Some like it hot . . . Les

  Les was starting to get a bit of the blues,  and tired of being chilly.  We always thought that a bright orange would find it's way into our color scheme somewhere and decided to put a little heat . . . in the office.

The room we're using as the office is part of the addition put on the house in the 40's or 50's.  It has no closet, but does share walnut floors with the rest of the second story of the house, which we intend to leave in place.

Initial peace-talks about color started with some leftover carpet samples from work, and trying to keep blue still in the picture.  Eventually we'll use the carpet tiles as a rug for the office.

After some deliberation and a little bribery, we chose a color called Salsa.  Ole'!

I found a great how-to article in This Old House magazine, about painting patterns and thought a pattern might help calm down some of the color shock.

http://www.thisoldhouse.com/toh/how-to/intro/0,,20440297,00.html

Les helped me with snapping the chalk-lines that would be the framework of the pattern.

After the chalk lines were in place, I used the templates that I downloaded from This Old House's website and traced around them in pencil.

Using the framework and template lines, I free-hand painted the star design using Benjamin Moore color, Vellum.  Overall the process only took about an hour and a half.  

For the dots, I used Jamaican Sea acrylic paint, from Folkart.

Fun With Furniture

For office furniture Les and I have been eyeing Ikea's, Galant desk series.  http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/categories/departments/workspaces/18960/

But we couldn't find a configuration that would actually fit the room, let alone sizes that would fit our needs.  We have lots of books, plus Les has three monitors he works from and I have two.  I also wanted a space to allow me to work on crafts.  

Les custom designed our desk using Ikea's framework and legs and made our desktop from leftover OSB board.  We got the exact desk we wanted and cut costs in half.  We're integrating Ikea's storage products for drawers and plan to install overhead shelving for storage too.

This is the result of being delusional and building furniture late at night.  We found that I fit inside of an 18" wide Ikea mobile pedestal.

I would like a project table like the Pottery Barn one pictured below, so that I have a surface I can make a mess on and a place to store pretties like ribbon!  We're going to use Ikea components to get the same result.   Les Sr. also gave us on old tractor seat that we're going to try and make into a stool to go with the table, like the one from Restoration Hardware (shown below).

Pottery Barn Bedford project table

Restoration Hardware Tractor Seat Barstool

More office design to come!