Ikat-woman

Ikan't tell you how much I love Ikat. Almost as much as I love neon. And bunnies. 

Here are my current favourites:

                                                      

                                                          

                                       All found here



And what would Ikat be without a little graphical diversity:

Stripes and (sort of) chevrons

This is another before & after of something I bought second hand from www.Leboncoin.fr (which is French for Craigslist):

Kind of pretty but kind of ugly on first glance. I wanted it because it matched my secretary desk. Same lines, same wood...at least I thought so at the time! This is actually laminate while my desk is solid wood...*sad face*. This meant I was a little reluctant to sand it and paint it entirely. It was going to stand next to my secretary desk, but I didn't want to make it too matchy-matchy, and I did really grow to like the natural wood colour while it sat in the living room waiting to be painted for a few months. So, this is what I did:

I used the same colour palette as for my desk: see the grey footsies? see the yellow pulls from Anthropologie? I wanted to accentuate the geometric lines of the wood, so I decided to paint stripes that would join up in the middle to form one HUGE chevron pattern. That was the initial plan. Oh how I overestimated my geometry skills. Oh how I forgot to take into account the fact that the doors would OVERLAP.

Yes.

So.

Anyway.

From this angle, it looks almost like chevrons. Right? Yes. Yes it does.

The tray is an easy way of hiding the ring mark that couldn't be saved with the mayonnaise trick

 Those two are so in love. Even Eames is a little jealous...

Neon envy

My recent tray table revamp has made me crazy. Crazy for neon. I officially crave colour.  Which do you like best? 

Found here

Found here

Found here

Found here

I simply can't decide

The hairy lantern

I'll admit I pinched this idea from Pinterest, though I can't seem to find it anywhere now. If I find the link I'll be sure to add it here. (Psssst! update! I just found the original here: http://www.designsponge.com/2011/03/weekly-wrap-up-paper-scrap-light.html)

Start with a boring Ikea paper lantern. (I haven't got a picture of one, but you know what I mean: white paper ball that costs 2 Euros).

Add about 50 sheets of A4 printing paper and a roll of tape. 

Take a pair of scissors and make sure you've got some episodes of The Big Bang Theory to watch

Cut away like a mad person for 2 days

Stick away like a bored person for 3 days

TA-DAAAA!

This is what it looks like when it's not centered above anything in particular:

 

And this is what it looks like after your handy boyfriend has spent 2 hours moving it along over the dining room table (also note that he finally put up the Japanese silk screen above the cocktail cart, YESSS!) :

 Everybody who walks into the room says it looks like a hairy or furry lantern, so this is now its official denomination.

The happy tray table

This weekend I finally got around to finishing my dear little tray table, and I think this is probably my favourite project so far. I can't stop smiling everytime I look at it! look:

This is what it used to look like before I sanded it and spent 2 weeks painting it white. I was going to go with a chevron pattern in gold or silver on the bottom of the tray, but then I was hit by neon. Wham! And I had to have some. So here it is:

Here it is again, with a bunny lamp, because no nightstand is complete without one:

And just because my bedroom is now my favourite room, here it is again:

*Yaaaaawn*
Time for bed!!

Headboard/ screen

This is a post about a sad old screen that my bf bought when we were dating to keep his cat out of his bedroom when I came to stay since I'm allergic. I must say, he made a pretty good choice. (I don't have any photos of his apartment at the time but let me just say you needed a box of Xanax just to build up the courage to walk DOWN the steps into the dark and damp underground grotto that he lived in). We inherited a lovely health bed from my Aunt but it came with a rather plain old headboard, so I decided to make maximum use of the screen. 

The pictures are quite personal without being too corny. I incorporated several foxes and rabbits (guess who is who in our household), the three postcards at the bottom came from the medieval museum in Paris, in the middle we have a reproduction of 'the kiss' by Klimt, as I was saying the other day, and I couldn't resist this cute play on words:

Hard to read from here, but the little poem is the second half of this.

Bits & bobs

Some little corners of my house that I really love

 

The first reader who spots the rabbit-free picture gets a..... errr.... free rabbit?

Chevron addiction

Hey!

another old revamp that I needed to post. Actually, make it two. Here is my official chevron series: 

 before

 after

 before

after

Weekend finds

I'm so glad it's brocante season again :D 

I found these treatures a couple of weeks ago on the East side of Paris. It was weird going to a flea market on the other side of the city yesterday only to find the same sellers! Paris is a village. 

 Check out the little set of polka cups and mugs ! (the green mug was being used for my tea!) They're Arcopal, so virtually unbreakable, and they are as happy as my kitchen! I think we paid €15 for the set. The little flower mug was another find, it's got it's own little tea strainer on the top. So cozy, so British, so cheap: €1

 Finally a white glass bud vase! I've been drooling at these on Etsy for ages but always on US shops, so although they're always cheap, you pay more for postage than for the actual vase. This was €3 so I'm glad I waited now!

I thought this would add some character to our bedroom and make it look slightly lees childish. It's an old poster from WW2 that reads "Silence, the ennemy is listening to your secrets", since our walls are paper thin it seemed appropriate. The navy and pale yellow are perfect for the room. €1!

Nightstand

I picked up this plain old nighstand for 3 Euro at a flea market right after we moved last year. It was just plain raw wood, all ready to be painted and I knew it would go perfectly in our guest room/office because of its slight Louis XVI vibe. 

I painted it a deep aurbergine purple and gave it a coat of varnish to protect it from scratches. I spent ages wondering whether to stencil it or use something like a potato stamp to add some bling. I was thinking little gold squares to match the lampshade in the office and the Klimt reproduction in the headboard (more on that later!!), but in the end I decided to just keep it simple.

Good enough for J.K. Rowling and Pushkin. And a little seashell from St Maarten!

Flower power

This is one of my older before & afters.

Just before we moved last year, we came across this old lampshade in someone's dustbin.

I hesitated for a couple of days thinking it wouldn't be worth the trouble (it's mostly cardboard and old fabric, some of the petals were quite damaged and it took a LOT of imagination to convince me), but its little face in that dustbin kept coming back to me... I couldn't resist !

 As you can see, it was gold inside and black on the outside. I wish I could have stuck with those colours because they really gave it a vintage 70's feel, but it wouldn't have looked good anywhere in our new place, so I decided to switch the gold to silver and the black to red (with a few of coats of white gesso inbetween). 

It's not perfect up close but it looks cute in its new home.

 Aren't you glad I rescued you, little flower?

Easter sales

                                      
                                


                            Some days are only good for shopping