Saturday, October 5, 2013

Dining Room Update & Wall Decor

A couple of months ago we bought a new home.  There wasn't anything that "had" to be done but the designer in me was going crazy with some of the out dated wall finishes. 

The dining room was the worst where the walls were sponge painted in two shades of mint green and had a lovely (not) ivy border all around the room.  I first tackled the wall paper border which came down extremely easy.  The last home we lived in was fully wall papered.  Some rooms had 2 wall papers and a border.  We went through every room and removed the wall paper and painted.  After a couple of rooms and nightmares about wall paper, we decided to invest in a wall paper steamer like this one.




Wagner Wallpaper Steamer only $47.57 with free shipping from Amazon.  

Remember, as always with Amazon, Prices and availability are subject to change without notice.

It was well worth the cost and it made the ivy border removal a piece of cake!   

Once the border was down it was time to decide on a paint color.  My first instinct was to go with a color similar to the dining room in our previous home.  It was a medium khaki that opened into our red kitchen and I loved it.  The more I considered this though, I decided that this was my opportunity to do something different and exciting.   Instead of purchasing a gallon or two of paint, I went about mixing together some mistint paints we had left from our kitchen & bath business.  The result was a really great color that actually looks green, brown, or grey depending on the time of day and lighting.   

Here is a collage of the before & after of the room.  



Now it was time to decorate the walls.  In our last house, I had a rusty iron leaf wreath and some winery inspired canvas art above the buffet but it didn't seem right in the new space.  We also had a new black & oak dining set and an open oak stairway in the dining room.  I did have a large twig wreath I wanted to use but the wall needed something more.  I decided I wanted to add something with a modern touch to offset the slight rustic look of the twigs.  

I looked through Pinterest for a number of hours (that I won't admit to) for ideas and inspiration.   This is what I came up with.  






I had a few dollar store black picture frames and a bag full of mismatched silverware I'd found at a garage sale.  I played around with some layout ideas and set to work assembling my new decor. 

First I removed the glass from the frames.  I considered covering the frame back with scrapbooking paper but I liked the brown hardboard looking back.  With my hot glue gun,  I attached the pieces to the backer and to each other.  Once they were secure I added a twine bow.  

The other piece required a bit more thought and "engineering".  Again I laid out the pieces just how I wanted them but I needed something to mount them to.  I wanted to do this as an inexpensive project and wanted to avoid having to purchase anything.  I rummaged through recycling and came up with a metal lid from a jar.  It wasn't the right color and I wanted the background for the spoon art to have some texture.  I had some cork tiles left over from a previous project and liked the color and texture it added.  I cut it into a circle slightly larger than the lid and attached it with hot glue. I attached a metal picture frame hanger to the back side and then used the hot glue to also attach the spoons to the now cork covered lid.  

And that's it!  I decided on the placement and hung the wreath and my fun new dining room wall decor!

What have you created for fun decor in your home?  Would you like suggestions or ideas for decorating or paint colors?  Send me your decorating questions & photos and I might feature it on the blog!  








No comments:

Post a Comment