Pepper Design Blog

Living Room Finds: A Few New Favorite Additions

Happy midweek! This is the time of the week that I just love because I’m starting to plan out my weekend projects and anticipate my time away from work with the fam, but am still not so rushed to finish my desk deadlines that I’m biting my fingernails. Midweek is a great time of the week.

A quick update to share regarding the trending colors that are making a friendly splash in this casa. That is to say that gold might be the new pink in this house. Or maybe they’re tied at this point (as evidenced here, here, here, here and here), but I’m noticing that I’ve been drawn to gold-hued home decor for a while now and that it has begun to pop up with sparkly and brushed gusto over the past couple of months.

Lots of pops of pink. Something so soothing and warm and inviting, no? Perhaps teal or navy should make an entrance…

I feel like I jumped on the gold-lovin’ band wagon early and began to embrace its shiny patina back when Kev and I first married almost six years ago. I’m pretty sure gold was still very not cool back then (remember the grimace you made when visiting Grandma’s perfectly brass-covered bathroom?) and I recall bringing a dainty gold chain necklace in for repair to my local jeweler and having him inspect it oddly, telling me ‘no one wears gold, no one’. I still wear that simple gold chain with a little pendant from Kevin every day.

Okay, side stories aside, here’s a new gold addition that I’m especially enamored with:

And it’s brass, too! Without a coffee table we have been in need of a convenient table solution for drinks and whatnot, especially with friends over. I have a little wooden tray that I usually keep on the couch that houses all things reading material, remote controls, etc but with a bouncing toddler and snuggly dog it never felt quite sturdy enough to hold mugs of tea or glasses of water.

So it’s been a side/coffee table search.

I tried out a couple of variations here and there over the past year (loooong search) but quickly found that this end-of-the-couch location called for something low profile and sturdy (anything with legs was easily tipped during the Liv and Bodie trial – one has inquisitive fingers, the other a very strong tail).

This antique brass West Elm drum table passed the test with flying colors.

It is still tail height and it is still visited by inquisitive hands, but now the table is far from tipping when anyone runs by it at a fast speed. It’s also fairly  light weight so we move it to the center of the sofa when it’s needed for wine and water glasses.

I’ve had too much fun at West Elm over the past few months. It’s rare that I’m toddler free outside of work and one of my favorite little stops when running errands is to swing by our local West Elm store and browse the sale section (which happens mayyybbeee once every three months). Other recent West Elm additions? There are a few now that I can spot.

This pink/coral vase that sits atop the bookshelves is a clearance find. (Kevin didn’t love my gold ‘home’ art project that used to also sit here and he ended up winning – I decided the letters might be best elsewhere after a couple of weeks).

As well as a couple of new pillows. How great is that pink and taupe tribal print? Or the striped coral and brown guy that pulls the entire couch ensemble together?

This one also now sits on our old leather corner chair.

On the more pink front, I believe I’ve finally settled the score on deciding on new wallpaper for the new nursery! And my gold Land of Nod desk lamp and pillow for the office have recently arrived. Talk about sparkly .

Happy soon-to-be weekend.

 All living room posts are sorted by tag right here for easy searching.

Living Room Update: A Little Letter Art Bling

While maybe a little overdone, I’ve been kind of loving ‘letter art’ for a while. We have our initials on the bookcase in the dining room and even a ‘LIV’ set in Liv’s room that I don’t think I’ve shared just yet.

When placing an order recently with Land of Nod for a cool new desk lamp, I fell for a free shipping coupon and had to spend $15 ish more on the site to qualify. So at $4 each, I threw four of these letters in for good measure (which with a free shipping discount makes them a steal at like $2 each, right? ).

They were made out of brown craft paper, 8-10″ tall and very light weight. I thought they might be fun to cover in paint or fabric or wallpaper and hang on a wall or bookcase in the house.

For now, my ‘HOME’ letter art calls the bookcases in the living room home:

But that might change soon. They feel a little big for this space? Would love to shrink them down about an inch on each side.

I thought about spray painting these guys for a super quick gold application but ended up sponging gold craft paint (left over from our Easter project) late one night, thinking that I might like a more burnished rather than solid effect (and the sponge would allow me to give that textured look). The result is definitely a solid gold (I nixed the burnished look after a few minutes), but I love how they’ve turned out.

I have a few gold paint containers in my stash but this metallic gold by Folk Art continues to be my favorite:

While the letters might not stay here, I do love the addition of gold and pink to the space!

Now the heart art ties in with the new Spring pillows (still debating pillows over here ) which ties in with that cool new glass coral vase (West Elm’s sale bin) up on the shelf.

My plan B was to set the letters up on top of the kitchen cabinets. Might be fun to add a splash of gold?

What do you think, has letter art become cliche? Overused to the moon and back? or does it still make for a fun and crafty addition?

PS The entire living room makeover is chronicled right here.

Dining Room Update: Giant {Pink!} Art for Spring

It’s been a while since we revisited the dining room, but I’ve been in the mood to inject some color into our home this spring (and pink, of all colors!) and this particular room was high on my list. We’ve had a wall in this space that for some time has needed one BIG piece of artwork. Something colorful and whimsical and oversized, a piece that would ‘pop’ with beautiful color.

But finding large artwork at a reasonable price is tough! I initially was on the hunt for a big piece of canvas art to add texture to the wall, but I soon realized that purchasing a piece that big (even if I saved my pennies for months) was not in the cards (though there are some really fabulous artists out there – I’ll try to get a post together on options). I patrolled Etsy and Art.com and every online shop in between. My mother-in-law gave me a huge 30×40″ canvas so that I could give creating my own abstract art a go – but then I found a piece that I fell for (that canvas will have to find another great spot in the house!).

Minted came on as a blog sponsor right about the time that I was giving up, and Minted’s print selection is over the moon fabulous! After searching through their beautiful selection, I fell in love with a print by Kelli Hall called Ligurian Houses. It was the perfect mixture of abstract, colorful, whimsical… it would fit the space perfectly.

Instead of framing the entire poster as it’s seen on Minted, I actually ordered the print in a much larger size than needed and then cut the poster down so that just the colorful artwork was visible. This is a great trick for any poster-style artwork, no need to frame the entire piece if there’s one particular portion that you love.

When the print (on a really thick, museum quality archival cotton rag paper) arrived, it was HUGE. I could have wallpapered the dining room wall with it.

When it came to framing, I was on the search for an economical solution, but one that would still look professional and great hanging there on that big ole wall. My favorite Ikea poster frames were just a few inches too long, and I considered breaking one apart as I did here but then decided that spending a little extra to have the right size made was probably worth the longevity of this image.

The most affordable route that I could find? Americanframes.com. I was especially happy that they offered to pop six frame samples into the mail before I ordered so that I could compare the different finishes and wood before making such a big purchase at about $85 sans the white matte.

I ended up settling on this natural frame because it matched well with the Ikea framed butterfly and dragonfly, and was the most inexpensive of the bunch.

 It felt like an eternity but finally my frame arrived! I spent last night assembling it. 

The wood frame came assembled and the backing, acrylic and hardware were in their own separate wrapping. A screwdriver (actually we pulled out the electric screwdriver for tightening the last few clips in place) and hammer later and the artwork was up!

I especially love how it plays so nicely with the new pink additions on the bookshelves in the living room.

I’m playing with adding a few lighter Spring-colored throw pillows into the mix as well. Yay for the arrival of Spring!!

Here’s a link to two additional semi-DIY over-sized pieces of artwork we’ve recently added to the house (and inexpensive solutions, too): ‘canvas’ fabric art for the living room and a black botanical chart for the kitchen.

PPS All dining room makeover posts can be found sorted right here.