For example, here are some of my home decor loves.... part of me would LOVE to live within the coziness of the Weasley Burrow:
I absolutely love the vintage Mid-Century loveliness of The Incredible Nest:
(Can you tell I have kids?) :-)
Sometimes I can see the appeal of living inside a Bass Pro:
I LOVE the glam-y-ness that Tori Spelling decorates her homes with:
I am completely inspired by the craftsmanship and beauty that comes from the Arts&Crafts era:
I find instant comfort in 70s decor since I was brought into this world surrounded by orange shag carpet, dark wood tones and mustard yellow refrigerators:
But mostly I would LOVE to sell my house and move my family into a Gypsy Wagon:
Or into an Anthropologie catalog:
.... And the list keeps going. I would say, though, that my overall style could be described by one blanket term: "Bohemian". So basically that is giving me the permission to combine elements from all of the above styles and although they may not "match" they "go-with" each other. I love rich colors, textures and patterns and I love them to all be in the same space but also be aesthetically pleasing all together. I might even be creating my own style here, but as long as I am happy with it, then so be it.
As most of you know, I make everything... and if I can cut my costs or reuse or up-cycle something (or all of the above) that will be my 1st choice. In this case, I need new bedding. And when I say need, I mean, I want something more stylish than what I currently have. I keep trying to come up with an idea of a comforter/quilt for the bed, but I am drawing a blank. I have been scouring the Internet for something.... anything that will provide some inspiration or at very least a direction. So far, nothing!!! So I am trying a new approach...... I am going to start from the ground up.
The bed skirt, dust ruffle... whatever you want to call it is 1st to go. If I had wood floors I would get a platform bed and this wouldn't be an issue but I have carpet, which I hate, so I try to cover up as much of it as possible. My bedroom is painted a dark red color and previously I had a Red/Green/Black/Cream color scheme going..... I know that sounds like Santa's outfit, but it worked much better than it seems. A year or 2 ago, I painted my master bathroom a turquoise/aqua/robin's egg-ish color (we will call it Pool), which threw off the entire color scheme in my bedroom. So now the colors are Red/Pool/Black/Cream... I have even considered throwing in mustard, but that is beside the point. The point is, my bedding is still "rustic" greens and cream and my dust ruffle is a Hunter Green color.
A while ago I saw this image from Urban Outfitters and I was inspired by the "duvet-cover-laying-over-creating-what-looks-like-a-bed-skirt":
I even like the floral duvet, too bad they don't make any of their bedding in king size. Anyhow, I bought fabric to "sort of" replicate the look of this "bed skirt", but then I kinda thought that this would be a little too much Pool color in the bedroom so it has been on hold for months. The other day I had this vision of combining the pool fabric with a woven hounds tooth, or something similar, and I have been a crazy maniac trying to get that accomplished ever since. This isn't hounds tooth, but this is near exactly what I was envisioning (woven fabric on top, pool fabric peeking out on the bottom):
I LOVE... the only problem is that the woven black and white fabric is a scarf... that isn't big enough to go around the entire bed. I could buy similar fabric but that would take forever to find and would get really expensive. So then I thought maybe I could find a few cheap-ish woven throws that I could cut up and convert and I found this throw from ikea:
It has a similar look and would probably work, and I really like the fringe. I am planning on a Chicago trip this year, so I wouldn't have to pay shipping and at $12.99, this seems pretty inexpensive. But, when I start measuring and adding up, I am going to end up needing 4 maybe even 5 throws... and suddenly it is no longer inexpensive. So I started experimenting:
Left over micro fleece fabric in charcoal. A little too plain for my taste.... so I thought I might gussy it up a bit. I had some leftover super chunky yarn and I had a crochet trim pattern in mind for a future project so what the heck:
Another fail. This one is a little too "fancy" and just isn't anywhere close to the look that I want. So I scrapped the polar fleece and decided to go with all yarn, and if I use up all of my scrap yarns in the chosen colors, it could save quite a bit of money:
Bingo! I love the way it looks, it's funky/handmade/vintage-inspired/retro/eclectic and ME. Biggest downfall: it is going to take me forever to crochet pieces to go around 3 sides of my ginormous bed.... this little 12" wide piece took me a good 45 minutes to crochet. Another downfall: even though I have a ton of yarn, I don't have a TON in these colors. So that means that I would have to purchase some yarn and since I am crocheting, that means I will have to buy a lot of yarn. However, since this is a bed skirt, I don't care what the content of the yarn is... so I can go with the junkiest/cheapest of yarns to get this guy accomplished.... but I still have to buy a lot of it. Unfortunately, there is no way of knowing exactly how much yarn I will wind up needing so I can either jump in feet first or I can scrap it and start looking at other options.
Suggestions? I am going for a black/white/gray/cream color scheme (with the hint of pool color from the fabric that I already have). I figure if I keep with those non-colors, it will expand the range of patterns and colors that I can use for the future comforter/quilt. I would like it to be rich with texture without looking too fancy or girly. Help??? Please??? Anyone??? :-)
On a side note: It might seem handy to be "crafty" but as I might have just demonstrated, it is most of the time extremely exhausting and frustrating..... although, I wouldn't change it for the world ;-)
4 comments:
I think you have some cool ideas... I am in dire need of bedroom make-over myself so i can relate!
I hear ya girl!! Well, from looking at ur pics, honestly I like the scarf look best. could you just buy a couple, cut them in half maybe since u won't see under the bed?? I found this one, its cheap and its 42 x 42.... Im just thinking it would take so long to crochet it and you don't know how much you'll wind up spending!? - boo
http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_SPM1264567001P?sid=IDx20101019x00001a&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=SPM1264567001 oops here is the link
OMG, Bets!!!! That scarf looks almost identical to the one that I have... and the one I have was my mom's and she probably bought it in the 80s!!! The scarf look is my fave too and you are right, I have been dreading the crochet part of it because it would take me forever. Thanks so much for your help, I am totally getting these!!!
Post a Comment