Rainy days # 2

Even if a bit of sun came out in the last weekend it's still so freezing cold that summer and Italy in general seem so remote

In  my last post I was sharing with you a project I realized during that terrible cold and snowy season. Here it is another one, the bad weather kept me really busy at home!

Gone sailing

It was long time that I really wanted to repaint the bathroom, it started out as a plain white toilet, which looked like an hospital one, plain white, spartan, the only touch of colour was the shower curtain that recalls the mixed blue mosaic floor. Recently I decided to be brave and try a bold colour on two of the walls, not all of them because it's a tiny room and it will look even more tiny with colorful walls. I chose an aviation blue that never turned out to be the same every layer of paint I put. It really annoyed me and I was determined to go back to white and do not bother with it anymore, but white looked so terribly sad...

 5 cm masking tape 

There is a little boat hanging on the bathroom wall, a lovely decoration I bought in an amazing art gallery in Cromer, The Garden House, the striped sail give me the inspiration. Moreover, I'm always been a bit obsessed with stripes, I love them, they remind me the summer, of the colorful beach seats that you can find in Italy.  So I began to figure out a possible stripe solution, not easy to realize, I have to be precise and neat, so a put it off for a while, thinking of different solutions, but none satisfy me.

work in progress

After a lot of thinking, and a lot of drawing I finally fully dedicated myself to it. It only took a day and a half, and the big job is putting the masking tape up, for painting I used a sponge I found in my husband painting kit, I wanted an uneven white since the blue never came out even in the first place.
I love how it looks: so summery, fresh and romantic with the old mirror, my mother in love gave me.

the old mirror

Have you got any decoration ongoing?
ML

Rainy days # 1

I keep on putting off my posting sequel about Sicily, because with such a bad weather it's really hard to look at the photos taken when I was on holiday and don't feel miserable...
Yes miserable weather till now, no plan to go back to Italy at the moment and plenty of energy to spend in the house restoration.

before - outside

Therefore I'd like to share a couple of projects I realized recently.

There was that old box that was of my husband grandmother, apparently she used to carry around her stuff, when as a young girl she used to work as a cook. It must have been forgotten for many years before it arrived at our house, when it already looked battered and well worn out.
My husband kept on telling me that it was originally used to keep a dinnerware completed with all the necessary cutlery, not the modern versions with no serving dishes that you can find in the shops today, but rather an ancient version plenty of dishes and serving tools that nowadays we don't even know what they are made for. So I started to look at that old box with renovated interest.

before - inside

It was covered in a thick material painted in a sad brown colour, which at first looked like a well worn out leather. Cover it again in leather would have been too costly, so I went for some material in neutral colour, which perfectly matches the colour palette of the house. Ripped off the old material I discovered a nice sturdy wooden box with quite a strong personality, a real pity to cover it up! But the inside was a real disaster, in order to be used it really needed a complete restyling. When I bought the material to cover the box I matched a bold toile de jouy in cream and black with gallantry

after - outside

after - inside

 scenes, because I really wanted something that stood out from the severe shape of the wooden box.
I completely covered the inside with the toile, trying to give continuity to the pattern An inside shelf at mid height  was missing, my husband cut a thick piece of MDF to size and it fitted perfectly as shelf, I covered with the same toile and...voila' it's finished! Perfect to store table linens and possibly a new dinnerware, still undecided between transferware or botanic decor.
Do you like to recuperate old family piece of furniture? Have you done any recently?

ML