Eleanor's House - Orange Beauties...

I have been getting some of our furniture reupholstered at the moment by our fabulous upholsterer and long time friend of esdesign, Geoff Fiebig.  Unfortunately, a bit like the exterior paint choice this has proved to be quite difficult as I have been faced with too many options.

As the access to our house isn't great we were fortunate to inherit all the existing furniture,  mainly because it was too hard to get out of the house!! It was all made in 1979, upholstered in Sanderson fabric - the frames and the fabric are excellent quality but the Sanderson really isn't what I had in mind and is starting to wear in areas.  I think it did pretty well for 30 years.

There are 2 of these sofas - they are very large at nearly 2.3m wide but they were also very low.

before

Having thought long and hard about what to put on them I remembered that I had brought a roll of corduroy velvet back from the Denholm Velvet Factory in England and had popped it in storage.  Perfect.  We decided to remove the skirt around the bottom and put legs on them to make them stand a little taller....et voila!

after

Orange Beauties - I love them.  Thanks Geoff.

Eleanor's House - Lighting

We are having a dilemma at the moment about light fittings - now that the girls' rooms have their wallpaper up and the hallway is being painted I really need to get my hurry on.

I think the previous owner bought a job lot of not very savoury lights - as every room has the same one...just like this one in Molly's room. They have now been re-homed at the Salvation Army.

Molly has spent a while looking at light fittings and has decided to go with the Matariki shade from our dear friends at Joug Design - this will compliment her wallpaper and curtains. 

For Elsbeth's room she was very keen to have a chandelier.  In our lounge we have two chandeliers that were installed in 1979 when the house was converted back into a home from being flats after WWII.  She wanted something similar.  I found on Trademe a chandelier identical, but smaller, for her from a gentleman who restores vintage (mainly 1960's and 1970's) light fittings.  It was cost effective, in fabulous condition and arrived ready for install - perfect.  Images to follow.....

I wanted something large in the hall but not too expensive.  I had always liked the Ikea Maskros light but I have a dear friend who also has it in her hallway .... eek the whole copy cat problem.  Anyway - another interior designer friend had brought one into NZ and it was too big for her client so offered it to me - I decided I loved it too much and went for it - ah well -  imitation is a form of flattery.

Here is my hallway - the main light fitting is down the end where the front door is...

Here is the Maskros light fitting from Ikea...

I will keep you posted on developments in the hallway once the painting is completed!

Eleanor's House - External Paint Colours

 In the Summer - yes Summer will be here quicker than we know it - we are booked in to have the exterior of our house painted.  This is what it looks like from the harbour side facing north...

... and from the west facing side.

To do this we will need to choose a colour and I think this is going to prove to be a very difficult decision.  I have always wanted to go very dark on the weather boards with white contrast trim but my Husband will need convincing!

I have been going dizzy on Pinterest looking at schemes to get some inspiration - here are a few....

From Poppytalk

From Remodelista

From Ebossnow

From Housemacarbe

Eleanor's House - Jack's Bedroom

In my first blog about my home I showed a sneek peek of a corridor in our house that we had great plans for - it has now been transformed into a bedroom for our 12 year old son, Jack.

The corridor was 1.8m wide and 4.2m long with a porch of the end adding a further metre. A challenging shaped space especially when wanting to fit a double bed, storage and a desk in.

This is the existing porch which we enclosed in and removed the orginal victorian door and surround from (we are saving this for a later project somewhere else in the house).

The above porch not only gave protection from the NW winds but it also has amazing views across the harbour up to Mount Kaukau opposite.  Perfect for distracting a studying teenager, so this was the best area for a desk - north facing - great all day sun.

Just incase you are wondering how we now get into our house after removing the door the house also has another main front door on a verandah to the west side of the house!

Here is the internal view of the door before it was removed.

...and the corridor looking into the house.

With the entrance ramp and door removed, a new double glazed window was installed.

An internal doorway was added in the hallway - watch this space to see what we have planned for this....

et voila.....a bedroom was formed.  Beautiful blonded solid ash timber stairs lead up to a platform bed,  together with in-built timber joinery - all of which was built by our very talented joiner, Terry - Thank you.



Jack now has somewhere for everything - his desk area is not installed yet so I will post images once it's in.

He also has a world map on his wall - planning his big OE. (world map available from esdesign).

Eleanor's House - Children's Bedrooms

Designing and decorating children's bedrooms can give you a headache.  Not only are you dealing with multiple spaces - sometimes all at the same time as I am - but also with multiple personalities.  I wanted to create spaces that the kids can sleep, work and play in, but would also give them longevity.  It is unlikely that I will be redecorating them again anytime soon.

Rightly or wrongly I gave the girls - aged 15 and 10 - free reign on choosing wallpaper, curtaining etc. They both have their own distinct style (I did give them some guidence). My advice to any parent doing this is that you have to set some guidelines otherwise the result will be a migraine enabling kaleidoscope. Also, we did this over a period of time - a few months.

Last week you saw my post about Molly's bedroom in progress - this week it's our youngest daughter, Elsbeth's turn.

Elsbeth picked out something very traditional right from the beginning. She was adament that this was the one and ended up with her choice. She didn't change her mind in 12 months. It is Sanderson's beautiful magnolia bloom design called 'Grandiflora'.

It features a very large scale floral pattern and though it comes in some more subtle shades - Elsbeth elected for the colour way below - chartreuse and steel (very appropriate) and a mass impact on a 3.3m stud wall... WOW!

and here is a sneek peek of how it looks so far..........

...more deliciousness to follow....

Eleanor's House - Teenage Girl's Bedroom

This is a hard one. My teenage daughter didn't really know what she wanted. But she did know what she didn't want - seemed to be everything I suggested!! She knew that she wanted wallpaper on one wall and she wanted something white tone on white.  The hunt was on.  Here are a couple of the contenders....

Eco Boras wallpaper

Elise from Sanderson's A Painter's Garden Collection

Molly, aged 15, eventually decided on this beauty from the Swedish wallpaper company, Eco Boras, White Collection. It has a beautiful pearlised background with white dandelion seed heads -perfect for lying in bed and making wishes.

Teamed with lovely white linen curtains it is a tranquil haven in a teenagers busy life.

The linen is from Modern Nature and is called Celine.  I decided to interline and line the curtains to give them that weightier look and more insulation in our draughty old lady.  The paint colours I have used throughout are Resene Half Bianca on the walls and doors and Quarter Rice Cake on the ceiling, scotia, skirting and window frames. 

All product featured is available through esdesign.....of course.

Eleanor's House - Girls' Bedrooms

After a 2 year search the Steel family found their dream home and moved in last May, and so after almost a year in situ we have now decided to get things moving on the reno front. We are very excitied - well I am! The projects ahead of us will involve every area of the house - from childrens rooms to kitchen and bathrooms.

This is the beginning of what I know will be a long journey - I invite you to join me on this journey and hope that you will get some ideas out of it, even if it is what not to do!.

We are starting downstairs in the girls' rooms, TV room and creating a new bedroom for our son, Jack.

If you know anything about children you will know that generally they are untidy - my solution is to give the girls wardrobes that are the size of small countries. My plan is then to put anything and everything that belongs to them in these large storage units and hope that I can then transit across their rooms (and the rest of the house) without injuring myself.  Here are some images of the wardrobe progress.

My eldest daughter's bedroom post wallpaper stripped - pre tidy!!!

My parents are currently visiting from the UK and are convinced that if we have an earthquake the wardrobe would be the safest place to take cover! I managed to source some old doors for these wardrobes - I will keep you updated on progress.

Over the last few weeks we have had my 18 year old cousin and her friend here from the UK on their Gap Year. Board doesn't come free - they have managed to strip the wallpaper from the bottom floor of the house. In future blogs we will look at decorating these spaces.

Our house has 2 hallways on the bottom floor. The original front door and veranda had become redundant and so we are keen to use it as our main entrance. This left us with a 1.8m x 4.4m space plus an entrance porch - see below...wait and see what we are going to do with it!

 Just moved in - still unpacking...

Wallpaper stripped and ready for the builders. Recycled wardrobe doors for the girls' rooms.

Bye for now!

Eleanor's House - A Reno Project

Over the next few months we are hoping to start a new feature here at the esdesign blog, following the real time renovation of Eleanor's own home in Oriental Bay. The builders are there this week to start tweaking, and Eleanor is planning to update regularly to take you through the changes that occur, showing you the nitty gritty before shots and the fabulous after shots, as well as everything in between.

Use the button on the right hand side bar to keep updated with the progress!

In the meantime, here's a little teaser of some of the work that's beginning this week...