Need to write!

Well, I never did do a reveal for my hallway makeover.  Why?  Partly because immediately after finishing I welcomed my Chinese student into my home and the disaster that followed sorta killed my enthusiasm.  Also I kinda wanted to have a completely finished look before I showed off my efforts, but that includes the potential for a stencil that I fell in love with but seems way over priced to my mind.

Today’s reveal is for the entryway (gee, how’d you guess?  Perhaps it was in the title??).  Back in November of last year I made a post about drift wood my parents had pickup for me on one of their many travels around the provence.  After “curing” the wood in the basement for most of the summer I finally got around to prepping the wood.  

You can read all about the “build” here, but here’s a brief photo review.

Inspiration photo (source)

After assembly, the future coat rack sat idle in my basement until just a few days ago.  What was the hold up?  I had a vision that wouldn’t settle for compromises.  I wanted something light and airy, whimsical even, and fun to go with the casual look of the driftwood.  I’d seen a few potential hooks in my travels, bent forks and spoons made into hook shapes but those seemed like they wouldn’t hold up if faced with a heavy coat.  I thought about antique glass door knobs but didn’t feel like paying full antique prices.  And finally, I thought about glass knobbed hooks.  What I found of the latter was too expensive in my mind, so I kept on the lookout for something cheaper but in keeping with this idea.  

In the end I couldn’t find anything cheaper than $10/hook (less 25% when you buy two or more) so I just said F$%@ it and bought four hooks and when I laid them out on the driftwood I felt a deep sense of satisfaction of my idea realized.  It was so beautiful, too!

The hooks are just the right side of whimsy that I wanted and they don’t over power the look of the driftwood, nor do they clash with it.

I have a beautiful double folding chair that I have placed in what used to be the entryway closet (that closet has moved here).  It had to be removed temporally while my father and I wrangled the driftwood into place.  I used painter’s tape to make a template for the wall (which I failed to take a picture of but see Younghouselove for the general idea).  Here’s a quick sample of YHL incase you’re too lazy to click through:

And once it was up I was so pleased with the effect!  I can’t wait to add my planed accent color as a future to-be-decided stencil to the opposite wall.  Since I’m going for a beachy theme in my house colors, I shopped my stuff and decided this shadow box of Blue Jay feathers I had collected over the years deserved a front and centre home on top of the little ledge.  I also like how the Indigo book bag spices things up a bit with the lovely cream and peach colors.  But check out the look for yourselves!

I then added a free enamel pitcher I got at last year’s town yard sale and a baby pegesus figurine just because.  After putting it up both dad and I had to double check the level-ness of the shelf.  And despite declaring it level the eye reads it as being off kilter.  We decided this was because the wood itself isn’t plum anymore after the extended soak in the ocean and so we didn’t worry about it further.  

Cost break down:

Wood:  free
Hooks: $10 x 4 less 25% when buying two or more = $30
Hanging hardware: approx $5 for a pack of two brackets.  
Decorations: free

Total cost of awesomeness: $35!!!!  

Anyone have any idea what something similar would possibly cost in a store?   

Here we go, second try at posting my hallway update =_= color me impressed.  You should have seen the post that got eaten *sobs*  But I will persevere because cause that’s just the way I roll today.

I also updated my info bar to include quick links to my tagged entries by room in case anyone would like to look at certain rooms.  FYI

Well, to the post then!  When I first moved in the hall closet looked like this:

Jade especially liked the old system for the perching opportunities it presented.

Once she was up there, where it was hard to reach for her, she was impossible to get back down.  I’d show you the scars but then again, maybe you’d rather not see them.

Beside the filing cabinet was a small space for coats, above was a bit of storage, but overall the space was dysfunctional at best.  I got my brother and father to move the filing cabinet to the basement.  Maybe one day I could make over the cabinet like others have done.  But that’s a project for another blog post.

[source: apartmenttherapy.com]

Once the demo of the hallway (get caught up on that here) began back at the tail end of summer 2011 the hallway looked so much better as a void then it did while the previous owners used it.

All the closets have the Rubbermaid Configurations system, but the hallway closet was even smaller than the bedrooms so installation of the Configurations required a bit of jigging but it all worked out beautifully!  Sometimes I just open the closet to look at it and see how better it looks!  It’s full of light with the wire shelving, and there’s as much storage as before, and it’s better utilized.  I can store my unused coats there along with guest coats.  Below I can store mom’s old sewing machine and my vacuum cleaner.  

The wall is right at my back and it’s hard to get a good shot of the closet without getting closet door in the way.  The nice thing about this system is I can rearrange the shelves for greater usability.  The shelves pretty much stayed the way they were set up since installation but there is room for improvement such as lowering the smaller shelf to allow larger containers to go above.  

Every weekend my parents go around the province to explore, to see the sights or to visit places like a mom and pop bakery in the country.  Sometimes they surprise me with stuff!  Over the summer my parents scored me an awesome selection of drift wood boards. 

I have no idea what I want to do with the pillar of wood but some of the boards I knew that I wanted to make shelves out of them using simple L-brackets just like it shows over on Design*Sponge here (locations to be determined around the house).

The tree branches are large enough—maybe—to drill holes the size of tea lights and destined to be centrepieces for the table.  They might be too shallow to drill for a tealight so I haven’t gotten that far.

It took me all summer before I could start to think about using this wood.  I had to let it cure inside, in the basement.  I’ve also seen around the internet that people cure the wood in the oven to speed things up, ‘cooking’ the wood at a low temp over many, many hours (the pieces I had were too big to put in the oven to cook).  I didn’t bookmark any of those particular links, but if your google-fu is strong you should be able to suss them out pretty easily.  

Now that the wood has had enough time to dry out, and let any critters living in the wood to die off (hopefully :S), I can start to make use of the wood.  

I knew I wanted to emulated Dana’s entryway where she converted a coat closet into seating and organizational space for her kids.  The bench I wanted to use in my own entryway was too long so I wound up find an alternative chair.

(source: here)

There was one board that I knew was meant for the entryway of my re-done hallway.  I just had to DIY it.  

The board with the notch in it was exactly the same size if I cut it right at the notched edge.  Then the smaller half of the board would become the top, or shelf where small display item could go and the larger board would form the back of the coat rack.  After dad chopped them up it looked like this.

I knew that once the board was up you wouldn’t be able to see the screws attaching the shelf to the coat rack back so I let dad fly with the drill.  I think he had fun judging by the amount of colorful language dad used when doing this project. =_=

I think dad used four inch screws, maybe longer.  They were as long as my finger anyway.  He pre-drilled the holes (only after he stripped three screws when he thought the wood would be soft enough to forgo that step) and countersunk the holes.  Even doing that though, the wood wasn’t soft at all!  the first few centimetres were weathered but the inside was still very, very good.  

So, more colorful language…

I plan to attach this rack to the wall with these Flush Wall Mount Brackets.  They come with two interlocking brackets per pack along with screws.

After it was all assembled the resulting coat rack was freaking heavy.  I’m kinda worried now that these brackets won’t be able to handle the weight but I don’t have to worry about that juuuust yet.  First I got to source out some whimsical coat hooks.  Home Depot and Kent just aren’t doing it for me in the whimsy department, so I’m looking around online, but no luck yet.  I’d like the hook to have some glass knobs or something of that nature.  The rack won’t go up until I’ve installed that hardware first.  Dad only has so many colorful words per day….

The finished product (so far…)

Total cost of this project?  Nothing.  Everything was found or on hand!  (except for future coat hooks)

With a new house guest/student/roommate about to move in in under a month the push is on to finish the hallway.  What first seemed to be a simple job somehow morphed into a big one.  I’m not sure my dad or I really saw how much trim needed to be prepped for painting until the sanding began.  Luckily the entryway had been done for a while now.  Back when the wallpaper was coming down for the second bedroom, the entryway was done as well.  One less thing to do \o/

Dad took on the sanding as his project.  You can’t argue with the man (tho I often do—my project, dad, my say!).  Sometimes it’s better to just let him do his thing and say out of the way.  Sometimes I really want to learn so I make him go slow, talk it out and go slow.  So hard for him >_< 

It was going to be a dusty affair and no way was I going to let that travel through the house freely, so up go the plastic sheets. 

The painter’s tape was not the best thing to hold up the plastic, so I nailed the sheets to the wall with small finishing nails.  I knew we’d make our way into the other rooms so it could be fixed, I wasn’t too concerned about that.  Then the painter’s tape just made sure that plastic didn’t blow around too much.  It’s not perfect, there is still dust over my other furniture, but not as much as there would be without the plastic.  The doors to the bathroom, and both bedrooms were kept closed and after each sanding session I break out the vacuum and do the best job I can at getting the dust up.

The wire disappearing into the wall goes to the thermostat on the other side.  Why couldn’t the guy do it right the first time >:S 

Doors to closets came off so they could be sanded and painted too.  All the hinges and other things came off as well.  The closet rods, both in the closet shown above and the one in the entry way have been removed.  For the closet above I’ll install some organizer.  Since the Hobbit door is pretty much my main entrance the above closet will be for guest’s coats and storage. 

Dad hard at work

It kinda sucks that the baseboards and the trim are just Douglas Fur and the stain is so old, makes it difficult to get the stain off.  If only the wood was nicer then I might consider not painting it, but it’s not, so I am.  I still haven’t picked out a color.  I still have time, a little.  Everything needs to be primed and the ceiling and trim are enough to distract us for the time being. 

In a fit of I-don’t-want-to-sit-around-all-night…something, I started to peel the wallpaper off the walls in the hallway from the front door.  

Have I mentioned that my whole house was wallpapered?  Yup, it is.  The living room and the space I use as a dinning room are just textured wallpaper, but everywhere else is floral *yay* (<- enthused cheering O_o) which means I have the distinct pleasure of taking it all down. *double yay*  I’m sure in its day it was very now but all I see is someone else whenever I look at it.  I need to put my own stamp on things, so that means taking it all down.

When I moved in this was the state of things:

When my parents and I worked on the second bedroom we took down the paper in the enterway but left the hallway for later (I thought I had pics of this, but I don’t.  I will try to remember to take some).  The entryway remains unpainted to this day.

So, here’s a close up of the wallpaper before it came down.

It’s not bad, but it’s not what I’d want (again with the bad photography >_<.  flash did not improve the picture any).  In case it does not read well on other computers, the background is a textured cream and as you see, there are flowers. hooray \o/… not, =_=

After my paper ripping extravaganza is looked like this:

So, this paper is old by about ten to fifteen years, maybe more.  It comes off fairly easy, but you need to peel off the ‘top’ part of the paper (ie the pattern) and then come back after with a bucket of water to encourage the glue to come up and thus take of the back half of the paper.  Then you have to wash the walls down with TSP.  I know this is considered a toxic material and it’s recommend that one not work with it, but there’s no other way to remove the gunk.  Peeling off the paper has revealed many hidden holes from past picture placements.  

I’ve yet to settle on a color for the hallway.  It’s rather dark being sequstered in the middle of the house and the only access to outside light coming from the front door.  I thought, though, that something like this might be nice to do.

*pst-take a look at some of the rooms I’ve completed already.  My bedroom, the second bedroom, the hallway downstairs, and the upstairs bathroom which I have never really blogged about (but included carpet removal and shower curtain installation).