One Room Challenge: Week 5

This project was created in a partnership with the One Room Challenge Sponsors!  

All ideas and opinions are my own!

Welcome back friends! The One Room Challenge week 5 is here and so much fun stuff happened this week! After we completed installing all of our Metrie millwork, there was still so much prep work that needed to be done before we could paint. We filled all the nail holes with wood putty, sanded, and sanded some more. We were waiting on a few more pieces to come for the wall so we went ahead and installed our wood floors. This meant that we had to tape those off too to make sure paint didn’t get on the new floors. All of this prep was leaving us feeling like we needed a smoothie break! (Peanut butter chia to be exact)

one room challenge

Once all of the prep work was finished, we were ready to paint, and boy was I ready to paint. I mean, READY, READY! Let’s get this show on the road!

one room challenge

Isn’t painting so satisfying? It is such a quick change in such a short period of time. I decided to paint my walls the same color I am doing on the moulding in the rest of my home, Dunn Edwards: Whisper. This is a nice soft white without too much yellow or blue undertone.

I love once everything is freshly painted and it is time to rip off the tape, this is also very satisfying for me.  Maybe I am a little strange, but I love it! Just look how pretty everything is once we got it all painted. It is even more gorgeous in person, I promise!

What does one do with a pretty room like this? Well, start adding in all the pretty furniture of course! This is my most favorite part (aside from building the furniture).  Seeing all the finishing touches going in makes it worth all the hard work.  Here I am with a piece of my dining table from The Mine that I am starting to put together! It was actually pretty easy. About ten bolts and it was all together.

one room challenge

Gosh, it is so hard, I want to show you more but there is still so much to be done. I will leave you with this little snippet of what I have done so far. Don’t forget to come back next week for the final reveal and all the details on each piece and why I chose each one.

one room challenge

This rug from All Modern couldn’t be anymore perfect for my space! It has all the colors I love, fits my room perfectly and it is very soft under your feet. I am completely obsessed with it and I highly recommend it! It is a match made in heaven with my dining table!

See you next week,

P.S. My pillow fabric from Fabricut came in too!!

 

Centsational Girl | Chris Loves Julia | Christine Dovey | Dwell With Dignity | The English Room

Glitter Guide | House of Brinson | House Updated  | J+J Design Group | Lark & Linen | Abby Manchesky

Nesting Place | Old Brand New | Old Home Love | The Pink Pagoda | Rambling Renovators

Erica Reitman | Sketch 42 | Suburban B’s | Erin Williamson  Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by CIH

One Room Challenge: Week 4

This week is shaping up to be pretty much more of what we were doing last week. Mill work, millwork and more millwork!! I have to say I am pretty obsessed with the way this wall treatment is turning out. I mean, stacking baseboards on the wall is a little bit of a crazy idea but the texture is amazing. I can’t wait to see all the pretty pops of color I have popping off of this awesome background. My mouldings and doors are all from Metrie and with their whole line of products, there is no stunting your creativity!

Check out the way the wood juts in and out and creates this cool texture.

One Room Challenge Week 4 wall detail

Another exciting thing that happened this week is that our wood floors went in. I feel like we are finally getting over the hump and it should be pretty much smooth sailing from now on (fingers crossed that is).

One Room Challenge Week 4

We still have quite a bit of caulking, sanding, filling holes and painting to do. After we finish the painting, we will install the hardware on the doors and the lighting. I am so excited to install this beauty I found at Crystorama! I just love the mix of the white and gold in this fixture. I feel like lighting is the jewelry to the perfect dress. It can really make or break a room. It is also important to have the correct scale when it comes to lighting. You don’t want to have a large table with a tiny chandelier. This chandelier is nice and large and will be oh so gorgeous over my new dining table!Crystorama Gold and White chandelier

I have a few items I have been wavering on the last few weeks. I couldn’t decide how I wanted to do the drapery. White drapery vs. blush drapery…. What is a girl to do? At first I was thinking I may just go white and have them blend into the wall and be very subtle. My heart was telling me blush pink ( I am currently obsessed) but will I tire of it? Well, life is about taking design risks right? I’m going with the blush…. I think! I found these great ones at The Shade Store, what do you think, pink or white?

 

This room has definitely been a group effort, but none of this would be possible without my amazing husband Dave that is always down with my crazy ideas. He is going to need a nice long vacation once our remodel is done!

 

So I leave you with this, unpainted walls and dirty floors. Two more weeks until the final reveal and I promise you it won’t disappoint. I may have even smuggled a tray I found while local shopping in Seattle home in my suitcase because it was just too perfect not to pass up for the coffee table. Until next update my friends!

XO,

Follow along with all my fellow Challengers!

Centsational Girl | Chris Loves Julia | Christine Dovey | Dwell With Dignity | The English Room

Glitter Guide | House of Brinson | House Updated  | J+J Design Group | Lark & Linen | Abby Manchesky

Nesting Place | Old Brand New | Old Home Love | The Pink Pagoda | Rambling Renovators

Erica Reitman | Sketch 42 | Suburban B’s | Erin Williamson  Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by CIH

One Room Challenge: Week 3

This project was created in a partnership with the One Room Challenge Sponsors!  

All ideas and opinions are my own!

One Room Challenge Week 3 is here! We have made so much progress so far! We have mostly been working on our Metrie moulding details. Our entire room is room is completely covered in wood moulding so naturally that is taking up the majority of our time. We were almost finished, and ran short on the base moulding we are using for the walls. We really wanted to get all the wall moulding and window moulding up so we could fill the nail holes and get it painted. It is generally best to paint your walls before you install your flooring. We may need to go to plan B and start laying the floor this week so we can stay on track with our timeline. This just creates a little more work for ourselves since we will have to mask off the whole floor before painting the walls.

Here are some more shots of the work we have completed.

One room challenge Week 3 Progress picture

How cool are these walls? I mean, c’mon!!!

One Room Challenge Baseboard detail on walls

And let’s not forget about these gorgeous Metrie doors!

One Room Challenge Week 3 Metrie Fashion Forward Doors

I wanted to keep the columns simple so they wouldn’t compete with the wall detail. Yes, those glass block windows are on their way out. This isn’t the only room in the house with problems, haha!

When we eliminated what was to be the formal dining room in our new house and made it into a walk in pantry and mud room, (something that was high on my list when looking for our new home)  I decided to turn the formal living room into a Living Room/ Dining Room. This way, we had one room in our home dedicated to formal entertaining instead of two rooms dedicated to it. Let’s be honest here, we don’t have a whole lot of extra time to host dinner parties and sit around with our friends (uninterrupted by children) sipping on cocktails and talking about world affairs. I mean, this isn’t the 50’s.  Although all those things sound great, we hardly use our current dining room or living room on a day to day basis. It is nice to have it for the holidays and the occasional dinner party. This room is one of the first ones you see when you enter our new home so it better be pretty right?

Here is the space plan I came up with to accomplish that goal. This space plan is perfect to sit with friends, read a book, do some homework with the kids and family game night. Not to mention a holiday dinner a few times a year.

One room challenge week 3 floorplan layout

Since the room was long, I was able to create two separate areas. I made the room feel cohesive with this very large rug I found at All Modern. When I design a room, I always love to start with what we like to call a “lead”. A lead fabric, painting, rug, pillow or artwork are good examples of color palettes already pulled together so you can pull several colors from them to use in your space.

The rug from All Modern was the “lead” in my design because it had all the colors I wanted to incorporate in the room. It also had almost all my favorite colors so when I saw it, I knew that was exactly what I had been looking for. The rug comes in a very unusual size of 10′-6″ x 16′-5″ so it was perfect for my entire space. It will really make the room feel cohesive and marry both areas together although they have separate functions. I think I almost died when I received it at my doorstep, it is so gorgeous!

One Room Challenge Week 3 Dining Room plans

 

1.Fuji Pink Area Rug: All Modern | 2. Fiddle Leaf Fig indoor plant |

3.Carrera Dining Table: The Mine

I am also very excited about the dining table I found at ATG Stores. The Carrera marble top and the brass legs is the perfect addition to my room. I can see many a turkey dinner or birthday being celebrated at this very table!

I found something a little unexpected for my dining chairs. I scored a major deal on the chairs from a liquidation warehouse in Phoenix. A friend of mine saw them for sale on Facebook and I scored 6 of them. They still need a new coat of paint but they are so cool and so comfortable!

Total Dining Room Chair score at the warehouse sale

Aren’t they bananas!!! I scored them for $20.00 each too!!

Once we get through this week, we will get to my favorite part which is bringing in the pretty furniture. Stay tuned to see what transpires and be sure to follow along with all my uber talented fellow challengers below.

XO,

Centsational Girl | Chris Loves Julia | Christine Dovey | Dwell With Dignity | The English Room

Glitter Guide | House of Brinson | House Updated  | J+J Design Group | Lark & Linen | Abby Manchesky

Nesting Place | Old Brand New | Old Home Love | The Pink Pagoda | Rambling Renovators

Erica Reitman | Sketch 42 | Suburban B’s | Erin Williamson  Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by CIH

One Room Challenge: Week 2

This project was created in a partnership with the One Room Challenge Sponsors!  

All ideas and opinions are my own!

Really?! How is it week 2 already? So much to do, so little time! I am feeling good though so far, one thing I know for sure is that everything takes longer than you think it will!! First thing is first, we had to demo the space, and by that I mean remove the existing nasty carpet, take down the short doors, and get rid of those hideous rounded columns. Oh, and don’t forget that awful tile YIKES!!!

Here is a picture after we finished the demolition. Look how open the room is now! Isn’t that crazy?

 One Room Challenge Week 2 Progress

The demo took about a day, then we had to pour the concrete for the steps that were missing where we ripped out the columns. I don’t know about you, but I love to tear out old and dated architectural elements.

After we filled in the steps we built out smaller square columns since we still had to hid a bit of duct work in the right column. We had a little re-wiring to do as well.

Next up was raising the header height on the doors. I love to do this any chance I get in a room. The taller doors bring your eye up and really make the room feel more grand. It can actually be a fairly easy thing to do, as long as the door way isn’t structural like mine is. As long as your ceiling is 9′ or taller, you can definitely fit in an 8′ door.

Raising Header Height on Doorway

I selected these gorgeous doors from Metrie’s Fashion Forward collection. I dreamt that one day I would have doors this beautiful in my home, thanks to the One Room Challenge, my dreams are coming true. Do you know what the best part is? They lead right into my home office so I will see these beauties everyday! I will be finishing them off with some gorgeous Emtek brass hexagon door knobs, they are like jewelry to the perfect dress!

 

Metrie Fashion Forward Doors

Photo credit: Metrie.com

It is not a secret that we love moulding over here at J&J! Working with Metrie, whom has such gorgeous door and moulding selections was so much fun. I wanted to create a “shiplap” look but with a twist. I found a baseboard that had an interesting profile and stacked it on top of each other to create this cool detail on the walls. We also cased out the windows with a more simple moulding to offset the wall detail. Here is a sneak peek of what we have so far. Once we caulk and paint, it’s going to be BANANAS!!!!!!

One Room Challenge| Metrie wall Detail | J&J Design Group

Let’s dig in a little bit and see what I am going to be doing with furniture in this fine One Room Challenge shall we? Like I mentioned in my Week 1 post, I like to design with a neutral back drop and pop in color. Here is a teaser with a few of the products I am using in my room. Let me know what you think!!

J&J Design Group | One Room Challenge Week 2

Sources:

1 Navy Velvet Chair : All Modern | 2 Lucite Coffee Table: Lamps Plus | 3 Chandelier: Crystorama |

4 Custom Pink Pillow| 5 Brushed Brass Knobs: Emtek | 6 French Doors: Metrie |7 Artwork: Parima Studio

 Can you feel it? Feel it starting to come together…… Oh my, I am so excited!!

Don’t forget to follow along with my fellow challengers below!

XO,

Centsational Girl | Chris Loves Julia | Christine Dovey | Dwell With Dignity | The English Room

Glitter Guide | House of Brinson | House Updated  | J+J Design Group | Lark & Linen | Abby Manchesky

Nesting Place | Old Brand New | Old Home Love | The Pink Pagoda | Rambling Renovators

Erica Reitman | Sketch 42 | Suburban B’s | Erin Williamson  Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by CIH

One Room Challenge: Week One

Having the opportunity to participate in the One Room Challenge is a dream come true for me! I have followed along on past challenges and love to see the rooms transpire. Being an interior designer, and designing rooms for my clients everyday is definitely rewarding, I get so wrapped up in my client’s homes that my home usually takes a back seat. I designed my current home that I am living in about 9 years ago, I was only a few years fresh out of design school, so let’s just say my tastes have changed just a bit. There were so many things I wanted to redo, new products came out and well, I just have so much more experience under my belt.

If you are new to the one room challenge, welcome! The One Room Challenge is a bi-yearly event where 20 designers and bloggers participate in a challenge to transform a room in their home. It is so much fun to see the progress of each room during the 6 week time frame.

My husband and I had a tough decision, build a new house, buy an existing home and remodel or remodel our existing home?? My husband refused to remodel a home we have already remodeled, building a new home had too many restrictions on what was available to choose from so we naturally took the toughest choice; buy an existing home and remodel it completely.

We found this beautifully dated (like the 90’s called and wanted their house back) property that had a great lot for my kids and a 4 car garage for all of our junk!! The floor plan works great for our family and we don’t have any wasted space like we do in our current home. Needless to say, the One Room Challenge couldn’t have come at a more perfect time for me!

I have decided to transform my living/ dining room for the challenge this season. I am so tired of my existing dining furniture, it was a wedding present and let’s just say we are celebrating our 10 year anniversary this year. The great thing about our new Living / Dining space is that it gets great natural light during the day. So here she is, in all her glory and it hasn’t been touched a bit since about 1992 that is!

Let’s have a little chat about all her problems shall we?

Rounded Columns: These columns are huge and block your view into the space. They have a undesirable 2″ moulding as does the rest of the room and a rather unattractive wall texture. So see ya later!!!

12″ Square Tile: I almost always steer clear of 12″ square tiles. I just feel that not only to they date the space, but they give a busy grid pattern that I don’t really care for.

Paper Shades: Let’s be honest, these just look cheap. I know they can serve a utilitarian purpose but they are not designer friendly, at least not for this designer:)

Eyeball Can light: This seems to be the only light available in this room at the moment, it gives a dark alley sort of feel at night that can be a little scary. You can point it anywhere you please, haha!

Short French Doors: I don’t mind the look of these doors, but they are very short and make the room feel squatty. I may be able to re-purpose them in another area in the house with lower ceilings.

Moldy Carpet: Water damage is apparent in the corner of the room. We think the washer may have leaked in a couple rooms over and pooled in the corner of this room. Needless to say, the carpet is history!

OK, now that your eyes are sore, let’s get to the pretty stuff shall we? I love interior design so much, I live and breathe it everyday. There is inspiration in nature, in experiences and in the people around us. I love to research design trends and get ideas from everywhere. Light and Bright interiors with a pop of color really make my heart sing and that is what I intend to achieve in my One Room Challenge this season. Here are a couple of rooms that I have designed for clients that I particularly love and would like to achieve the same feel in my own home.

This room is so bright and happy! The coral, emerald green and navy are a few of my favorite colors.

A touch of gold is almost always a must for me as well.

Photo Credit: John Woodcock

This room may be one of my very favorites! Navy built in, gold hardware, striped drapes, hits of pink,

this is my love language!

Photo Credit: John Woodcock

Make sure to stay tuned as my room makes it’s way into the 20th century. I expect hiccups along the way because no good design doesn’t have them. Tune in next Wednesday to see some demo and plans of what I come up with. Make sure to check out my fellow participants rooms as well (listed below).

XOXO,

 

Centsational Girl | Chris Loves Julia | Christine Dovey | Dwell With Dignity | The English Room

Glitter Guide | House of Brinson | House Updated  | J+J Design Group | Lark & Linen | Abby Manchesky

Nesting Place | Old Brand New | Old Home Love | The Pink Pagoda | Rambling Renovators

Erica Reitman | Sketch 42 | Suburban B’s | Erin Williamson  Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by CIH

 

Design Trend: Buffalo Check

Buffalo check hit the scene about a year ago but it is really starting to gain momentum on the interior design scene. Usually we see these trends first in fashion then they find their way into our homes not long after. I have to be honest, I wasn’t all that hot on it at first. Jen is almost always early to the party when it comes to pattern trends. I remember her telling me how much she loved it way before it had time to grow on me. I of course am in love with it now. Here are a few of my favorite examples, and fun ways to add it to your home. Just remember, like any other trend, it is best to use it in moderation!

Sources:

Blush Pink Pillow

Chair with Gold Legs

Navy Check Drapery

Sheet Sets

Kitchen Set

Cement Tile Flooring

RenoJOvation Mudroom Progress

Renovating a home is definitely a lot of work! Especially when you decide to do much of the work on your own (or your husband does the work in my case.) There are so many design decisions to be made. Easy for me right?! No, not really, it is actually so much harder for me to make decisions on my own home. I guess maybe it could be just because I am constantly bombarded by the newest, latest and greatest. Will I get sick of it? Will something I love so much more come out next month? Should I take risks or keep it neutral? These are all questions I struggle with on a daily basis.

I decided to take my own advice, the advice I give most of my clients. Keep the backdrop neutral and pop in fun colors with the pillows, rugs, drapery, and artwork.  These are all things that can easily be changed once your tastes change. I also like to tell my clients that architectural details take the design to the next level, and not to cheap out on light fixtures. Well made and designed light fixtures set the tone for the design they are a little bit like the perfect jewelry for an outfit.

One of the first rooms I want to talk about it the mudroom. Mudrooms have become very popular in the past few years. They are much more common on the east coast where there is more seasonal weather. A good place to kick off your snowy boots in the winter and hang up your jacket. Most homes that have been built in Arizona in the last 10 years don’t have a mudroom area. There doesn’t seem to be a place in the home where you can kick off your shoes, hang up your jacket and drop your purse. The new house we built didn’t have that area either so I decided to create my own space in our new home for that very function.

Currently, we have several baskets by the front door where we all drop our shoes and it always looks so messy. Not anymore!! I am putting my foot down.  Here is the design board I came up with for our new mud room which is right off the garage so it is the first room once we enter the house.

I wanted this area to feel cheery but elegant. I fell in love with this citrus painting from Pink Puddle Studio so I commissioned her to paint the oranges into a repeat so I could have it printed into wallpaper. Definitely head over and check out her work, it is amazing!!

Since the wallpaper is curve-linear I wanted to offset it with a more linear floor. So I decided to do a buffalo check pattern in these cement tiles from The Cement Tile Shop. They have so many beautiful tiles to pick from, the possibilities are endless.

The light fixture that I am using in the mudroom is actually a vintage fixture Jen and I picked up when we were working on a project in California. The brass was heavily tarnished, I think It took me about 8 hours and a whole bottle of brass cleaner to get it shiny and pretty again. It was so worth it!!

I have a pocket door in the mudroom that leads to the walk in pantry behind it. I have never had a house with a walk in pantry so that was another room I had to create in this house, but that is a whole other post.

I designed the built in for the mud room and had it built. It is in progress now, we are still waiting on the doors, drawers and paint but it is coming along very nicely.

 

Stay tuned for more updates! Things are happening and changing everyday. I am so excited to share everything with you!

XO,

 

Transformation Tuesday: Tuscan to Transitional

Here in the Southwest, the Tuscan and Mediterranean look was big in design for quite a long time. It seems more and more these days clients are asking us to take the “Tuscan” out of their home.  Clients are looking for a lighter and brighter look. This is more of a transitional look with moldings, textures, and bright pops of color on a neutral background.  We have been mostly working on large remodels and love to transform spaces to happy places our clients love to live in.

Let’s take this kitchen for example. This kitchen was very Tuscan, dark and needed to be laid out more efficiently for the uses of our client.

Before

Our client’s love to entertain and have friends over whenever they have the chance. We created a large island for entertaining that doubles as a dining table for family dinners. We relocated the stove to the center of the kitchen as a focal point and lightened it up with white cabinetry. The large double refrigerator is now located where the existing stove was.

After (Photo by: John Woodcock Photography)

This is a different angle than the before picture, but i promise you this is the same kitchen! Can you believe it! Many drawings and months of planning the kitchen is a great gathering space for this sweet family.

XO,

 

RenoJOvation Part 1

I am so excited to share “reno JO vation” with you, the renovation of my personal home.  My husband and I bought a home on a gorgeous lot that was sitting unoccupied for over 2 years. The home has so many great attributes but it is very dated. We decided to gut the whole thing and make it our dream home. I thought it would be fun to document the process with a video series and this is the first episode to our series. Please comment and let me know what you would like to see during the process!

 

XO,

jo

Transformation Tuesday in Full effect….

We love a good transformation as much as the next designer. Oftentimes people see our pretty pictures on our website and have no idea of what we were originally working with. This is what makes our job so much fun. Here are a couple transformations for your Tuesday to make you scratch your head a little!

We were hired by this young family to transform their Kitchen/ Family room areas. The property is on a man made lake where you can water ski in your very own back yard. Unfortunately, the neighborhood was built in the 90’s so it was all very outdated. Not a problem! J&J to the rescue!

family room snip

Before

fishel-fine-grain

After

We deleted the windows on either side of the fireplace to add needed storage for the growing family. The windows looked out to a block wall so there weren’t any views that were sacrificed the the process. We also changed the original doors into a large picture window and moved them to the bay area. There is still access to the back yard but it is not in the way of the living area anymore.

OH, and there’s the kitchen too…. This 90’s beauty boasted oak cabinetry and green laminate counter tops.

kitchen snip 1

Before

kitchen snip 2

Before

Well, this may be one of the best transformations yet. Food truck kitchen window? Yes please!!

kitchen snip 3

After

kitchen snip 4

After

Professional After Photos by:  John Woodcock Photography

 

There is hope for almost every outdated home! Are you inspired to update your space?

XO,

jo