I’m feeling bold and colorful today with the relaunch of the blog, and Carlos Miranda is doing nothing but egging me on. How rude.

I know you’ve enjoyed those photos, but did I mention I refreshed the blog? Oh I did? Well come to the site and check it out, I’m loving it! I’ve added categories up top for all my favorite areas and now that I see there aren’t many posts in each topic, maybe I’ll actually post more! :) I designed it myself, so I’d love to know what you think!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

–

All photos from Carlo Miranda’s portfolio website.

Found via Design*Sponge

Atleast to me, it’s perfection. I didn’t know it was possible to find my perfect bedroom. It has a wall color I love, furniture I secretly (not anymore) hope will fit in our bedroom with a king size bed (not happenin’), and um, those sheets!! I have been craving those sheets for months. MONTHS, PEOPLE. I just can’t seem to convince the boyfriend that we HAVE to have them. HAVE TO. Dear boyfriend, if you are reading this, see? The yellow isn’t bad, I promise! (Back me up, dear commenters.)

This bedroom belongs to Angela Hardison, who is a graphic designer and co-owner of seesaw designs and is featured today on Design*Sponge. While I enjoy some other elements of her home, the bedroom is by far my favorite. If you would like to read the rest of the article, and see the rest of her home, you can do so by visiting Design*Sponge.

If you are curious about those FANTASTIC sheets (that just so happen to match the outside of our new townhouse) they are a product of DwellStudio and can be purchased here. Just, brace yourselves for the price. ;)

Do you like the space? The wall color too cold for you? Stripes not your style? Are mis-matched lamps your thing? I’d love to know what you think!

Amanda Kyser Master Bedroom, originally uploaded by justalittlebitnet.

I know, I know. It’s been a few week’s since I’ve been around. I’m sure you’ve really missed me. ;) I went on vacation and ended up staying in some pretty uncomfortable beds. Me and hotel beds do not get along. Unless the hotel costs more than 150$ a night, the beds are just.. ick! They are either too hard or you get this creepy feeling that there are BUGS in the bed.

That thought, married with the thought that in a few weeks I’ll be sleeping in more since I’m getting laid off, means bedrooms are on my mind. Big time. And when I came across this bedroom from Amanda Kyser’s cottage in New York, I was gasping. It’s gorgeous. Calm, classic, modern, clean. Everything I want. Heck, I even showed it to the boyfriend and HE liked it! We never agree 100% on something!

The bedroom color is pretty darned close to what I have in my room now, and I love the combination with the yellow-brown — perfection!

What do you think? Not your style? That’s okay! What is your style then?

Today’s post is all about yellow. Yellow rooms and yellow accents. Pillow, rugs, walls — you name it, we’re talkin’ about it!

We can start off rather traditionally. Pale yellows are a good way to bring happiness and a cheery disposition to a room without overpowering it with YELLOW. The graphic rug and the classic furniture take center stage here, but the yellow is in the background, keeping you happy!

This photo does the same thing — it’s a simple, traditional home but the yellow accents are the POP, the WOW, the PIZAZZ! The thing I like about this one, is that there are completely different things going on in each of the pieces. You have a lamp that has a bit of an eclectic, mid-century edge to it; a graphic and modern pillow and a more traditional pillow with yellow piping. This is also a great time to point out the wonderfulness that is grey and yellow together. I’ll have to do a seperate post on the combination, but they work fantastically together! Modern, clean and totally cool.

Next we’ll go bold and brave. Who needs traditional? This can also be all about making a statement with yellow. Sure, it’s not taking up the whole room, but man, the return on investment of a couple of fantastic focal points in yellow is amazing!

Maybe you like punch and wow, but you don’t want to go overboard. Keeping the scheme monochromatic with a few punches of color is another way to add wow factor. Take for example the image above — the fuchsia and yellow really give this room character where it would otherwise feel cold.

Following the trend of the bedroom, but going a bit more moody, this living room has pops of color in all the right places. So much so, that I focus on the hot pink table, the yellow artwork and the yellow lamp and totally forget that ugly lamp off to the right. ;)

And how about the kitchen? The heart of the home? It needs some cheery air to it as well, right? Not only does this room have fantastic light, but the bold cabinets really make it a place to want to prepare and enjoy a meal with friends or family.

Perhaps a whole wall of yellow cabinets is too much for you. How about this yellow range? That is a bold yellow, but it’s so cheery and welcoming! The view isn’t too shabby either. :)

And finally, my favorite. If I had to decorate my living space from scratch, I would totally start here. The purples, pinks and yellows all go fantastically together. It feels modern, contemporary but totally accessible. Flop down in the middle of the pillows, prop your feet up on the garden stool and let’s watch some HGTV! This room has it for me!

So how about you? What is your power color? What color, when you walk into a room, makes you go wow?

Coverage
While my Glidden Shakespeare Green covered one large wall and another medium sized wall with ease, we were not as fortunate with the Duron brand. Because the green wasn’t super dark, I assumed I could forgo using a primer. But at the rate we’re going, it would’ve benefited me greatly to have used a primer and saved myself some time, money and stress. We have put two coats on most of the green, and there are still variations in the look of the paint, meaning it’s going to need a third coat. I just do not understand why a light wall color, covered with white paint, would need three coats. Two, I could handle — you know, cover those spots you missed, but three is just crazy, in my opinion.

Quality
To be honest, I was surprised at the quality. Based on the price, I figured this had to be some good paint! But the latex paint dried too quickly and left the bottom of the pan a mess, so that when the rolled when through the paint, then to the wall, we ended up with wonderful little latex globs on the wall.. Talk about a pain!

Smell
It’s been a week since we painted the first two coats of paint. I’ve cooked, I’ve cleaned, I’ve had the balcony door open — the smell is just now starting to diminish a bit.

Price
I can handle bad paint — when it’s cheap. This stuff isn’t sold in Home Depot (at least, not around me) so I had to find a specific store in the industrial district that is mostly used by contractors. Their hours are inconvenient — I could not get a gallon during the week because they are only open from 9-5 and only on Saturday from 8-12. No Sundays. Which is why the walls still aren’t finished.. So what was the damage? $40. Fourty dollars for one gallon of white paint.

–

When it comes down to it, I give Duron Paint a 1 out of 5. It was inconvenient to locate a store, it had a high odor, and quality and coverage were poor.

I want to make a disclaimer that I am writing this review not out of disrespect for the Duron brand, but so that other’s might know what they are going into before painting a rental’s walls. Had I known it was going to cost me over $100, supplies included, to paint my walls back to white, I probably would have forgone the green paint in favor of other decorative accessories.

Have you had any products lately that you’ve been disappointed in? Have you had different results with Duron paint?

With that preface in mind, today’s image is of a pink-filled living room.

This room pulls it off, totally. I don’t think a guy would hate this room, though I’m pretty certain it wouldn’t be his first choice. The pink is light enough that it’s not offending, and the stripes in the couch bring in a multitude of colors that modernize and warm up the space, drawing your eye away from the pink.

The purple and green accents are well played — speaking from experience, getting the proper balance of purple and green is hard, that is the color scheme in my place! (Until this weekend when the green walls go white again..) I also really like the clean, straight lines on everything here. The couch, the coffee table and end table, the chair — it just works!

I recently got sick of green, from having a full living room of it, and now that I’m moving, I’m going cool with greys and tans and blues, while the boyfriend and I just painted one of his walls almost the same shade of green I am getting rid of! What about you? What color do you like in a room but wouldn’t put in your own home?

I love the punch of yellow, both indoor and out. And the scale of those lamps is crazy! While I might prefer something a BIT smaller than that, the lamp itself–despite it’s grandeur size–is awesomely graphic and definitely an eye catcher.

And those couches, yum! While I am more traditional, and prefer browns and tans (though my current couch is ‘brown’ it’s more purple than anything), the subtle look of those blue velvet couches is yummy. I love that the purchased two and backed them up to create a traditional reading/conversation area and a television/game area. Clever!

Overall, seeing this room makes me smile. What rooms have made you smile today? Perhaps one of your own?

I have furnished my apartment with mostly cheap stuff, a lot of Ikea so far, but slowly I am working to get better pieces, things with more personality. But at the same time I find myself looking for certain pieces, like my coffee table, to be simple and functional. But the other pieces I want a bit more flair and character. So where does this leave me? Well, apparently, according to sproost.com, it leaves me with a style called Modern Elegance.

Sproost, which I just found today, is a great little tool for figuring out your style. Not only that, but they give you quite a few inspirational images with your result so that you can really see what they mean by the classification. This was the first paragraph of my result:

Variety is the spice of life! And nowhere is this truer than in the design of your home… You either love contemporary but wish it wasn’t quite so cold and austere; or perhaps you’ve always been drawn to more traditional rooms but are now at a point in your life where you’d like to pair down a bit or want to create a less cluttered and busy space. Transitional Style is here to marry those apparent contradicting designs. And guess what — it’s the contradictions that make the mix of contemporary and traditional so successful. The result is an elegant room that appeals to young and old alike. A sofa with modern lines blends seamlessly with a pair of traditional chairs. New fabrics work so well on antique pieces. It turns out that modern art looks even more exciting above a collection of traditional pieces. The room feels simple and sophisticated, elegant and hip.

The crazy thing is, after reading that first paragraph, it made sense. And perhaps my style will change over time, but right now I living in a small apartment and while I started with simple, modern pieces (read: IKEA), I have begun to incorporate more traditional items, or have a desire (but not the money) to do so. My first place, which I am soon to be leaving, was all about bright and bold colors. I started with bright green walls, an orange duvet on my bed, red in my kitchen, etc. But as time has gone on, and as I consider the planning of my next space, I find myself gravitating towards more traditional pieces, say a pedestal table and cross-back dining chairs, and lighter, more contemporary paint choices, like pale blues and tans.

I still love bold patterns and warm, textured woods and fabrics, but I find myself paring them back as accents to the simple and traditional. Now I would find myself leaning more towards something like this:

I love the bold rug (Check!), the simple slipper chairs, graphic prints and flowy curtains. I would probably add in a sofa like Crate and Barrel’s Petrie sofa with its clean, classic, mid-century look, and trade the coffee table for something still simple in shape but airier. Perhaps even trading the chairs for something more traditional, like wing back chairs with a simple, neutral fabric would be nice too.

But the point is that this quiz has got me thinking about my style and I found it to be fairly accurate. Make sure you go check it out at sproost.com, and let me know if you thought it matched your style! Don’t forget to check out the mood boards they provide and I believe if you sign up, you’ll have access to more mood boards. Oh, the inspiration!!

Photo by juhansonin

Bookcases, for example. I do not understand the purpose of coordinating books by color. Shouldn’t they be ordered by author, or series, or topic? I don’t want a CSS book that is green put next to my Asian cooking book. It makes no sense! I don’t want to look at the green books, or the orange books — I want my cooking books!

Another one that perplexes me is the clothing in the closet thing. I organize my closet by style: sweaters, nice tops, jackets, dress pants, dresses, etc. I can see all the colors in the closet, I want to be able to find a specific piece not necessarily something that is purple. Maybe it’s because I don’t have a ton of clothing, it makes it easier to find what I need.

Do you organize by color? Or do you organize by style, function, etc?