Thursday, March 6, 2008

Living in it . . .

Well, we've been living with this gorgeous space now for a few months. It's so easy to clean (even though I don't clean as much as I should). My favorite things so far? Breakfast bar (I'm sitting at it now) Dishwasher ( my boyfriend always does the dishes) Blue sink (it's perfect in every way) all the tile -- tile is so cool. Huge kitchen sink with no divider -- great idea. It's 10" deep and 36" wide. Stainless steel countertops -- so industrial, sleek, modern, and recyclable. The butcher block island with recycling center -- awesome. The clutter is down to nothing now. We have to separate our recycling here -- the recycling guys are absolute nazis about it. It's so fun cooking now, and I love being in my bathroom. I never want to move. I also love the fact that I picked everything out, and it's my taste. Usually, you live with some other yahoo's taste, and if you're lucky, you can change the wallpaper or the vinyl flooring.

Negatives? Hmmmm. Not crazy about the faucet in the kitchen. It keeps falling apart, and the water pressure isn't as awesome as I'd hoped. The cabinet paint is chipping where the screws from the pulls hit it. Shoulda picked different pulls. Still love the cabinets. And, this is impossible in my place, cause there is no space for it, but I wish I had a pantry. Right now all our dry goods are stored under on a lazy suzan, and all the stuff falls off when you're spinning it around. I should organize it better, I guess.

Things I did right: Hired a great contractor. I know this is a do-it-yourself site, but now in the future I'm confident I'll be able to do some of the stuff myself. Jake Nau sincerely cared about the project, and works with really talented people. They are all true artisans, which are really hard to find these days. Also, I'm so glad I went to the salvage place. Nowadays, we live in a throw-away society, and it's really hard for me to believe this is the right way to live. There is no way the Earth can sustain all the abuse we subject it to every second of every day. My parents save everything -- my mom's cat sleeps on my old baby blankets. We need to adopt the idea of reduce reuse recycle now. So instead of buying a tub and sink from home depot, manufactured in China, shipped across the world to replace my old tub and sink produced in China and shipped across the world, I found perfectly good used tub and sink, manufactured here like 100 years ago, that have a million times more character, for virtually free.

Things I should have thought about more: Even though I love how everything turned out, I wish I would have done more research about materials well in advance. There were these gorgeous recycled glass tiles I wanted so bad, but the lead time was 6 weeks, which would have delayed the project.

I don't know how to add links, but I'm going to add some copy and paste links that were instrumental in the completion of Sayer-ville.

First, my contractor:
http://www.openairconcepts.com/

The salvage place:
http://www.citysalvage.com/

The tile place:
http://www.katelotile.com/wall.html

The recycled glass tile place:
http://www.bedrockindustries.com/

Also, thanks to the last few people who e-mailed me and commented about the project; positivity is hard to find on the internet!

I'll be adding more pics, and now I'm decorating my bedroom (when I come up with the cash). So, I'll be talking more about decorating and what I've been learning in Interior Design school.

That is all.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

No need to apologize for hiring a contractor - you do what you can & hire the rest. You still oversaw the project & provided the overall vision. And a great vision at that!

And forget about the idiot that fussed at you for removing the built in - not everything has to remain how it was built. Just because it is original does not mean it is a good idea. Especially as the way people live now is not the same as it was long ago.

You rebuilt with quality design & materials & craftsmanship. You recycled what you could and used old materials when possible. You made your house a home that works for you and the way you live. You rock. Give yourself (and all who helped) a big pat on the back.

The place is gorgeous - you should be very happy. And based on what I see you should do very well with a career change to interior design - good luck with the classes.

Cheryl

Anonymous said...

i'd love to know where you got the green sink. it looks like a wall-hung sink, which we are looking for.