Sometimes we grow up. Ok its inevitable. It happens. We age. We change. Interests change.
And rooms should evolve as their owners do.
My 30-year-old friends have a super cool South Philly rowhome. Maybe you saw their kitchen renovation on the DIY Network. They were living with a secret though. It was in the room they call their den. The den was straight out of college. It basically housed all of their leftover furniture, CDs (yes we had CDs in college), DVDs and other early twenties paraphernalia haphazardly.
Leigh & Aaron looked to me for advice on how to turn the space into a room that would reflect who they’ve become. On a budget.
No problem. We established up front that the sofa would stay.
The maps in the room were also inspiration and they were to stay. However, they really needed to be pulled together for a little bit more of a cohesive look. In their before state, the map theme wasn’t evident.
The other “keeper” was the cool industrial built-in shelf that Aaron constructed recently. But it needed to be highlighted for sure.
We came up with a game plan. We decided the room would feature maps, have an industrial vibe and a recurring accent color of orange.
Having established those 3 items, we went shopping.
First for reclaimed wood for framing the maps and building the media console.
Next we shopped for pipes for the media console and curtain rods.
And canvas which was outfitted as curtain panels on curtain rods made of piping to drive home the industrial vibe. Look out West Elm!
Because these two are handy DIYers I left them to execute the vision. First was fresh paint. Rejuvenate by Behr. Second was organizing and purging. What really needed to stay in the room?
Then Aaron architected a media console to coordinate with the industrial shelves. The proportion and open shelves of the console helped to expand the space.
The blue bookshelf found a new home on an adjacent wall housing organized books and photos.
All of the maps were framed with dark reclaimed wood that was once used as trim.
Then came the accessorizing. My contribution was reviving a plain photo album with an atlas page of Queens, where the couple used to live.
They upstaged my use of maps by making custom throw pillows. Each pillow featured a different area – the town each grew up in plus the New York neighborhood they lived in early in their relationship. It doesn’t get much more customized than that! Did I mentioned they created the fabric and stitched the pillows? And the orange throw pillows were created from a set of orange linen napkins.
So now that you know the plan, here are the full after shots of the grown up den.
A newly created map of Philly was added to the collection.
Lots of uses for industrial piping.
Bonus! The space got a new flat screen TV.
Not a CD in sight.
Doesn’t it just feel more pulled together now?
Linking to Get Outta My Head Please
