Knoll Handkerchief Stacking Chair

I hope you're all enjoying some great summer days. We're enjoying the benefits of summer in the Willamette Valley, mostly good wine and veggies galore from our garden, other people's gardens, and farmer's markets. This spring we also benefitted from Craigslist! We picked up these Knoll stacking handkerchief chairs in the tiny Oregon town of Azalea! They were red and faded because they had been used as outdoor chairs. But with a little spray paint these puppies cleaned right up and I couldn't be happier with them. They're super comfortable and easy to clean. The Danish table we got from Hawthorne Vintage up in Portland. The other 2 chairs were from St. Vincent's and with some spray paint and new fabric for the seats they cleaned up nicely as well (before pictures below). You can see the Flor tiles that we got from Modern about 3 years ago (past blog posts about Modern and Flor). Before the remodel the Flor tiles were the runner in the hallway but now they help to define our dining area. In the background you can also see how great the floor and door trim turned out thanks to David Schmitz, AIA (Engage Architecture) and Jonathan Plummer (Bunchberry Woodworking)! Having an actual dining room table has me actually looking forward to winter dinners and card games - but I don't want to wish away this sunshine and warmth.  I'm gonna go eat some sun-warmed blackberries that are creeping through from our neighbor's yard now. . .

Window and Door Trim: Modern Organic

Life is busy these days so I'll keep it brief. Here's our front door without any trim. After some discussion David Schmitz, AIA directed us to go in a less conventional direction. You can check out the trim on the windows below. We kept it continuous with the hallway doors as well. David plus Jonathan at Bunchberry woodworking built us a new hallway closet door to also keep to look consistent. It was a little extra cost at the end but well worth. This is a design piece that we really didn't think of until the very end. It took a few extra weeks to get it all installed but it's looking great and the trim really makes the whole place feel finished. The trim seems minor but without it the whole remodel would have looked either incomplete or simply an after thought. It was indeed an afterthought but thanks to David's smart thinking it looks like it was always a part of the plan.

Green Kitchen Feature Item: Built in Compost Bin

This is the first weekend that Mr. Monkey and I have been able to cook and live in our new kitchen (pictures coming soon). We've just spent the whole weekend moving kitchen items in from the garage to the house, sorting for keepers and tossers (to Goodwill of course), and washing, and then finding each item a home. One of my favorite features of our new kitchen is the built in compost bin. As you can see it's just a catering pan. But it's placement in the top drawer makes it so that we can bump the drawer with our hip and the drawer opens, we just lift off the lid and wipe all food scraps from the cutting board or the stainless steel counter top directly into the compost bin. Lid goes back on and you bump the drawer closed with your hip again. As an added little niceity Jonathan Plummer  whittled a wee walnut handle for our compost bin to match the gorgeous island top. A nice touch indeed. Now we're composting and no one can tell because our compost bin isn't sitting out on the counter. We're covert composters! If you're wanting to see more recent pics of the kitchen check the twitter feed. I'll try to get some bigger non-phone pictures up here this week. Thanks for reading everyone! I appreciate the feedback over twitter and in person. We're nearing the end of this kitchen remodel and now we're left with a few choices remaining like bar stool selection and wall and window trims. Stay tuned!

Dispatches from a Construction Zone: Part 3

Bunchberry Woodworking Cabinet in the shop, push to open door and silent close drawers.

Now we're getting somewhere. I'm a bit tired so I won't be writing a ton but I wanted to share the latest views of the kitchen with you all. Things are moving fast and furious now and I'm no longer "Fear and Loathing" in Remodel-ville. The floors turned out better than we hoped through some major rough spots with Boles Construction, who we would never hire again (future review on Yelp?) and now we welcome the dynamic duo: Mr. Plummer and Mr. Schmitz for the dramatic custom cabinet install. Here are some shots of the early stages. Oh and appliances got delivered today!!!! 

Monday evening, floors not quite done.

Wednesday evening, Bunchberry Woodworking install Day 1.

Thursday, Bunchberry Woodworking install Day 2.

Thursday evening, south facing view.

Thursday night, north facing view

Mid-Century Front Door: Crestview

In progress with 2 coats of stain.

Naked door.

Ugly before hollow metal door (read: double ick).

June was a wickedly busy month. I'm thrilled to be onto July when I'll have some more time for blogging. I've got a lot of updates coming your way. First up you might remember way back in Feb. 2009 I bought a front door, one of the last from Crestview Doors in Austin, Texas. Crestview started out as a husband and wife team who were interested in purchasing a front door for their mid-century modern home and could not find any high-quality retailers. They ventured out, took pictures in neighborhoods built in the 1950's and 1960's and came out with a dozen or so styles that ranged from exact replicas and others that offered a more modern twist. In winter 2009 they decided to restructure their business model. They wanted to get out of the business of shipping whole front doors and in the business of selling something a bit more compact. You can check out their website now to purchase a window kit to mid-century modernize your already existing front door. This is much less expensive then purchasing and entire front door mail order. It took me while to settle on s stain and to find someone to hang the door but finally it all came together about 2 weeks ago with the help of Jonathan Plummer from Bunchberry Woodworking and Mr. Monkey of course. The front door is up and the hardware is a whole other story. It will get it's own post once the final product can be shared. In the meantime here are some pics of the before and the during (not quite the after). I still have to put one more layer of stain and the top coat and then we'll call it beautiful. Cheers!

Modern Platform Storage Beds!

Doze from Suite New York.

Modern Storage Bed from Modern Interiors.

Hudson from Room & Board.

So when Mr. Monkey and I returned from Chile and Palm Springs we were so happy to snuggle up in our own bed. It's so cozy and soft and soft and lead to achey backs and crooked necks. We were shocked! What happened? Too much kayaking? Too much working out? Too much age? Although we consider ourselves a smart bunch it took us a couple of weeks to realize (cue villian music - dun dun duh) it was our very own beloved bed that was causing us so much pain!!! We promptly moved the old mattress out and moved the mattress from our guest bedroom in. We're cuurently sleeping on that foam pillow of a thing which is super cozy and the cricks and aches have gotten much better. We've recently decided though that we're ready for a new space age springless mattress. We're still shopping for that piece but somewhere along the way a salesperson said to us that platform beds are the best fit for foam beds and well it didn't take much more than that for me to yes yes yes! I started looking and found some gorgeous. I started with Apartment Therapy. They had a posting awhile back on inexpensive modern platform beds. I took a look at the IKEA bed but it was too cheap. I found the 3 examples above. The first one called Doze and is the most expensive from Suite New York. You can pass hours drooling over many of their products. The last one is from Room & Board and is called Hudson with storage. While the price is much more reasonable it's still a touch outside true financial comfort for use. Another problem is that most of these platform beds only come in the queen size. Mr. Monkey and I love being in a smaller bed and our bedroom itself is small. To have a queen would really suck up too much space. And you know we're all about livin' large (in lifestyle) while livin' small (impact and footprint). So our solution . . . drum roll please . . . call in all-around nice guy and extremely talented wood artist - Jonathon Plummer owner of Bunchberry Woodworking. We met with Jonathon this past week and discussed ideas - believe it or not a combination or drawers and cantilevered-ness! We'll keep you posted as we review a first draft of the bed next week.