We first posted furniture designer Roxane Beis‘ work last march after we stumbled on her unique stenciled tree trunk side tables whose splits and cracks were vividly painted red. Only we didn’t know whom to credit. When a reader sent us an email with a link to Beis’s site, we discovered a trove of interesting furniture, like…
Read Moresolution: stenciled painted floors
When we chose plywood floors for the Laboratory, the idea was that we could paint them as needed. They’d start out an oyster white…and then go who knows where as they became worn or our mood changed. So we’re always on the lookout for cool painted floor ideas, like this one from an old station…
Read Morehow to overdye a vintage rug (and make a chair)
(Video link here.) A couple of weeks ago, we stopped in at ABC Carpet & Home to see what was going on there: a huge display of lovely overdyed rugs, in vivid colors. Wonder how they do that? we thought. And voila: a video from Still & Co. appeared giving the diy gist in a curiously…
Read Morerichard woods’ fab colorful wood-pattern floors
When we stumbled on images of artist/designer Richard Woods‘ show D.I.Y at the Alan Cristea Gallery in London, we literally gasped. LOOK at those floors!. They turn out to be Woods’ trademark vibrantly-coloured and exaggerated wood-grain motif. …deceptively simple in form, these bold images are produced using traditional block-printing techniques and installed as parquetry (inlaying wood in geometric patterns)……
Read Morewe finally figure out the best way to clean wood floors
Over the years, just about every place we’ve lived has had hardwood floors. They’ve ranged from prewar bleached and polyeurathaned oak to white “pickled” new oak and lately, off-white, high-gloss painted slightly rough plywood. For all those years, we’ve searched for the best way to clean our floors without damaging the protective surface. Since New York…
Read Moregarden in the shower + a moss bathmat
At Unconsumption, we came across this picture with commentary from a couple of different sites: the first via A Harsh Light: craigslist houseshare ad: “i have a garden growing in my shower so you have to use eco-friendly hair products. you will see worms and other insects, and you will occasionally see a spider too but they all…
Read Morecool designs to paint on buildings, walls, more
In the small country of Burkina Faso near the border to Ghana, it is common for dwellings to be painted with intricate patterns using colored mud and chalk. The patterns tells stories of the community’s culture. We are amazed at how modern these rustic wall paintings are, and imagine how beautiful they would be adorning…
Read Moreawesome wood brick floor (with + without cement)
Of the many inspired DIY ideas to be found in the rustic Sunset House we posted previously is a beautiful and rather startling floor made of wood “bricks”. We’d never thought of simply cutting the ends off wood planks to make wood bricks. Industrious owners Lilah and Nick made a pattern of the wood bricks,…
Read Morerelaks cafe’s fab cheap chic tile floor mashup
We are completely smitten with this jazzy floor at Relaks Cafe and Bike Repair Shop in Warsaw, Poland. Conceived of by Super super and Moko Architects as a low-budget flooring solution, it’s a modernist mosaic made out of scraps and offcuts of plywood, chipboard, mdf, maybe some cork and non slip rubber tiles…
Read Morediy stenciled coir, jute, and cork rugs
The other day, we spotted natural fiber rugs on the floor of a Swedish farmhouse — they look like coir or jute — that seem to have been stenciled with a pattern. Brilliant, why didn’t we think of that?!!! The technique would allow you add simple geometric designs to inexpensive and durable rugs. It might even…
Read Morewall-to-wall carpet solution: stripe it! (tiles too)
We have a strange aversion to wall-to-wall carpeting, finding it monotonous, one dimensional and claustral. But when we saw this clever carpeting made of stripey colors, we though, yeah we might could live with that. Then we saw these stipes made out of floor tiles and realized the striped thing could be done with lots…
Read Moremarble tables with a rough, unfinished edge
We were instantly smitten with this kitchen, for its spareness and simplicity (on the upper East side of Manhattan no less), but especially for the marble slab table with a rough, unfinished edge. Such a simple detail to leave undone, yet the effect is bold and surprising. It could be done with any stone surface.…
Read Moretin-patched wood floor: kintsugi in action
Not long after we posted about kintsugi, the artful repair of damaged things, we came across these photos of a worn wide-plank Douglas Fir floor patched with tin in Mindy Marin’s renovated barn Bluewater Ranch. A perfect example of modern-day kintsugi: the undisguised tin becomes part of the design on floors whose age and wear makes them…
Read Morepaola navone’s painted rugs
We love the simple white-on-concrete? stencils designer Paola Navone put in her Greek summer home. They act like rugs, and can be done on wood floors as well. We’ve seen this done before, but not quite so beautifully.
Read Morekitchen-testing chilewich floor mats
Having admired sleek, modern Chilewich floor mats, we decided to do a test to see if they would really clean easily despite our abuse.
Read Moreever wonder what an orange floor would look like?
One of the big surprises in our renovation of ‘the improvised life’s laboratory was the floor. When we took up the funky carpeting, we didn’t find the concrete we expected but a soft gypsum compound that couldn’t be hardened. We had no budget for a floor so we started to look around at possibilities. We…
Read Moredig this swell red brick floor (like alexander calder’s)
This lovely brick floor spotted at Style Files reminded us of the floor Alexander Calder installed in the huge windowed studio he added on to his Connecticut farmhouse. It was made of the most ordinary of materials – sans mortar or cement.
Read Moreplydesign: an essential guide to diy plywood projects
As we’ve mentioned, ‘the improvised life’s laboratory is something of an homage to plywood. We’ve used it for many things, from window sills to cabinets to floors. We love the stuff, and are constantly hatching plots in our head for furniture, housewares, endless inventions. So we are smitten with carpenter and author Philip Schmidt new book PlyDesign which…
Read Moredesktop (+floor +wall) inspirations from unlikely sources
Since we started renovating ‘the improvised life’s space’ we’ve had our eyes peeled for solutions to various design problems. We’re finding that once we have a question in our head, inspiration and ideas can come from the most unlikely places. Desperately needing a proper desk to work on, we hurredly devised one out of hollow…
Read Morepainted wood ‘coloring book’ floor
We view this beauty of a floor as a kind of coloring book for adults: paint a color within the lines of each floor board and look what you get, the ultimate d-i-y, pattern already built-in. (Practicality: be sure to lightly sand and prime the floor before painting…) via Inside via Newyorkicorn Related posts: zigzag…
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