Has it been this long? I havent updated in a long time and when my notification about my upcoming hosting was soon to expire, I realized I kind of neglected this blog for a more frilly one filled with tablescapes, white dresses and ridiculously beautiful shoes.

Exciting news to share is that we got our Spencer Sofa in Urban Ink Tweed and Delano Chair in black leather from Gus Modern. We opted against the sectional because we have one upstairs in the casual bonus room and to ensure the room was left open via both sides.

Here they are in the living room. Don’t mind my iPhone pics and the absolute mess/clutter that we seem to enjoy living with.

Doesn’t it look better than our previous camel sofas?

I have to admit, I’ve fallen sick for the “re-upholstering item syndrome”. It’s absolutely amazing seeing the before and after shots after a chair or bench has been upholstered with a modern graphic, especially if it has a more traditional style/frame.

A couple weekends ago, Jason and I visited the Strathcona Antique Mall in Edmonton and set off to check out the furniture like we always do. But now that we have a house where we can put our purchases, it’s a lot more fun buying rather than envisioning what could be.

Immediately, I was drawn to a bright tangerine coloured chair in the back all by it’s lonesome. And as any wedding professional or interior designer would notice…”It’s in the pantone colour of the year!!!!!”. I squealed this with excitement as jason face-palmed still standing and wondering what the heck I was thinking in wanting this piece of furniture. In fact, when we purchased the item, we realized it didn’t fit in our car and had to drive home to pick up my dad’s van to get it. And the damage for this chair? $55. I thought it was steal.

Well, here it is!

It’s got nice lines. It’s clean, sleek and sort of mid-century modern-ish, which I love. I can say that what immediately drew me to it was it’s resemblence (or rather, the other way around) to the green truss chair from the latest line by Gus Modern. A piece I was eyeing for a while but couldn’t quite muster up the $1000 for something so simple.

The fact is, the wooden frame is still solid with minor cuts, but it just needs some TLC, oil and a new uphostery finish. Actually the foam itself has probably given way, but it’s still quite cushy and aside from the colour, the fabric itself is in good shape and all it needs is a good clean.

The bottom of the chair states that it was made by the “Global Upholstery Co. Ltd” which is based in Downsview, Ontario. We believe it was made in 1969 based on the label.

Now the debate is whether we can incorporate this tangerine chair into a colour scheme of one of the rooms. My guess is that it won’t, albeit a coworker of mine insists I should keep it the way it is. But I can imagine that it would be quite the stunner if I added a bold black and white stripe fabric..or yellow/white chevron pattern. Oh the possiblities.

And while I’ve tried to learn how to DIY the box foam upholstery myself, I think I’ll leave it to the professionals. But the question is, will the cost of upholstery end up costing us more than buying a new item on the market? Guess we shall see!

In other news, Jason’s really catching on because on Valentines Day, he bought me tangerine dyed roses and proclaimed “they’re pantone color of the year!” Oh love.

We’ve been without actual dining chairs since Jason moved out into his condo. For the time being, we were lucky enough to have 2 beige card table chairs from Jason’s grandmother. But with the house, we decided it would be nice to have chairs for guests to sit on. Until now we were moving each chair up and down the stairs when we needed to sit to do anything.

We wanted them to be
- comfortable
- fairly modern
- dark fabric

We wanted to go with the grey theme of the entire home, but wanted the fabric to be dark enough so that stains wouldn’t show as well. The winner? The Frank Chair by EQ3. We took advantage of a post boxing-week sale and after waiting 3 weeks, they were here!

The chrome legs and charcoal fabric match the overall home really well. And it’s funny, but Krista, one of my Wedding Obsession blog contributors suggested that Jason and I were more into the glam side of modern. I hadn’t really thought of it, but somehow these dining chairs are exactly that. But still minimalist in a way.

It’s been a while since I’ve last posted. Don’t I say that everytime?
Well, there’s a bit of urgency in today’s post because one of my favorite lines, Gus Modern (canadian!) is having a ‘give back’ sale and well, I’d love to take advantage of it. But then I’m stuck with the issue of “How do we organize our furniture?”

Obviously we have a budget we need to stick to, but any combination of items I bring up here will keep us within our bounds.

The living room. The focal point.

When you enter into the home, you immediately see the living room which is connected in the main space as the kitchen and dining nook. Here is the current simple version of the floorplan.

We have a fireplace/TV combo centered on one wall and a large 8 foot window on the left. On the right is some railing. Can you tell why we’re upgrading from our condo furniture? The current sofas are bulky and camel colored.

The potential pieces:

Sectional

We’ll also have a rug and coffee table, but that will come later.
The arm chair (delano) is a maybe. We do like the industrial/modern look of it.

We’ve already ruled out having a sofa in front of the window and a sofa in front of the railing like this:

It’s important that we sit facing the TV. And with the sofas that we want, we can’t get two..it would blow the budget out the water!

OPTION #1

This includes the sectional, coffee table and arm chair.

We thought about the sectional because we really like the look of the ones by Gus Modern. It’s contemporary and a good use of sitting space. The sectional takes up majority of the space. THe good news is that it’s fairly low visually with clean lines. And the long portion without the arm is found on the left side of the sofa just below the 8 feet wide windows so that the view isn’t blocked.

However, it does restrict the size of coffee table, one which I’ve already fallen in love with. And what are your thoughts about seemingly restricting the left side entrance into the living room? Of course, it would bjust be from the nook or kitchen. Inately, you’d want to enter the room from the right. I threw in the arm chair on the right at an angle since there’s some empty space there and it would be nice to bring in another element to the room. But it does seem sort of cramped in the space.

OPTION #2

Here, symmetry comes into play. The spencer sofa has a mid-century modern feel that we absolutely love and the sofa itself has a sense of formality to it. ONe thing we wanted was for the sofa to face the TV so that we weren’t sitting on the sides turning our heads.

There is overall less restriction and there is access via both sides of the room and seems a bit more open.

OPTION #3

Essentially option #2, but replacing the armchair (in front of the window) with a daybed/bench or another armchair with less of a footprint. Or maybe have 2 armchairs next to each other in front of the railing?

This brings up an issue I’ve been struggling with. Does the furniture in a room have to be symmetrical? You normally see designers do things in “two”.

Enough rambling! Any help would be much appreciated.

One of the things I was looking forward to doing when I had a house was to hang a wreath. Silly, I know. Well, I searched everywhere for the perfect wreath and I think I found it! It’s simple, white and kind of modern. It looks so nice next to the dark front door. I picked it up at the Bay for just under $30 and I think I’ll be using it for years to come. J likes it too, so that’s even better. I forgot to mention that the wires or pipe-cleaner-type material is absolutely covered in glitter. It sparkles but it leaves sparkles on just about everything as well. It’s pretty so we’ll forgive it.

-M

The first thing we did before we had furniture was put the Christmas tree up. Talk about priorities!

The thing is pretty tall. I’d say about 7 feet. We actually bought it when we were still in the condo. The 75% discount post-xmas convinced us to buy then and enjoy later. I’m pretty happy with the blue + silver colours and thrilled at the white sparkle snowflakes that I forgot to return (oops), work perfectly on the tree. J wishes the tree was multi-colored but I’ve had to convince him it should be filled with style..for the time being :)

We have to admit, we’re very behind on our posts. As we said before, life just got in the way…but that’s a good thing. Sort of. You see, we’ve been dealing with a lot of issues with the home and well, it’s time we stopped neglecting this blog because you’re likely wondering how everything is going!

So I might backtrack a bit and try to post as if I am sharing the photos the day we took them. Play along?

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We are so thrilled to have moved into the home but here are some photos that we took when we had possession but did not have furniture in yet. Sorry for the poor quality..it’s the iphone again.

A couple things to note:

The backsplash is glass tile. I know it look’s like porcelain strips in the photos.
The walls appear more blue in the photos and in person. Ugh. Grey is such a hard color to get right. But it’ll do!

I just wanted to give a quick update, since it has been a while and I really wanted to build this blog, but somehow life got in the way.

We moved in on Saturday thanks to the help of some fabulous friends. We can’t thank them enough. And naturally, the house is now full with boxes. Hopefully for not too long but likely until we get furniture to hold everything!

There are still some things that need to be fixed by the trades

- Cabinet (absolute nightmare – microwave trim kit doesn’t fit because the cabinets somehow aren’t straight? Oh and the side piece by the fridge has to be replaced because it was nailed into the waterline. Yikes)
- Tile needs to be replaced by the island
- Quartz needs to be polished (DONE)
- Light needs to be replaced
- Electrical is a gong show upstairs. The cables and phone lines upstairs don’t connect to the basement. Yikes, yet again.
- Paint touch-ups (DONE)
- Grouting in the backsplash

So in essence, there’s still a lot to do. And right now I’ve held off on putting things on the entire side of the kitchen wall because they may need to reconfigure it. Ugh.

I have photos of what I’m talking about along with our ‘loaner’ fridge & stove (that’s another story….)

Anticipation is nice isn’t it?

-M

It will definitely be a while before we can fully decorate our house. Money and time are the primary reasons with the former being number 1 on the list.

But I had to stop and wonder exactly what style I preferred in terms of decor.

I’ve shown styles to J over the years and he always has the same answer “meh..”
He doesn’t seem to have an opinion, as long as it’s not girly and frilly. The house is quite masculine, so in a way, we need to soften up the space.

Now the reason why I’m saying that I have a style identity crisis is because I seem to have an affinity for multiple styles. Mid-century modern, contemporary, industrial and a couple more. But what’s interesting to me, is that I also love thick traditional upper moulding which often lends itself to a very french chic aesthetic.

First off, mid-century modern. I LOVE. I LOVE. I LOVE. J is also a fan of this. Clean, straight lines and minimalist to an extent. Our dream, of course, was to purchase a house built in the 50′s or 60′s and fix it up with some modern touches. Bungalows, wood paneling on the ceilings..etc. Our new house is definitely far from it. I absolutely adore teak. I am a sucker for danish furniture with the wooden tapered legs. I adore anything eames and wish my father kept all his previous furniture which fit the era so perfectly.

Here are a couple pictures that particularly resonate with me.

{images: 1, 2, 3, 4}

Second is industrial. Concrete floors, concrete beams, grey/white/black palettes and loads of metal. In a way, we’ve tried to bring this style into the home. Stainless steel appliances throughout and concrete-style wall for the fireplace. J would say that this is probably his favorite interior style of all. But with it is a lack of warmth, in my opinion.

{images: 1, 2}

And the style that keeps tugging at me and likely will take over, if not already is…contemporary chic? I don’t exactly know how to describe it. Upon further thought, could it be that it’s a mix of the aforementioned styles? Clean, minimalist lines with a contemporary edge? A mix of mid-century modern + industrial?
The pictures speak for themselves.

{images: 1, 2, 3}

I think we’re going to incorporate a little bit of every style and hopefully it comes together seamlessly instead of looking like a kid with no fashion sense.

Lest we forget 11.11.11…

J is working today so I’m working on the website. But being the procrastinator that I am, I decided to do a couple posts on Bumpy because been neglected these past few weeks. But for good reason.

A) Condo is SOLD. Just 5 days on the market, an offer came in. There were of course conditions on the offer and my understanding is that they’ve been met. The buyer doesn’t want to move into the condo until early December, so that will give us some time to pack, move out and clean-up.

B) We get possession of the house on Wednesday! The walk-through is scheduled for that afternoon, and we’ll likely not move in until the end of November. Appliances will be coming in next Saturday. I’ll try to document that process.

BUT, as with anything in this new build, we’ve come across a snag. A rude snag.

I’m not sure if I want to write about it here until we take full possession, but I will say that the builder (who I will NEVER recommend ever) fought with us on an issue that we brought up during negotiations. We were told only the home owners would be allowed to do the final inspection. We already informed them during negotiations that we would be bring a family member to the inspection but apparently there was a change in policy and this was no longer the case. However, when putting the onus on them to find a clause in the contract that states we cannot bring anyone else, they couldn’t come up with anything. Suffice to say, they allowed this family member to accompany us to the inspection, with the conditions that we agree to 4 terms.

I won’t delve into the terms, but I will say that they are rude. Beyond a doubt. They’ve already jumped to conclusions about us based on past bad experiences and are essentially on a power-trip because they know they’re wrong. Brutally wrong.

Let’s hope the inspection goes well. Fingers crossed.

-M