Sunday, April 29, 2012

What is wrong with my style?

Did anyone else see the premiere of The White Room Challenge on HGTV Tuesday?



Oliver (my husband) and I watched it and was rather surprised with what they chose as the winner.  We could not believe that this room didn't win.





I mean these sconces made out of ivy are completely unique and stylish too.  Isn't that the point of the show.  Design a room using the items from the specific challenge (this time flowers) and still make it look good.




Why do we always pick the person that the judges hate.  Every season on Project Runway there will be some fantastic red and black dress that we love and the judges tear it apart.  Do we have bad taste?


What is wrong with this?


Or This?



Our style isn't for everyone, I guess.


Speaking of style that isn't for everyone, I can't wait for the finale of Rupaul's Drag Race.  I hope Sharon Needles wins. 





She is gothic and different and it doesn't hurt that she is from Pittsburgh.  Non traditional isn't a bad thing.


What a weird post.  HGTV, Project Runway and drag queens.  Just some insight into my weird baroque, gothic style.  Welcome to my strange world!




Bedroom Sneak Peek

Oliver and I love Ikea.  As you see our projects, you will notice a lot of our furniture has come from Ikea.

Oliver had already purchased the Malm bed and 2 Malm dressers before we met.

 Via


He added red handles to the dresser to go with the decor of the room.


In our bedroom remodel, we moved the one dresser out of the room and kept the tall dresser.  It looked like it needed something once we moved it to its new location.  So I thought an Ikea hack was in order.  We bought 2 Billy bookcases to flank the dresser.



We cut a 1x12 into 3 pieces and stained them black to match the Billy's.  Then attached them to the sides of each Billy giving it a built-in look.





(Sorry about the photos.  You'd think since I was a photographer, I would take better pictures.  I need a wide angle lens to be able to fit the whole thing in really.  Oh well!)

I added all of our Asian accessories that we have collected over the years.  The new items were the red fu dogs from target and an iPhone alarm clock that my fantastic hubby bought for my birthday at the beginning of the month.



The bottom shelves on each Billy are storage for Oliver's shoes.



Stay tuned for more projects from the bedroom.

Monday, April 23, 2012

Our Home

Here is our home.  My husband purchased this house before we met.  It had belonged to his sister.  When she moved out, he moved in.

My husband has great taste obviously (because he likes me).  But he had only focused on one room in the house, the bedroom.  I was surprisingly very happy with what he did to the room.  It just needed a little tweaking.  So a few months ago we decided to do the tweaking.  We took out the stained beige carpet and replaced it with a laminate floor in a medium brown wood.  We also took out the closet in order to rearrange the furniture to make space for additional closet space.  My clothes, sadly, were in another room in the house.  The bedroom is about 90 percent done and I will do a bedroom reveal as soon as it is complete.

The rest of the house was left the way my sister-in-law had left it.  She is more traditional than I am in her decorating.  My style is very modern baroque (hence the name of the blog).  So I wanted to make a lot of changes.

It has been a slow process, but most rooms have been at least started.  We have yet to touch the kitchen, bathroom and basement.  All of these rooms are on the list of upcoming projects.

I have before pictures of all of these rooms.  I will post them with each room reveal.

By the way, the outside of the house hasn't been touched either.  We have made a few landscaping changes in the yard.  But other than that, the outside of the house needs major work.  Sorry to subject you to the horrible picture of our house.



Saturday, April 21, 2012

My First Post

So after some contemplation, I have decided to start a design blog.  A vehicle to get my design projects out there for the world to see.  I am both scared and excited at the same time.  I am very passionate (or obsessed as my husband would say) about interior design.

I will show projects that we already completed plus new projects that are in the works.  I will show room reveals as well as design plans that my family has asked help with.

I will try to post as often as I can.  I hope you enjoy!