending the money - I always knew it was just perfect) In the end, it was my husband's sage advice that made me order it - "You will look at this everyday, all day, for years - buy what you love!" I am so glad I listened to him (He says its one of the only times!)

Here you can see that we added three windows on each side to keep the original feeling.

I found a wonderful Belgian wrought iron table with old wood top that fit the space perfectly. Wisteria had a bench that was just the right size and I topped it with a grainsack! The linen curtains were a steal, only $20. a panel, a close-out from Country Curtains; all they needed was a little doctoring.

You might remember that at this time I also took out the over head cabinets between the Family Room and Kitchen area and removed four lower cabinets to create more of a center island.

Here you can see how much better the space feels. Removing the upper cabinets also allowed you to see the recessed ceiling area in the kitchen. We spiffed that up a bit by adding the beadboard and crown moulding details.
Here is the Family Room before. This is directly across from the center island. The size is deceiving as the back wall is over 13 feet wide.
Here is the Family Room after. We added the window on the right to match the rest of the back. It was a great addition as it brings in so much light to what used to be a shadowy area. The mantel above the couch I found in the trash on the side of a road many years ago. It has an original workman's label from 1881. What a find!! I just love the feeling it brings to the space. Lamps are from Aidan Gray and the mirror is from Wisteria - It came in gold so I silver leafed it one afternoon.
Here is the before looking from the Kitchen area out toward the Family Room area. Notice the wonderful ceiling detail that was hidden from view before we removed the upper bank of cabinets.
And here is another photo of the after. Notice the addition of the crown moulding. The chairs are my old yellow club chairs, slipcovered in the same close-out linen from Country Curtains- a steal at $6 yard. I think they are bit oversized, but until I find what I am looking for they were an inexpensive fix. Here is the TV cabinet - notice the size of the TV that fit in it.

We added a gas fireplace, mantel and surrounded the area with crown moulding. We also placed a much larger TV above. Winter is long here so the fireplace makes the space so much more cozy.

This is the full view of the new space if you are standing in front of the fireplace.

From this...

To this...

(click to enlarge)

A final thought - I have received some email recently about rooms done by decorators that are considered "high-end" and not accessible to the average person. I just want to share with you that not all things that look expensive actually are expensive. Beauty does not have a price tag. Do not be afraid to mix $20 curtains and mantels you find in the trash with expensive chandeliers, or reproductions from mail order catalogs with real antiques. Trust what you love and it will all come together. It's not about the price, it's about surrounding yourself with things you enjoy.

We really enjoy our new space - I hope you do too!!

To see more of my house click here.

(all photos Willow Decor please do not copy without permission)