I didn’t realize how naturally brutalist concrete sidewalks are — drab gray, strangely crude— until I saw leaves painted on the sidewalk outside a Harlem plant store. The harsh, dreary slabs were transformed and seemed to be casting light and a feeling of whimsy and charm. It made me wonder why sidewalks are rarely embellished, and how to do it…
Read MoreNOT Checkerboard Floor
We love black-and-white checkerboard floors for how they seem to uplift just about any style room, like the ones below. Now we are smitten with THIS NOT-checkerboard for its subtle rebellion…
Read MoreThe Secret to Artist Constantino Nivola’s Sublime Painted Floors
We stumbled on this inspiring idea for painted floors while leafing through Artists’ Handmade Houses, which is chock full of ideas. Sculptor- designer Costantino Nivola painted the kitchen in his Long Island home a sublime, deeply saturated yellow available in a singular paint.
Read More2 Ideas To Evoke Charming Wabi-Sabi in Your Space
Tiny Japanese restaurant Davelle employs inspired tricks to create a “bright and thoughtful little world” and a lovely feeling of wabi-sabi.
Read MoreRugs on Rugs Are an Ancient Tradition that Comfort and Transform
Patterns of rugs create a space that is welcoming, cosy, colorful, and mutes the difference between seat and floor, no matter what your style: moderne, Bohemium and even outdoors…
Read MoreMetallic Checkerboard Floors + a Trick for Visualizing Pattern Painted Floors
When we couldn’t find examples of the metallic checkerboard floors we’re smitten with, we devised a way to envision what they —and other jazzy patterns— would look like as a floor.
Read MoreCanvas Floor Mats, Inspired by Marisol
The jazzy black-and-white checkerboard “rug” that defines the living room of artist Marisol’s Tribeca loft reminded us a painted canvas floor cloth: practical, stylish and easy-to-make.
Read MoreRugs Comfort +Transform, from Haute Moderne to Refugee Tent
This mid-century moderne room of colorful flat-weave rugs laid end-to-end breaks from the usual restraint of moderne decor. Patterns of rugs create a space that is welcoming, cosy, colorful, and mutes the difference between seat and floor, no matter where you are. They emulate nomadic Arabic tradition, where rugs are used to create spaces to gather upon, and even the walls of shelters.
Read MoreA Family Home Full of Heart and Good Ideas
“Something boldly improvisational and cheery going on in this house in Australia” wrote Susan Dworski in an email as she described the home Ruth Bruten, writer of Gourmet Girlfriend blog, shares with her husband and five boys. It is delightfully REAL and colorful, and packed with ideas. Here are Susan’s favorites, and ours:
Read MoreA Cheap Chic Hardwood Floor Solution
When we saw this Parisian flat in Design Milk, we were intrigued more by the floors than by the slanted shelves built into each “space” of the sprawling apartment. Short lengths of hardwood flooring are almost always less expensive than longer lengths, but, when laid out in the traditional, end-to-end pattern often LOOK cheap and…
Read MoreA Floor Made of Stacked Ceramic Bowl and Tea Cup ‘Bricks’
In his installation at the Maruhiro Flagship store in Nagasaki prefecture, Japanese designer Yusuke Seki used 25,000 pieces of imperfect ‘Shinikiji’ ceramics as bricks, stacking them to create a platform/floor to support simple timber plinths that showcase the products on sale. Feeding into our serious “brick love“, we looked closer into how Seki transformed the pottery into…
Read MoreTake Your Shoes Off ? (Signs, Opinions + Warhol)
We knew the Take-Your-Shoes-Off-In-the-House-thing had reached critical mass when we saw door mats for sale that say SHOES OFF in big ugly letters, and other iterations on the theme. It got me thinking about the homemade signs we’ve seen asking guests to remove their shoes, as well as the ones we’ve made ourselves over the years. Here’s…
Read MoreDIY Painted Hide (or Other) Rugs…or Floors
Cow hide rugs are so ubiquitous these days, that we’ve gotten pretty tired of seeing them in interiors. That is, UNTIL we saw one speckled with gold. It seems that painted, spattered, striped, embellished hides have become something of a trend. Apartment34 has a great DIY that gives the gist (and there are lots of…
Read MoreLiberating a Painted Floor
We view painted floors as a canvas that can be embellished or changed as needed. Here are some examples of cool floor patterns you can paint on top of a painted floor, to shift the look or disguise damage or wear.
Read MoreLaura Handler’s White Painted Floors: How-To
On the continuing theme of the viability and ‘how-to’ of white-painted floors —sparked by a reader’s question —we asked designer Laura Handler how she painted the parquet floors of her 1950’s coop white. Here’s what she wrote:
Read MoreEssential Lessons about White Painted Floors
Recently, a reader wrote us about our white painted floors: Your white floors look amazing. How are they holding up over time? I’m interested in doing the same in my house but there are lots of naysayers saying they won’t be durable enough to retain the sleek look. I love my pale floors which are…
Read MoreImaginings: A Jigsaw Puzzle Floor?
Wandering around Artists and Craftsmen the other day, we came across jigsaw puzzle blanks meant to be painted or printed on to make a custom jigsaw puzzle. We saw the jigsaw pattern as an interesting possibility for a ….floor, no doubt inspired by our white-painted plywood floors with their geometric grid of seams. From the beginning, we’ve thought…
Read MoreOptical Illusion Rug or Floor Stencil
When we looked closely at this 3D rug, we realized that it was really an assemblage of simple shapes that LOOKED way more complex that in is. Very cool as a rug OR as a painted floor.
Read MorePainted Oriented Strand Board Floors
Remodelista recently featured the clever redesign of a 430-square foot-apartment in a century-old row house in Antwerp, the work of Belgian architecture firm Komaan! —translation, “Come on!” It’s full of good ideas, including clever layout that creates a fluid space with lots of storage, and interesting use of plywood, but our favorite is the floors: sheets of…
Read MoreContest: Solve the Vibrating Bed Mystery
After a mysterious vibration in the floor started shaking our bed, and us, awake at night, we started improvising solutions. We’ve lost count of our attempts at damping the vibration. So we’re issuing a challenge to IL’s readers: help us devise a solution to keep the bed from vibrating.The winner will receive a lifetime subscription to Improvised Life. Here’s what we’ve tried already…
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