A dear friend of mine (soon to be married!) sent me a house warming gift that I have been mulling over and enjoying for some time now. It is a book called Use What You Have Decorating, by Lauri Ward. It boasts that you can re-do your whole house in ONE hour, "using the space you have, the things you like, and the budget you choose."
Now, for those of us whose "decorating budget" is non-existent and further don't already have lots of nice things, this method is slightly less effective. However, I have found this book quite useful.
Basically I think she offers a set of rules and guidelines to help you achieve what you want and might possibly stumble into a few years from now after many, many failed attempts. You know how sometimes you walk into a room and say...hmm, this just doesn't quite work, and you might be able to rearrange for a while and try different scenarios till you find something that does work? Well, this book is pretty much a list of all of the things that your room needs to "work", so now when I walk into a room I can say what it is that doesn't work and perhaps even see a solution before I move the furniture 15 times.
I think I have made many improvements around my house. I have two corner cabinets and a china cupboard all with exposed shelves and I was really at a loss as to how to make them look decorated instead of just used. They still aren't perfect, but I don't go cross-eyed staring at them anymore! (sorry I didn't take before and after pics!)
I do disagree with some of her "rules". Like I don't always think that any wall that is less than 36'' has to be left bare. And in general I would allow for a LOT more art work on the walls than she would. But I do see what she means about people (myself included) hanging everything on the walls about five inches too high.
Anyway, I had fun at my parent's house the other night rearranging their front rooms. They have TONS of furniture that they have inherited from different sides of the family or picked up different places over the years and have never really figured out quite how to make it all work in their current house. I am sure my solution was imperfect, but I had fun, I think the rooms look much homier and more usable and my parents appreciated my efforts!
Anyway, this book (and blog!) is worth a look!
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4 comments:
I'm glad about the 5" too high thing. I often feel like things are high, but I thought it was just cause I'm so short!
haha, yeah, she was saying that everyone says "eye height" but that's silly cause there is no such thing!
My decorating advice is to wait until your children grow up. Isn't that awfully cynical? LOL
No, it's not. My dad's way of dealing with that was just not allowing kids in certain parts of the house. That was a little irritating growing up.
Leila said she used to feel the way you do on her blog recently...I forget why she changed her mind...
When I say decorating though, I don't mean, anything expensive but things you would do with kids around. Not getting lots of expensive nice things, but rather arranging the things that you have in a functional and practical way that looks to their best advantage. That you can do with kids!
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