Sage – Author at Plaster & Disaster

If you don’t understand the title of this post, that means you haven’t read Naomi’s recent post on her home color palette. Go do that, and then you may return.

Like Naomi, I also elected to paint my bedroom purple when I was a kid. Unlike Naomi, I am “lucky” enough to still have a purple room in my home — actually a shade of lilac that isn’t too far off from that childhood bedroom of days gone by. As I share my home color palette, keep in mind that we just moved last fall into a house where every room needed to be repainted, and we’ve only made it about halfway through at this point.

So here’s what we’ve got, according to my very scientific recordings:

All of these colors are Benjamin Moore, which we usually have color matched to Olympic ONE paint. And let’s pretend that “mystery color” is the official name of a color, rather than acknowledging that I painted my bathroom a color that looks a whole heck of a lot like this (very dark blue/gray), and totally didn’t record the color (and threw away the can because I used up all the paint). After I had been in this home improvement game for several years. And already had a blog. What was I thinking?

I wish I could say that the palette stops there, but that would be excluding about 50% of the house. Here’s what we still have to contend with (color names are not official, but I think Benjamin Moore should consider adopting them).
So without further ado, let me take you through this wonderfully incomplete and evolving color journey!

Let’s start with the places where we’ve been intentional. The first place we painted when we moved in was the living room, and I knew from the start that I wanted a light gray to replace the dark red that had been there.

On the first day we moved in (while the seller was still slowly removing her belongings from the house, even though we’d already closed on it…), we whipped out our paint brushes and went from this on the walls:To this, “moonshine” by Benjamin Moore:

It’s a very light gray, with blue undertones. I chose it because I wanted a very light neutral for both the main living space and to continue into the hallway and stairwell, and this one fit the bill. I will confess that I bought it before looking at a paint chip on the wall because we needed to buy it before we moved into the house so we could paint immediately upon moving during a very short window before our furniture arrived from storage, which is a total decorating no-no. But I think it worked out, so I’m relieved. Oh also, one day the baseboard radiators will get painted white, but as you saw from the second color palette above, I currently have bigger fish to fry.

The living room attaches to the hallway, which was a big makeover project this winter. We also have moonshine on the walls, plus semi-gloss white on the trim, paneling, and doors (the precise shade is some generic store variety, I confess I’m not on top of my trim color the way Naomi is). Also in the hallway are some more colorful accessorizing colors that I picked out to add some pizzazz: “surf blue” on the back of the built-ins and “spirit in the sky” on the inside of the front door. The surf blue and spirit in the sky are meant to tie into the patterned stair risers I created using fabric and mod podge:

Off of the hallway are the bathroom and master bedroom, both of which we decided to paint darker colors to contrast with the light and airy main living spaces. This is my first time with dark walls, and I absolutely love it in both rooms. We have “black pepper” on the walls of the bedroom, creating what I like to call our “sophisticated cave“:

While black pepper is a dark gray, it has blue undertones so it reads like a very dark blue in a lot of lights.

The bathroom came in a totally lovely shade of lime green:

But that just wasn’t cutting it for us. I had been thinking about a light shade of blue, but Naomi suggested something dark to make the brown tiles look lighter in comparison and she was so right. I considered a bunch of options:

And then picked a color that I forgot to record (and I can’t even sleuth from this photo, because I remember that the color I ultimately picked was on a strip that fell down before I snapped this pic because of the humidity after a shower). It is dark blue/gray, and wonderful — especially with the colorful and inexpensive art we’ve added. I painted both the walls and the ceiling, which I think helps the small space feel more cohesive and draws less attention to the relatively low ceiling.

The last room we’ve painted so far is our home gym, in the basement. We started with dark wood paneling, and wanted to lighten up the space with paint and mirrors. Here’s where we started:

And where things are now with “chantilly lace” on the walls:

I totally copied Naomi on the shade of white — Sam decided on a whim that he wanted to buy paint for the basement while we were at the hardware store one day, and I hadn’t picked out a specific white yet so I just went with what I knew Naomi had used as white throughout her house. When in doubt, copy Naomi.

So that’s where things stand now! I think I want to add some warmer colors as we trudge through the rest of the rooms, though nothing too crazy. And here’s a quick tour of what we’ll be slowly painting over:

In the kitchen, we have this lovely shade I like to call “childhood bedroom”:

It goes especially well with our bright blue counters, wouldn’t you say?

Upstairs we have the watermelon craft room:

And the blue, floral, and wood paneled guest room:

And then we have the sunroom, which is currently a lovely shade I like to describe as “taupe-ish/green-ish.” It’s not terrible, but it’s not my style.

So that’s where we are with our home color palette! Not quite as complete and pulled together as Naomi’s, but we’re making progress!

(Sharing at Weekend Re-Treat Link Party, Two Uses Tuesday, Tip Me Tuesday, and Link Party Palooza)

As we shared last week, one of our scores at the Brimfield Antique Show was this pair of awesome mid-century chairs:

I really only need one (for the living room), but the seller was offering a discount for two (one for $75 or both for $120) so we decided to take both with the thought that I’ll keep one and we’ll sell the other one. Besides having great lines, being the perfect color for my house, and costing a very reasonable sum for such solid pieces, they also have a cool backstory: the seller bought ninety of them from a hotel that was closing for about $23 a pop, and has been reselling them like gangbusters. Even for the low price he gave us, that’s a pretty tidy profit!

They weren’t 100% ready to sell or plunk down in the living room yet, though — they both needed some new strapping and some sprucing up. This past weekend, I set up shop in the sunroom and got to work.

First, I took the cushions of both chairs. As you can see, the straps were sagging pretty badly (except the three new straps on the right chair, which the seller had put on), so the first step was replacing them.

I bought a roll of 2″ webbing (affiliate link – read our policies) which was $17 for 25 yards on Amazon when I bought it. Webbing comes in all different widths, so if you’re attempting a project like this be sure to determine the width you need by just measuring the webbing you’re replacing.

I flipped the first chair over to see how the seat was attached to the frame, and determined that it was just a matter of unscrewing five screws. Nice and easy.

The straps were attached to the seat with staples, so once I got the seat off I used a screwdriver to pry off all the straps, plus needle-nosed pliers to pull out the staples.

That left me with a gross pile of old straps and staples, and a lovely seat.

To attach new straps, I just cut the lengths I needed, stretched each one across the frame in the same places where the previous straps had been, and used a staple gun to fasten them to the seat.

Each time I stapled one end of the strap and then pulled the other one as tight as possible before stapling. I also made sure to weave them over-under with one another.

The front of each seat had slits that the straps went through, so that the straps wouldn’t be visible wrapping around the front.

Prying out all the staples took a fair amount of time, but there wasn’t anything difficult about this. If you come across a chair that just needs some new webbing, don’t be daunted! Just be sure to peek under the chair to see how the seat is attached to the frame and make sure it looks like something you can easily deal with.

Next was reviving the wood with some polish and wax. The chairs are in pretty good condition and the wood is very solid, but there are definitely some worn spots and plenty of little dings.

Having seen Naomi transform a number of furniture pieces with Howard Restor-a-finish and Feed n’ Wax (like the drawers in her dressing room and her butchers twine cane chair), I knew I wanted to give them a go. I picked up my supplies at Home Depot, and grabbed the “mahogany” tone of the Restor-a-finish as this seemed like the closest match to the original wood.

Restoring a mid century chair -- Plaster & Disaster

The table looks super dusty, but don’t worry: its just a thick coat of pollen that has infiltrated and coated my entire house. Because thats better?

This is a pretty easy and very satisfying process, though it does take some time — especially with these chairs, which have a lot of surfaces and joints. I started by using a cloth to liberally rub the Restor-a-finish over every surface, using a fingernail to push the cloth into each crevice and joint. It was amazing watching the wood come back to life — little imperfections disappeared, and the chairs developed such a rich luster.

Per the directions, I let that dry for about 30 minutes, and then followed up with the Feed n’ Wax. I applied a generous coat of this over all surfaces using a cloth, let it sit for 20 minutes, and then wiped away the excess with a fresh cloth. This part of the transformation isn’t as striking, but it helps maintain the Restor-a-finish over time.

Now just like Naomi, I am totally sold on these products. The difference is amazing in person, but these photos capture it a little bit:

Of course it doesn’t magically eliminate all the heavy wear on the chair arms (I’d need to sand and stain), but it does such a great job of bringing out the natural beauty of the wood, creating a lovely shine and fixing all the more minor dings and scratches.

After letting the chairs sit overnight in the sunroom, I brought one back into the living room, popped on the cushions, and voila!

I love how it looks with the yellow chair — the legs are strikingly similar and they relate to one another in style (both mid-century, both low slung), but they’re very different and don’t look too matchy.

The Greek key detail is one of my favorite parts — it makes it feel a little unique in the trendy world of mid-century lounge chairs.

And one more sans cushions, to show off the new webbing:

I’m in the middle of one more change to that side of the living room that I plan to share next week, which I think will round out the space nicely.

Oh and one last thing: you may have been reading this post thinking, “Sage, your photography is looking even better than usual!” That’s because Naomi gave me this beautiful new camera strap as a post-marathon gift:

Now you may be thinking, “But Sage, a camera strap has nothing to do with the quality of the photos taken, and also I don’t think there’s any such thing as a post-marathon gift.” Wrong on both counts — the beauty of the camera has inspired me to new artistic heights, and Naomi is trendsetter (and an awesome friend).

The end.