living in style

im about 90% complete. still have to buy a tv.

MY APARTMENT!!!

so ladies and gentlemen, it's a new chapter in my life. i have finally seized the opportunity to move out of my parents' house and get my very own apartment in nyc. it was a long, depressing struggle to search for a place, much less to convince my parents. finding an apartment in manhattan is a rat race. it's searching obsessively, all day long, on craigslist; calling owners, brokers, whoever and leaving messages; going to talk to brokers about the listing for apartment x you saw, and end up being shown apartment y, because x was never available in the first place (bastards); and it's an exercise of patience, which i have none of. i had originally started with a low budget of $1300/mo to see what was available. nothing. but in all fairness, i am extremely picky about where i'd live and what the apt looks like. so then i upped it to $1500. do you know what i saw for $1550 in the east village? i saw a 1BR- i walked in saw a tiny stove and a tiny fridge, turned around to see the tiny sink, and then, oh, what else? a BATHTUB, in the KITCHEN! i looked at the guy showing the apartment and the first thing that came to my mind was, "where do ppl shit?" lo and behold, in a communal toilet. i think i spent 45 seconds max in that place. broker after broker, i was told to raise my rent to at least $1800 to find anything decent- totally crushing my original budget. long story short, i began shopping with an open mind and looked at the not-much-more-glamorous apartments, until i finally found my apartment. and it's so true, you know right away that it's yours when you see it-- just like when you first meet a love: your heart skips, and you feel comfortable enough to claim it as yours. and that was how i found my killer 1BR for a reasonable rent!

being the diva i am, i had a vision about where i'd take this place, and since i moved in on friday, i've been bringing that vision to fruition. i gave myself a budget of $3000 to furnish an entire apartment (remember, ive never had my own furniture before, so i literally have to buy EVERYTHING (with the exception of art, photos, candle-things, etc)! ikea has yet again, been my loyal source of vision fruition-ing. i've said it before and i'll say it again. on a budget, and for the quality of the products, compared to other stores, it is hard to beat ikea's prices.

ok, enough talking, here are the pics!

Day 11: Done D-Done Done!

My plan for the day was to paint over all the holes I spackled and finish up. Had to zip over to the storage place to pick up the paint first. It took me maybe 15 minutes to go over all the holes and now the wall looks shiny and new. I vaccumed, dusted, made the bed, and smiled. I also managed to have enough time to have all the digital pictures printed to put in a photo album for him. Included in that was an 8x10 of this fantastic picture he took in Istanbul, at the Blue Mosque. It's the woodwork on a door, just stunning. I framed that for him and put it up on the wall unit.

It's kind-of sad to be finished.

Day 10: Chalk it up!

I couldn't wait to try out the chalkboard paint to see how it comes out. I've read and seen on TV that the secret to transforming any regular latex paint into chalkboard paint is by adding tile grout. That means you can have it in any color you want, not necessarily just black or green. (Check out the Martha Stewart link b/c I know she had it on her site). Regardless, I went with a ready-made black chalkboard paint for the door. You're supposed to apply it with a foam brush or roller, and one very important tip is to apply generous coats. That's what I kept repeating to myself over and over, apply generous coats, apply generous coats! Because it's true, the first coat is so streaky, it's scary. We were concerned that a black door in an already poorly lit corridor would make it feel like a black hole, but contrarily, I think it's going to add to it. Once we get colored chalk and make it fun and useful, won't be a problem at all! So this really is a GREAT way to make an otherwise useless space, usefull. Now he can write To Do lists and checklists on the door, and skim through them on the way out. Perfect.

While I was in between coats, waiting for them to dry, I came up with the idea of creating a key rack. He had this really interesting postcard that I framed, and underneath, screwed hooks into the wall. It came out nicely, and it's a much better alternative to your traditional wood-carved key rack that you would normally find in the shape of, you guessed it, a key!

Day 8 & 9: Hangman

The projection screen is up!! So I decided to go ahead with surface mounting the plywood on the ceiling. I figured I'm in no condition to be opening up the ceiling and attaching plywood or 2x4 to the joists, blah blah blah... we sketched an analyzed every possible option between our team and the carpenters. But the truth is that the screen isn't THAT big or that heavy that I need to tie it into the ceiling. I felt pretty confident that the least intensive option, surface mounting the plywood, would suffice. I had 2-4"x6" pieces of plywood that I attached to the ceiling with 4 toggle bolts each.
I actually bought bolts that were a bit too short and had to run out to the nearest hardware store, and like the handygirl that I am, got lost looking around at all the fun. Guess what I found???? Chalkboard paint! Benjamin Moore makes chalkboard paint in quarts, so it's exactly the amount I need, and at a great price, $12.99-- vs. $39.99 that I saw over at Yoya (granted, this one is not also magnetic, which is the expensive part of the paint). The toggle bolt, is a more secure anchor for sheetrock. It's a bolt with a butterfly clip on the end, that when inserted through the sheetrock, expands, and clips on. 2 blocks of plywood and 8 toggle bolts later, the projector screen is up!

I had a bit of bad luck with the large poster. This poster is 56"x34"-- any custom made frame would be $200+, so I decided instead to head down to Canal Plastics (Canal and Church St.) where they can cut plexiglass for you in any size. I got the plexi for only $66 and stopped by Pearl, just down the block, to get some clips and foam posterboard with which to attach and hang the poster. Bad news, I dropped it and the corner of the plexiglass snapped right off. I am so crushed. Ugh, I don't know if I should go back and buy another piece, or if I should wait for R's opinion.

It's a bit frustrating that things aren't going as well as I would like them to. I feel like this project peaked on Day 6, and since, has been challenging and frustrating. The satisfaction of the end result is still keeping me keepin' on, but God, this isn't as fun as it used to be! But, good thing is that the worst is over and from here on out, it will be really fun, gratifying, and I'm so close to the end I can visualize it. Note: just because I am almost done does NOT mean we are almost done.

Shoutout

Naturally, I've been googling "do-it-yourself" "studio renovation" etc, just to see what's out there, what other tips I may find, you know...

This just cracked me up and I had to give a shout out to Stuff White People Like.

http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/2008/01/29/37-renovations/


enjoy!

Day 7: Obsession

Our white board at work is covered with all of our projector-hanging ideas sketched out. I have my entire team helping me out with this. Each of us have a unique approach, and I still have no idea which one to go with.

Do I surface mount plywood and screw into that? If so, do I use a 6"x6" square of plywood, attach to the sheetrock with 4 toggle bolts each, and then attach the screen at each of the hooks; or do I go with a 4"x98" long trip (the length of the screen) screw into the sheetrock at 12" intervals, and attach the screen to that strip????

Do I cut open the sheetrock, install the blocking within the sheetrock ceiling, tape, spackle, sand, paint, and hang the screen?

Should I recess the screen into the ceiling, get creative and make it very very complicated?

I don't want to take the easy way out, but I truly don't want to cut open the sheetrock ceiling.

I have a bucket of spackle and a roll of tape on stand-by.

Day 6: Screwed

Long, productive day of screwing. I began by hanging all the frames on the walls. Above the bed, in lieu of a headboard, I hung 4 framed Rothko's side by side. Those are the same posters that I took off of the entrance door- I chose the least orange-y ones and put them in black frames. Framing and relocating the same exact posters that were formerly hanging elsewhere added so much flavor and color to the room. I also framed the camels poster I bought in Dubai, along with the Rothko that was on the wall next to the window. It looks great! Next to the bed, I hung an empty 5x7 picture frame. I figured I'd give him the choice of what picture to put in it.

The bed sheets were chosen to match the couch so as not to clash with too many colors. This let me incorporate the posters and colored pillows without it being too loud. I ended up switching the new orange IKEA pillows with the two pillows formerly placed on the couch. I just didn't feel that the new orange IKEA pillows fit with the bed and the frames. Simultaneously, I didn't think the funky pillows fit well with the couch, so switching the two was the best solution. Next to the bed, I used one of the (2) ottomans he bought months ago, as the night-stand. The cube actually has a smaller ottoman inside, and the lid of the cube/ottoman flips over to be a solid-surfaced tray. It's the perfect solution to use the ottoman, and not spend money on a night-stand, plus, it looks great and things can be stored inside- more storage!



Next were the blinds. Not so difficult. But the projection screen, not so easy. I removed the projection screen from its location above the window and tried to screw it into the ceiling in front of the wall unit. After drilling, hammering in an anchor, screwing in the hook, and hanging the left side of the screen, bam, it crashed down on me, ripping the hook and anchor right out of the ceiling. Super. I decided I would think about it and get back to it after installing the shelves. I measured the desired heights of the shelves, located the placement of the brackets, drilled, hammered in anchors, screwed the brackets to the wall, leveled... done. Not done. Once I placed the shelf in the brackets, this too came ripping out of the wall. It's like the walls are made of paper! I discovered that what worked was to use a muuuccchhh smaller anchor with that screw to really secure it to the wall. It did work, and I installed the top and bottom shelves the same. The middle shelf that I designed to wrap around (to shelf the projector) was challenging in a fun way, to install. I had to use a little bit of trigonometry (Pythagorean theorem anyone?) to determine the height of the cable screws based on the depth of the shelf. Actually, this kind of shelf is ideal for a projector because you can adjust the tilt of the shelf itself however you want. The color of the shelves didn't clash (as I mentioned in a previous entry), in fact they look great. The shelf system came out as nicely as I'd hoped. Feeling optimistic and accomplished, I went back to the projection screen, hoping to tackle it as I had tackled the shelf problem. The second time, with the smaller anchor, the hooks screwed into the ceiling and all was fine. ...Until I tugged on the screen to roll it up, and it came crashing down on me, again. The poor neighbors below... I don't know what to do now. My only option is to screw it into the ceiling, and that proved impossible to do with anchors. I might have to get a long piece of 2x4 (wood), screw it to the ceiling for the entire length of the screen, (obviously, would have to paint it) and then screw the screen to the wood- thus securing it. This might be my only option right now, I'll be at the lumber yard next weekend. Haha.



On the wall unit, I removed the plastic planters with my favorite vine plants and put them out on the balcony- it actually dresses up the balcony very nicely. The new pots for the other plants have a nice, organic look instead, and I'm starting to see a completeness of the wall unit. Can you believe I'm keeping it? It's not looking so badly anymore! With the rest of the room shaping up, this wall unit fits right in, alas, it is saved! Finally, my last task of the day was to untangle the pile of wires... and that's about as much as I can do with them, because I could spend a lifetime trying to figure out how to reconnect all the electronics. I am so technologically challenged!

By the evening, I was so physically exhausted that I gave the bed and couch equal opportunity to host my crashing body. The place looks so amazing, I couldn't even recognize it myself, and now I have a hard time leaving it. I find myself standing in random spots of the apartment, taking in the view for x amount of time. I stand in the kitchen and stare at all the refreshing, new changes. What an incredible transformation, I just canNOT wait to see his reaction!

Day 5: Go to Bed...

Putting the bed together. Exhausting. Took a few hours, but it's done. IKEA's great about including all the tools and parts needed to put together furniture, but man, do those screws add up.


This bed is what makes all the difference. Having an actual bed frame that doubles as storage will kill 2 birds with 1 stone and essentially, double the room's space. The relocation to the opposite wall keeps the room looking orderly, and opens the flow. Now you can stand in the kitchen and not see a bed in your face. Similarly, you can sit on the couch and not see a bed in your face.

Introducing...

I have finalllllllyyyyyy set up my company. Now that I've received my tax ID and filled out all the paperwork, I would like to introduce you to my name.

sylc, pronounced as "silk",

will be the name I will be using for all future endeavors. I'm in the process of developing the logo and business cards.

Day 4: Shop Till I Drop...

I went back to IKEA after work. I returned $65 worth of goods, and ended up spending another $175 on wood blinds and picture frames. I hate to seem close minded, and use IKEA for the vast majority of my choices, but seriously, IKEA is hard to beat. For the decent quality, the modern look, and the selection, it's challenging to find a better store--- when you're on a tight budget. I've searched online, I've searched through catalogs, I've visited all the stores I know and like, but when renovating an entire space for only $1,000, the options, quite honestly, are limited. Does anyone have any suggestions on where I can find cheap wood blinds--- preferably made of recycled wood? (I bet that R could find half of the stuff I bought online, on sale, somewhere, since he IS the master Googler!)

After IKEA, I hopped over to the Container Store where I bought the shelves and associated brackets. I chose to go with the gray wood-stained finish. I'm debating how that's going to look overall. The built-in wall unit is like a cherry beech, and I bought the wood blinds to match. Since the shelves, blinds, and wall units are all lined up next to each other, I thought that mixing it up and bringing in black-ish shelves will prevent the feel of a monotonous design. We'll see this weekend. The woman at the register told me that if I were a member of NAPO, National Association of Professional Organizers (can you believe there is such a thing!?), I would receive 20% off in the store. Something to look into... So another $90 later (got them on clearance, wahoo!)... and that's it... I've bought everything I needed to buy, and I have about $70 left in my budget. I will probably try to spend that on lighting since there isn't any. I wish by some miracle, I could have had the closet doors in my budget. I'll still collect quotes and decide whether or not to proceed. I'm thinking that if I have custom closet doors made, the same people could look into the pocket door for the bathroom. It might be to my advantage to have that all in one proposal, so I will think about that, and address it when I'm done with the main scope.



I asked the guys at work to give me some tape and spackle on the side, since I'll be needing to patch some holes this weekend. This is too fun.

On a side note, I finally registered my company name and filed for my tax ID, so I can get my company started! Soon to come: business cards...

Day 3: Movin' Along...

All day yesterday, i was receiving feedback about this blog, which kept the project fresh on my mind, and left me anxious to head over after work and continue. I also couldn't stop brainstorming and thinking about what to do for shelving. It's not as easy as picking out any shelves and brackets and just installing them- because of the electronic equipment they are going to support. With the cables, those electronics are about 14" deep, while most shelves are 8-12" deep. The idea is to install wall-mounted shelves next to the window, and have a shelf on the wall adjacent to it (above the couch's new location) so support the projector. After a series of sketches and an afternoon spent searching for options online, I came up with a solution!

I will be searching all week for the other unpurchased matierals/furniture, so that I can have a super productive weekend next weekend. That's why I decided to go by the apartment and do a bit of work in the meantime. I started cleaning: removing the blue tape around the edges and the drop clothes off the floor. But man, I'm so diappointed in that blue tape! I should have just cut the base and walls by hand! the thing about blue tape is that unless you do a PERFECT job taping the edges, your painting will "spill" or the lines won't be straight. I found so much paint on the WHITE wood base that now I will have to go buy white paint to go over my mistakes; and the corner where the two wall colors meet is imperfect, so I'll have to go over that too. I'm so hating that blue tape, but i'm really glad that at least the man at the paint store gave it to me for free, or i'd be cursing the $5.95 plus labor it would've cost me!!! For the time I wasted taping, I couldve just spent it cutting everything by hand. Ugh, oh well, better luck next time.

So that bummer aside, I started rearranging the furniture to its new locations, and gave myself the satisfaction of starting the bed assembly. Half the fun of buying (and saving) from IKEA is assembling the furniture yourself! My fingers are a little sore today, but it's all good!

Day 2: Let's Get it On!

Too excited to sleep in, and still a little jet lagged, I was up and out of my house by 9:30am. I stopped by a local paint store, Sipersteins, in Bergenfield, NJ, to pick up some paint. There I had one on one service with a great guy there to help me. He offered his suggestions and helped me out a lot, since I'm in the industry. That trip cost another $59 for paint, brushes, drop clothes, etc. This is adding up quickly. Since the majority of the apartment is painted in a sand color, and I know his favorite color is orange, I decided to go with a deep orange to paint as an accent wall right at the head of his bed. It's going to look fantastic.

I was able to land a parking spot RIGHT outside his building. Unloading was horrible to a minimum. 11 trips later, I finally had all materials inside the apartment-- the bed alone required 8 trips.

I was hoping to paint and get the bed assembled, but unfortunately, painting took a lot longer than I thought it would. You have to be especially careful when you paint darker colors because imperfections show! Any streaks, any uneven coats will be so obvious. Therefore it is important to paint 2 SOLID coats and make sure that you don't miss any spots. Cutting (painting at all the corners, trims, and edges) took forever. Not to mention how much it el-sucked-o to paint underneath those stairs. I'm talking about lying flat on my belly, no light, and trying to get every corner. The great thing about the paint I bought, making it all the more worthwhile, is that it has no VOCs (Volatile Organic Chemicals) which means that it doesn't release any toxic chemicals into the air, and it has no odor either- so we didn't choke on that paint smell. I'm trying to be as green as possible about this! Check out Pittsburgh Paints. I'm very pleased with the product.

I had a girlfriend come keep me company to catch up, and she was simultaneously cracking up at me and feeling sorry for all that I was going through. (I didn't ask any friends to help me out with this--- if it's my own apartment, that's one thing, but as a favor to someone else, I'd never oblige them to share the burden (burden of pleasure!) with me... so she wasn't being lazy/unhelpful, I refused to let her help) I forgot to bring a step stool, and found myself performing some sort of cirque du soleil act to stand up on a tall stool, while remaining balanced (and everyone knows how clumsy I am), with a paintbrush in one hand, and a wall of wet paint that I can't even use to support me. Who knew that painting could be so exhausting!? But nevertheless, it was loads of fun, and the end result is what made it all worthwhile. Check out the before pics from Day 0, to compare with these after pics:

For the rest of the day, I took all the dimensions I needed for: blinds; more picture frames; the closet doors; etc, and I framed a few of the posters which now look oh-so-good. It made me all the more excited to come back asap and get that bed assembled so then I will really see it all come together. Bed and paint are the main milestones in the schedule of this work. I like to start with the biggest, most important elements because they really give a sensation of the direction and progress, by showing you exactly what you're working towards for the overall, final design. Then it's always fun to fill in with the miscellaneous items that only enhance the entire accomplishment. So by next weekend the place is going to look dramatically different, and I will have to start thinking about other major items like the organization of his stuff, and what to do with that wall unit!

Day 1: Shopping

I literally just got off the plane from a week long vacation and I feel ready to go, NOW! I chose not to waste any time and headed straight over to IKEA to start buying the things that I know I need, and also to let myself be inspired by the store.

Here begins the spending spree (which, as I mentioned before, although I will try my best to stick to the tighhhhtttt budget, I know in the back of my mind that that figure was more like an uneducated guess than a qualified budget based on the scope of work). What that really means is that yes, I am checking prices, but I can't help the math. Even when I'm spending only $9.99 or $12.99, I can't help that that suddenly becomes a total of $669 in one trip!!

I bought my bulky basics: bought the bed with the storage which is fantastic, you just lift up the mattress and can fit the world inside. This will help eliminate the need for his mini storage-- a monthly cost that will now most likely go towards spoiling me, hehe-- (heyyy I'm volunteering here!) For some reason, I'm not finding the bed on the IKEA website, but I'll be sure to post a picture once I find one... It's the Sultan Alsarp bed, only $300 for queen sized. I also bought picture frames, plants, planters, sheets, pillows, and miscellaneous items like hooks, screws, an apron, etc.


What I have yet to buy are: shelves, wood blinds, some additional frames, and in the future (not included in my little budget) mirrored closet doors (currently his closets are wide open), and replacing his bathroom door with a pocket door. There's a good amount of work cut out for me/us, yeah essentially, me.

Little did I know how heavy this box-of-bed was going to be, but luckily it fit in my car... I only had to open the box and put it all in piece-by-piece. At least that will also make it easier to unload and bring it into the apartment.

I stopped by Home Depot to get ideas about paint colors, the closet doors, and the pocket door. Useless. Home Depot sucks. It's not the same as it used to be, or the same that it advertises to be. Home Depot just sucks. It's always crowded, the people who work there are more often than not- unhelpful, they usually don't know what they're talking about, and it's nothing short of a hassle to go there. I got so tired of standing around waiting for someone to help me that I just left.

So for now, I've got a car stuffed with goods that smells like IKEA unassembled furniture.