A Designer At Home

Boho Wallpaper Options and progress

April 13, 2016 by CORINNA HENDERSON

A big part of my design plan for the dining room is big impact with interesting walls. I shared an inspiration pic last week that had a shibori look wall treatment above wainscotting. I love it! And while I do love the exact look, I’m looking to do something slightly different. I’ve never wallpapered before. I have stenciled, but that’s not really the look I’m going for. And I need something a bit more than just paint. So, wallpaper it is! And I’m actually excited about that because wallpaper can do something that paint and stencils just can’t.

Wallpaper Boulevard has offered to work with me on this project, and since I’m so indecisive and am having trouble making a snap decision, I thought I’d share my favorites here today to see which one you like best.

Top Row: KATSUGI COBALT & TURQUOISE, DESCANO FLOWER GREEN BOTANICAL, TAHITI SCENIC

Bottom Row: PEONIES COPPER, IRIS INDIGO SHIBORI, CITIES TOILE ROBINS EGG

Which ones do you like? I also did plant shopping and shared a sneak peek of what that’s looking like on Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BEBscaaKcua

And then there’s just the usual patching holes, piles of things I can’t figure out what to do with a spots of walls that are still being painted. But that’s not nearly as interesting as pretty wallpaper, right?

Don’t forget to check in on the other linking participant’s spaces at Calling It Home.

Pro Plant Purchasing Tips

April 12, 2016 by CORINNA HENDERSON

plant purchasin tips

I have bought hundreds upon hundred of dollars worth of plants. Seriously! And through all that I’ve had a lot of practice picking which plants are easy to care for, what to look for when buying houseplants and red flags. Since I am amidst a full overhaul of our dining room I needed (yes, needed ;)) to buy a lot of plants and it struck me, “Hey! I might know a thing or two I can share with my friends on the blog.” So after a large plant shopping trip at The Home Depot over the weekend, I’m ready to sit down and chat about all the things I look for, avoid and think about when buying new houseplants

My place of choice for buying plant? I like to buy my plants from The Home Depot. I have less problems with pests and diseases when I buy my plants from them. I also have a local nursery that I favor just to make sure I’m putting money back into my local economy, too.

The one thing I can’t stress enough: Do a bit of research on the plants you’re interested in caring for. You won’t regret this. It’ll help you when determining if the plant you’re picking up at the store is healthy and you’ll know what you’re getting yourself into once you get it home.

Signs of sickness: Yellowing that shouldn’t be there, droopy leaves, dull color and lack of new growth are all signs that a plant isn’t faring too well. Unless you’ve had practice reviving plants, these may be things you want to avoid. Aldo check the base of the plant for softness that shouldn’t be there, small bugs, and spots that may indicate bugs have been eating on it or have laid eggs on it. Bringing home 1 sick plant can ruin all of the hard work you’ve put into your other plants.

Personal Tip: I spray all my plants down with a Insecticide/Fungicide/Miticide Spray when I first bring them home. This one is my favorite because it’s organic and works well.

Super Pro Tip: Find a pot with 2 healthy plants- split them and you’ve saved yourself from buying 2!

Fancy pots vs Ugly: Are you buying a plant because you have a pot to fill or are youbuying a plant that’s also going to need a pot? If you already have a pot, make sure you’re not paying extra for a decorative pot. You’ll pay a lot more than you should for the plant because those decorative pots normally don’t hold up very well. And, chances are pretty good you’ll have to repot soon anyways since oftentimes plants are sold in pots they’ve already outgrown.

Super Pro Tip: Buy bushier plants that have outgrown their pot at the smaller pot size instead up paying the upcharge for the same size plant in a larger pot. I see multiple different sizes of pothos all the time. Usually a small pot, a bigger pot and a hanging pot. Most of the time the plant is the same size in each of the pots, so I buy the cheapest one and that’s usually the small pot.

Which Plants To Buy?

My favorite viney plants are Pothos and Philodendron

My favorite big leafed plant is the Fiddle Leaf Fig

My favorite tropical plant is the Dracaena

My favorite decorative plant is Lucky Bamboo

My favorite low light plant is Sanseveria

My favorite bright light plant is Peace Lily

Easiest To Care For: Pothos, Lucky Bamboo
Moderately Easiest To Care For: Peace Lily, Dracaena
Plants I’ve obliterated: Succulents, Air Plants, Elephant Bush, Yucca

These are just the ones I’ve had the most success with personally. It takes a bit of trial and error. Like some people do wonderfully with air plants and succulents and you’ll notice I didn’t share either of those (technically the sanseveria is a succulent but we’ll save that for another day)

I hope these tips and advice is helpful to you! If you have any questions, please leave them in the comments and I’ll do my best to get you an answer. Caring for houseplants is so therapeutic and choosing which plant to purchase doesn’t have to be so hard. I have to say though, go for a pothos- they’re awesome!

Pro Plant Purchasing Tips

Mystery Thrift Find Makeovers aka #swapitlikeitshot

April 8, 2016 by CORINNA HENDERSON

Hello! It’s the most wonderful time of year for bloggers and thrift lovers- #SwapItLikeItsHot. Coordinated and hosted by the incredible Charlotte of Ciburbanity. Yesterday I shared a small sneak peek into one of the makeovers I’m sharing today. If you’re stopping in from Cassie, Primitive and Proper, welcome! I love Cassie. She’s such a sweet person and I am so lucky to call her a friend. She thoughtfully pulled together 2 care packages of items for me to makeover.

She’s knows me pretty well at this point. We’ve cohosted #thriftscorethursday every thursday for well over a year. So she knows I like woven things, brass things, vintage things and shells. I’m super proud to say I didn’t spend a single dime on makeovers this time around! Except that means I hoard too many craft things :/

First thing I’ll share is something I didn’t even makeover. I thought about trying to polish up the brass a bit but I couldn’t make myself do it. I love the old aged look to it too much. It fits in perfectly with the bathroom I’ve been in the process of renovating and making over since last Fall.

Next up is the seashell chandelier. It was missing quite a few pieces and many of the shells were broken. I could’ve done many other things with the base and individual shells but I really wanted to set out to revive a bit of life back into the piece.

I had just picked up a random-stuffed craft bag from the thrift store and it had a jewelry box with turquoise beads. That paired with leftover thread from my sunshower art piece and old beads and shells from my collection, I added a hanger and a second tier of smaller shells below the flower shaped clusters.

The final piece I made over actually turned into a couple of makeovers. The basket was in great shape and I loved that it was lidded, but I don’t have a whole lot of need for a lidded basket this size so I took it apart.

Makeover 1: A tray for bills (and everything else we can manage to cram atop it)

Makeover 2: A towel caddy for the bathroom with mexican blanket inspired paint job

Makeover 3: A baby wall hanging. The shape was too neat to pass up the opportunity to do something a little fun with it.

And, I’m so embarrassed to admit this, I had the brass champagne glass sitting on a table in my living room and after my kid played with it- it went missing! So she sent me that really neat piece that I didn’t have any ideas for and can’t find right now to share a picture #oops

This event works round robin style. Your next stop on this trail of epic surprise thrift store makeovers is BrePurposed. Bre has such a cool vibe to her pieces. I kinda sent her a box of a lot of random things (I can’t help but pick up those catch all craft bags they throw together!). See Bre’s #SwapItLikeItsHot makeover here.

I may not have been as inventive as many of the other participants- seriously check ’em all out! They’re listed below! But I’m so happy with my pieces and they’ll actually get a ton of love in my home!

Thrifted Beads – a #swapitlikeitshot sneak peek

April 7, 2016 by CORINNA HENDERSON

It’s every creative bloggers favorite time of year- Swap It Like It’s Hot! It’s back and it’s exciting because I love being surprised with thrifted goodies and a challenge. To keep you in suspense, I’m not going to show you what my sender sent me. But rather something I thrifted to use on one of the thrifted items I received.

A lot of thrift stores will have bags of miscellaneous crafts and decor items. I like to take a chance on these bags because every time there’s been something I love in it. One of the last bags I picked up had these pretty light switchplates. I painted them with Rustoleum’s oil rubbed bronze to match the other switchplates in the house and I love the feminine detail.

In that same bag was this little jewelry box and beans. Looks like they belonged to one or two broken pieces of jewelry. I love those turquoise beads though. And I used them in one of the projects I’ll be sharing tomorrow!

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A post shared by Lidija Jerant (@lidijajerant)

https://www.instagram.com/p/BDoUEr2Ktjx/

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A post shared by Vintage Home Decor (@shopmidcenturymodest)

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A post shared by Alice W. |alicewingerden.com| (@alicewingerden)

And because I’m not showing you anything worth looking at, and the features were just that dang good, here’s another couple for you to oggle and heart and maybe even give the IGer a follow.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BDo_0mUTWAX/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BD0UV0ROrMY/

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A post shared by Doug Fritock (@doug_fritock)

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A post shared by mellagerie (@mellagerie)

Wanna Play? Here’s The Rules!

We want you to participate! Hit up your local thrift stores, craigslist, yard sales, estate sales, side of the road, anything! Thrifty doesn’t necessarily mean from a thrift store. We want to see your good deals, wacky finds and treasures.
Don’t feel like you need to save those finds for Thursdays! Yes, features are shared on our blogs and Instagram on Thursdays, but we’re all checking in on (and using!) the hashtag all week long. So, when you see/find it, feel free to share it!
Want to get featured? Add the #thriftscorethursdsay hashtag, Follow the hosts (@the_gathered_home, @primitiveandproper, @adesignerathome and@maggieoverbystudios) and tag a friend to play along, too!
Each week, Cassie from Primitive and Proper, Brynne from The Gathered Home, Maggie from Maggie Overby Studios and Myself (A Designer At Home) will pick a favorite thrift score or two to feature! So please note that by linking up with #thriftscorethursday, you are giving us permission to share your finds via social media or on our blogs.

All Instagramed out yet? I sure hope not! Because you’re not finished. Yup, you’ve got more thrift scores to look at. I know you’re not disappointed. Ha. Click on my beautiful cohost’s faces below to check out what they’ve scored and featured.

My 6 Week Vintage Boho Dining Room Makeover

April 6, 2016 by CORINNA HENDERSON

It’s that time of year again.

I’ve just starting looking at doing some pretty intense changes to our dining room. Actually, right now it’s not a dining room. It’s the catch all room that I desperately need to address. When we bought the house, it was listed as the “den.” We don’t need two living spaces and no eating space. Without making this a dining space, we continue playing playdough and eating dining on the couch.

I dream of a vintage filled space with fun patterns, pops of color and boho. Give me all the boho 😉 And having it in 6 weeks sounds pretty awesome.

So I’m going to attempt to finish the One Room Challenge again! As a linking participant, I share my post with tons of other bloggers on Calling It Home‘s blog. Linda is the host of the challenge and that’s her blog. It’s not a competition, but just like the name suggests, it is a challenge. I’m going to show you a bit of the before and for 6 weeks I’m going to feverishly try to finish all my projects and get the room completed.

Here’s the Vintage Eclectic Dining Room moodboard I put together a few weeks ago when this vision was first starting to form:

Featured in my mood board: Hairpin Bench, Chairs, Shades, Tapestry, China Cabinet from Retro Therapy Rehab, Dresser, Rug, Light, Bar Cart, Boho Chair

And here’s what I’m starting with:

The part of the room you can’t see? Assume it looks like a tornado ripped a bunch of junk about. Just, trust me.

If I’m not posting here a whole lot in the next month, it’s because I’m knee deep in a million projects at once. But if it all turns out as I see it in my head, it’ll be worth it. Because look at this inspiration space. Yeah, I want those walls.

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A post shared by Gloria (@gloriajoy)

See more dining rooms I’m inspired by here

And I’m going to resize a fireplace mantle and surround. Yup. If you want to see how that goes, you can sign up for my RSS feed, where you’ll receive 1 email every morning there’s a new post posted. Wish me luck!

Where to buy global inspired and sourced bathroom accessories

April 5, 2016 by CORINNA HENDERSON

Global decor is having a hot moment right now and that is awesome. Even more traditionally decorated spaces are getting a fun pop with moroccan inspired tiles and mexican textiles. It’s a trend you totally ought to give a chance. Besides the obvious choices of baskets, tiles and pillows. What kinds of things can you use to infuse the styles of other parts of the world in other rooms of the house? Specifically a space like the bathroom, you know, because most of us aren’t using a ton of throw pillows in our bathroom.

Since I’ve been working on my own bathroom remodel with a strong emphasis on incorporating global sourced and inspired pieces, I thought it’d be a great time to share with you where I’m sourcing those items. It’s kindof my segway to letting you know I’m diving into One Room Challenge later this week and won’t be talking about the bathroom for another two weeks.

So where do you buy global inspired and sourced bathroom accessories? Let’s chat…

The ring of “Handmade in Guatemala” has a really cool sound, right? And you may be baffled why you can jump on Amazon and find really cool gems for reasonable prices only to find them elsewhere for a whole lot more. Is it a joke? Are the more expensive ones a rip off?

I promise not to make this whole post one big ethics speech, but I do want to point out that the “bargain” globally made items are more than likely made with slave and/or other forms of forced labor. Our buying power is strong and supporting fair trade companies is a really big step towards equality in the world. If it’s not “Made in the USA” or made in another company with clear and enforced labor laws, business owners care about money and you should know that your dollar supports the unfair treatment of people.

1. Artisan Connect (now merged with Nest)

That’s why I’ve really enjoyed perusing Artisan Connect. I stumbled onto this site when looking for Le Souk Ceramique for sale. They do exactly what their name implies, they’re the connecting force between artisans and us. Here’s an excerpt from their “Impact” page:

“We source exclusively from organizations that provide fair wages and social services to their artisans and the communities where they live, promoting the broader goals of empowerment, inclusion and self-esteem.”

Here are a few items you can find in stores like West Elm and Madewell:

Reclaimed Textile Throw Pillow at Madewell (partnered with Nest)

2. Etsy

Looking for more selection or something specific? Everyone’s favorite handmade and vintage retailer is a great place to look. Vintage is my favorite because you can find really unique mirrors, wall art and textiles. And handmade is fantastic for supporting artist. Handmade towels and soaps are some of the best you’ll use!

I’ve admitted to having a soap problem in the past. One of shops I discovered at the Coastal Virginia Home and Garden Show is Symphl Creations and they even made vegan soaps so they get a huge recommendation from me. But any reputable shop on Etsy is going to be a fantastic alternative to buying chemical laden soaps at the drugstore. And you’ll support someone’s craft!

And who doesn’t love a candlelit bath? One of the Etsy shops I discovered through GlobeIn is Sundos and I did because of a candle I received in one of my boxes. It smelled beautiful and did everything I wanted from a candle and it’s organic, fair trade and no GMO. Winning!

African Fabric Picture Frame

Floral Mango Wood Jewelry Box

3. GlobeIn

And speaking of GlobeIn, they’re also a fantastic resource for bath products. I pay for an Artisan box monthly subscription service and each month is a different theme.

The main point of the service is the subscription service. It’s a curated box that supports remote artisans and farmers. Every box includes a handwoven basket and a few other items specially chosen for their support of small artisans around the world. A little booklet is included each month that explains where the finds came from and information about the person behind the product.

50% off 1st Box on any 3-month “GlobeIn Premium Subscription Box” – with code “TRYUS50”

But there’s also “the shop” where you can buy items from past boxes as well as other items that haven’t been included in a box. Like, body lotion, soaps, shampoos, towels, makeup cases, and more.

Hand-Carved Golden Mango Wood Ornate Photo Frame — Hand-Carved Mango Wood Photo Frame

Cotton Artisan Batik Robe - Moonlit Blossoms — Moonlit Blossoms Cotton Batik Robe

2 Chain Stitch Embroidery Cushion Covers - Floral Night — Floral Night Embroidery Cushion Covers

4. Anthropologie

Anthro has got the classy boho thing down. And a lot of their pieces are influenced by the patterns, styles and crafts of other countries and especially artisans. Mixing a piece or two or a lot with your existing decor or decor from the other sources is an easy way to get a gathered look.

Anthropologie Artist Collabs – supporting a diverse group of artists
Eco Friendly & Sustainable Textiles – organic, eco fabrics, artisan-made

I’m pretty heart eyed emoji stricken for their shower curtains. But their towels rods and soap dishes are also really beautiful. They’ve pretty much got everything you’ll ever need to decorate a bathroom but even with their massive inventory, I still say it’s best to source from multiple places since it’ll give your space a more real life look than if it were all sourced from the same space.

House of Hackney Printed Shower Curtain — House of Hackney Collab – Shower Curtain

Michelle Morin Heron Lampshade — Michelle Morin Collab – Heron Lampshade

Catherine Martin Collab - Starry Night Glasses — Catherine Martin Collab – Starry Night Glasses

5. World Market

No global decor source list would be complete without including WORLD market. Right? It’s in the name! This store can get pretty addicting to walk around. I have better luck going in store than online because so many items are for purchase in store only. But with departments clearly laid out and all the awesomeness in one building, it’s worth the drive for me.

I especially like their bathmats, but their towels are also stunning. They also have good candles to choose from, too. Oh, and I love the soap dish I included below. Like, love that thing.

So Fresh & Clean Bath Rug — So Fresh & So Clean Bath Rug

6. Home Depot

I’m throwing this one in as a bonus because they’ve really been on top of the encaustic tile look alikes. And since those tiles are the absolute must to stay on top of your home decor trends, I figured I’d include my three faves as part of this resource for globally inspired and sources bathroom decor 😉

Merola Tile Kings Star Sky Tile — Merola Tile Kings Star Sky Ceramic Tile

FloorPops Ezra Yellow Peel and Stick Tile

Are you holding out on a good source for global sourced and inspired bath décor? Don’t keep it a secret! We want to shop, too! Leave your fave places in the comments below.