I completely forgot to take a for-real “before” picture of the space (whoops)…
But this is basically what it looked like when we moved in (except for the floor, which was covered with beige carpet tiles that smelled like decaying alien feet).
Anyway, all we’d done at this point was rip out the carpet, bleach the floor, and paint it dark brown, so I guess it theoretically counts as a “before” shot.
The after, after the jump.
What we did:
1. Installed an “area rug” of new carpet tiles. This, by the way, is a great solution for areas in your house (such as family rooms) that get heavy traffic and are prone to mini-disasters – when the carpet gets stained, all you have to do is replace a tile or two rather than the whole thing.
2. Re-imagined our old kitchen cabinet as a bar/video game console and added bar stools (only one is pictured above, but there are two) from Christmas Tree Shops.
3. Threw in comfortable furniture that totally doesn’t work with the decor of our house (like a floral chair that used to belong to my grandmother and that I keep swearing I’ll have recovered one of these days, my old hand painted Salvation Army desk, and our old Salvation Army coffee table, which isn’t pictured here), but that can take a little beating-up.
4. Hung some thematic artwork from Stampa.com.
5. Added a dartboard that I found outside a bar on 9th Avenue, plus darts from eBay.
6. Created a mini-kitchen area with our old microwave and a wine rack.
