Tag Archives: Miller Paint Crystal Ball

Katie’s House: A Quick Update for the Hallway

First and foremost: We are so excited to announce that we’ve been asked to become regular contributors to the domino.com website!  Our first feature – an updated post about Mera’s downstairs bathroom – ran yesterday (we may or may not have had a squeal-filled phone call when we saw it).  You can check it out here.

And in other news…

All hail the power of paint!  I’m so desperate to finish the Chamber of Secrets (which is taking forever – this is renovation in real time folks) that this Sunday I grabbed my painting supplies, marched downstairs, and gave the hallway a little makeover.  Sound counter-productive?  The truth is that I desperately needed to finish something, and now that I did I totally have my house-fixin’ mojo back.

I’ve been steadfastly ignoring this hallway for years, but since painting the living and dining rooms, it’s become much harder.  The yellow hue – perhaps sweet and sunny in its younger life – has become through the years dingy, and more evocative of urine-soaked snow.

Red House West||Quick Hallway UpdateWe use the hutch to store linens and extra bathroom supplies.  It’s a really sweet piece, and definitely deserved better than it was getting.  This hallway had become the repository for stacks of homeless art which became, in turn, repositories for Dean and Carl’s copious furballs.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

Even the magical blue dining room paint that I love so much was suffering in its proximity to the hallway.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

I decided to paint the hallway the same color as the living room – Miller Paint’s Crystal Ball, the prettiest shade of pale gray.  Behold the difference:

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

Hallelujah!  Now that the color palette is more unified, the flow through these spaces is so much better.  When the hallway was yellow, the three different colors made the view into the living room visually hectic.  Things are much more serene now.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

To give the hutch a little update I lined the back with this chalkboard-printed paper by Lily & Val; I just used double-sided tape to hold it in place.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

I’m crazy about the Bakelite handles.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

I decided to keep the art simple (which means the stack of homeless art is now seining for furballs in another room), but these two little pieces feel right to me.  The Picasso drawing is a page torn from a Sotheby’s catalog that I got for really cheap on Etsy.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

The photo of the dove is from a thrift store.  On the back someone wrote, “1980.  Taken in a small courtyard in Alicante Spain, after a night train from Madrid, killing time before an afternoon bus.”  It’s funny how photographs taken with real film have an undeniably vintage cast to the them – a look that many Instagram filters attempt but few achieve.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

I’m so, so happy I made time to do this.  I get a little lift every time I walk through here and I feel reinvigorated and excited to dive back into the Chamber.

Red House West||Quick Hallway Update

Anybody else sometimes need to switch gears when they’re in the middle of a big project?  Thanks for reading along!

 

Katie’s House: If I’d only had (a) Crystal Ball

Well I’m thrilled to report that our living room no longer looks like a little boy’s nursery!  I admit to feeling pretty defeated when I realized just how wrong the color was.  Repainting meant not only that the house would stay in a state of chaos for longer, or that I had hours and hours of work ahead of me, but also that I had to find a new color – and that this time I better get it right.  My spirits were low and my confidence was shot, but I had to gird my loins and do the paint sample parade again.  Fast forward through some real anxiety, many a text and photo sent to Mera, a cricked neck from all the ceiling edges, and two complete audio books plus innumerable podcasts, and it’s done!  And… I love it!

Red House West//Miller Evolution PaintThe color is luminous, the room is much brighter, and it does not – in any light – read nursery.  The name of the paint is – with no shortage of irony – Crystal Ball.  If only I’d had one, I could have saved myself a lot of heartbreak.  It’s from Miller Paint in their Evolution line (the same paint I used and loved in our dining room) and was actually a color I initially considered for the space before I succumbed to the expert advertising of Farrow & Ball.  Its name may not evoke the soot-blackened walls of a cottage nestled in the English countryside, but it sure is pretty.

We’ve put a few things back into the room, but it’s mostly still a blank slate.  It’s nice to take a little time to think about where art and furniture will go, and it feels wonderful to be liberated from the green paint that was in here – there’s so much more potential to bring color and pattern into the room now.  This week I decided to spruce up the booze hutch, an antique British cabinet that Cameron and I bought at a thrift store soon after we moved in.  As the name implies, we use it to store our hooch and glassware.

That wall color is so pretty it makes angels sing

That wall color is so pretty it makes angels sing

It’s a pretty piece, and its curves are a nice counterpoint to the mid-century modern furniture also in this room.  There’s an awful lot of wood in this space though, and this seemed like a good opportunity to dress it up a bit.  I am crazy for Rifle Paper Co.’s wallpapers and would love to paper my whole house in them, but for now I thought I’d do something smaller scale and a whole lot less expensive.

Red House West//Rifle Paper Co Gift WrapThis Rifle Paper Co. gift wrap is $8.50 for three sheets (and it only took three to paper the hutch).  There are lots of pretty patterns, but I couldn’t say no to the colors of this one.  It might be a wee bit feminine, but I figure that it’s just a small space, and it will be partially obscured by booze which is totally gender neutral, so it’s okay.  I didn’t want to permanently adhere the paper to the hutch so I decided to just use double-sided tape.  This way, when its tenure as a backdrop for spirits is up, I can still use it for something else.

hutch

Red House West//Rifle Paper Lined Hutch

Red House West//Rifle Paper Lined Hutch

Red House West//Rifle Paper Hutch

So there you have it!  Almost two weeks of blood, sweat and painting-related angst plus one easy update distilled into one short post!  I’ll show you more of the room (and no doubt solicit your opinions) as I start to move more things back in.  Thanks for reading along and make sure to check in on Friday!