One Room Challenge Week Two: Trim, Trim, and more Trim!

Welcome to the ORC week 2 - is everyone else as exhausted as me???  I knew this was going to be the most labor intensive part of the whole process requiring a few late nights, but I was able to push through and just about reach my goal for this week. **I apologize in advance for the dark pictures...it's been pretty dreary around here today**

Last week I was able to build the frame of my faux-fireplace so I could install my board and batten to match the height of the mantel.  I like to go higher than standard chair-rail height with my trim to add impact and interest.  Everything has been caulked, primed, and has gotten two coats of Sherwin Williams Pro-Classic in Extra White.  I need one more coat and to do some touch ups but I'm 85% there - except if you consider I still need to add the crown molding...yay more caulking : |

In addition to the board and batten, I also replaced the door trim and added window trim in the same simple craftsman style as the rest of the house.  If you're interested in my "How To" check out this post - I say it every time but if you are looking to add personality to your house consider adding trim to your windows if they are bare...it makes an AMAZING difference!

Along with the trim, I've also been on a mission replace all of the old door hardware.  I first tried spray painting all of the original nickel door knobs black, but it didn't hold up as well as I was hoping, plus I wasn't that big of a fan of the carriage style ones that came with the house.  So I switched and started buying these very simple knobs in Bronze and then giving them a coat of black paint - so if they start to wear it's barely noticeable.

In more exciting news - we also got the new ceiling fan installed giving this room some desperately needed light!  I know - you either love them or you hate them, and we love ourselves a ceiling fan in this house as it lets us keep the AC off and the windows open more.  And honestly how gorgeous is this Leoni ceiling fan from Hunter!  The brass art-deco hardware gives the room a perfect modern touch.  If you're building new I HIGHLY recommend getting a light fixture rough-in in every bedroom - we didn't and this is the second room we had to install one from scratch...not impossible but something I would change in retrospect.

And because I couldn't help myself, I also hung some artwork (I got this map from a friend's garage sale and it actually was my jumping off point for this room!) and I picked up this adorable little dressing chair at the antique store (for $15!!!!)  I also couldn't help propping up my Animal Portraits before taking the pics of this room - more on those later but the plan is to use them to hide the TV.

So what's in store for week 3?  I plan to keep working on the "bones" of the room by finishing the fireplace - which includes adding the front panels/doors and also the brick backsplash - finish the trim touch-ups, change out the electrical outlets, and hopefully get the crown up!  I want to wrap up all of the potentially messy work before I build the bed and layout the new rug.  It's gonna be another hard week but the room is coming together exactly as I had it in my mind which is always good motivation!

If you have some time make sure to check out all of the other awesome One Room Challenge guest participants and featured designers!! You'll be sure to come away feeling incredibly inspired......

 

 Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by ORC

One Room Challenge Week One - Guest Bedroom Inspiration and First Steps

To quote my girl Liz Lemon ---- "It's all Happening!!!"

This fall is a big move forward for me and Hilltown House as I've decided to branch out by joining an amazing group of fellow bloggers and becoming a Guest Participant in the One Room Challenge hosted by Linda at Calling it Home and in partnership with House Beautiful.  In the next 6 weeks a group of over 200 guest and 20 featured bloggers will take the challenge to transform one room in their homes and share their progress - and I'm so excited to join them this time around!  At the end of the Spring Challenge I spent a good amount of time going through every final reveal and it was incredibly inspiring - so much that I immediately began making plans to join them in the fall.

Even though this is my first time participating in the One Room Challenge, I've already finished many rooms in my house so feel free to check out my Home Tour page if you'd like to get a sense of my style.

The one room that has been severely neglected is our Guest Bedroom - besides replacing the carpet with laminate when we re-did all of the floors, this room is still basically an empty box that my husband sleeps in when he has to leave early for work (or when the dog is snoring too loud).  Besides that, this room doesn't get used very often, but instead of seeing that as a reason to ignore it I see it as a reason to have some fun and take some chances - which takes me to my design plan:

My first iteration of this room was much closer to that of my powder room, and for a long time I was really attached to using the same Bee Stencil for the upper portion of the walls, but it all started to look too serious.  Instead, I am going to take a big departure from the rest of the house and use a bold color on the walls (Sherwin Williams Halcyon Green) and then balance it with a lot of neutrals.  As usual, I plan on building a lot of elements, mixing in a lot that I already have, and finishing with some quirky art and some amenities tailored just for guests.

I really didn't mean for my Before Pic to be so bad but this is the only one I could find from about a month after we moved in - poor little neglected room!

Right now this room is pretty much just storage for all my One Week Challenge goodies and some random husband stuff.  It's not the largest room, and you can see it has a little "entryway" on one side that you can see from the loft so space planning is going to be really important.

I started painting so I could start on one of the projects I'm most excited about - the faux fireplace!

At first I wanted to try to find an antique mantel to hang, but since we wanted to install a TV above it building one that can accommodate some hidden compartments to hide all of the cords and gadgets made the most sense.  This is the part of the room I'm honestly most worried about executing so getting it out of the way Week One will be amazing.  So far we mounted our new TV and hid the cords in the wall (YoungHouseLove has a wonderful tutorial with links to all the products you could need - it's not the easiest task, especially if your wall has insulation, but it's worth the extra effort). BONUS - it's turned into a great place to store all my tools!

Other than the fireplace, my goal is to get all of the trim installed, caulked, and painted by this time next week.  We replaced the carpet with laminate about 2 years ago (we used Pergo wide plank laminate in Riverbend Oak), and I was motivated enough to put up the door trim, but never got around to getting the floor baseboard back on - whoops.

I decided to use a board and batten style trim on the bottom 2/3ds of the wall to tie this room into some of the other spaces in the house.  To make it work I am using a combination of 1/4" MDF board and pre-primed MDF boards (which is what I've used for all of my house trim).  So far so good, but I'm trying not to think of  the crazy amount of work still needed to check this item off the list.

Somewhere in this whole thing I need to also schedule time to check out everyone else's project because isn't that the best part!....you can play along at home too by catching up each Thursday on the Calling it Home One Week Challenge Blog where all of the guest and featured participants will be sharing their progress.

In my mind 6 weeks is enough time to finish everything - but ask me come week 5 if I still feel the same way LOL.  After a month of staring at a laptop for 12 - 16 hours a day I cannot tell you how much I am looking forward to spending time in my workshop and getting my hands dirty.  I hope the husband doesn't mind getting displaced for a few weeks ; )

For more progress pics and Insta-story nonsense be sure to follow me on Instagram

 

 Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by ORC

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A personal note -

In the wake of the recent tragedies across the United States from Las Vegas, to Houston, to Puerto Rico (let alone across the world!) please know that the frivolity of running a home design blog is not lost on me.  I think I'm as guilty as the next person for wanting to distract myself and while I spend a good part of my day vacillating between tears, anger, and a sense of empowerment, I use my projects and this space as a way to re-focus my energy into something positive (as trivial as it may seem) for both myself and my family.  

If I had one ask of everyone out there - it's to make a commitment to be kinder to each other....from the person sleeping next to you each night to the the person that cuts in front of you in line at the grocery store.  The world needs more positivity and that's something everyone can take part in!