When I married my husband and moved into his bachelor home, I knew it would need updating to become a beautiful space. The bones of the house were just fine. Great even. But the inside… that’s a different story entirely.
I knew when I moved in that I was going to have my hands full with the making over of each and every single room in this Cape home. There was no other choice if I was to also live happily here, and my husband was more than excited at the prospect of this home once again becoming beautiful like it used to be when his mother lived here. This is my husband’s childhood home. While he was growing up it was his mother’s showcase and a place she took great pride in making beautiful, cozy, inviting and elegant. However now, it was the epitome of an outdated, neglected space. The dining room had been turned into a den and was devoid of anything other than a couch, a lamp and a TV. There was no dining table anywhere in the home to sit at and enjoy a meal and conversations. When I moved in we just tossed some mismatched furniture in this room and made it a dining room again. There was a giant oak table in front of the extremely large slider in the great room being used as a catch all for boxes of T-shirts with my husband’s logo on them that he likes to give away. I didn’t like the color of the extremely light blonde stain on it which through the years had attained a slight yellowish tone but it was a great table structurally. There were no nicks or dings anywhere so at that point I decided to move it back into the dining room. We took the couch and the table and lamp and set them in the great room while we dismantled and reassembled that giant table in the dining room. That’s how it started. Through antiquing, yard sales and adding my own furniture pieces to our living spaces each and every room had stuff in it but nothing looked cohesive. There was nothing special about this space, yet there were several fabulous pieces in this home that no longer looked fabulous. The entire house was a mismatch of everything and it was finally time for me to start the makeovers, one room at a time. The bones are good. The layout isn’t bad at all. It’s a beautiful Cape Cod style home full of charm, character and potential that anyone with an eye for design can see. It’s just going to take a willing and able person to devote themselves to this huge project and do it on the scale and pace that works best for them. Here’s where I come in.
Now because of the amount of work needs to be done I need to be sensible and savvy about how I go about these desperately needed revamps. I want to stick to a budget. And while I am not afraid to spend money when I need to, I simply don’t want to where it isn’t a necessity. If I’m not careful this could cost upwards of $25,000.00 to do each and every room. There is no way that that is remotely feasible for us. When I had my interior decorating business back in the mid 90’s I prided myself in giving my clients a high end look for a fraction of the price. I was quite successful and through trial and error at times, I learned some amazing tips and tricks along the way which I have carried throughout life and used in my previous homes. And I’m going to apply them in this house too… starting with the dining room. I’ve had enough of this house not looking put together. Of it just being “good enough for now”. It’s time to turn this house into a beautiful home, full of warmth, charm and character that I can take tremendous pride in. I want a home that when people walk into it, they gasp with astonishment and delight and I’m not ashamed to admit that. Who doesn’t want people to enter their homes and admire the aesthetic as well as the overall vibe of the space? Yes, I want those who enter to truly appreciate my hard work and eye for designing the space. The fact that I’m going to do it for the least amount of money possible is a secret they don’t need to know, so don’t tell them.
Now remember how I said we just tossed our combined furniture into the dining room space simply to create one in the moment? Well, the table was a solid oak table with 4 bulky, curved chairs. They had a blonde, stained finish on it so very reminiscent of the 70’s. The table had potential, but it just didn’t showcase it with that bland finish on it. The chairs needed to go. They were just too bulky for me and I just didn’t like them. I found an antique hutch on Marketplace. The finish wasn’t working for me, but I could see past that little detail, and for $30.00 I wasn’t passing it up. The small side table was a roadside find that just so happened to have the same finish as the table when I brought it home over 20 years ago and the console table under the television mounted on the wall was a $20.00 score in need of some touching up here and there but otherwise a solid piece and one that was definitely worth more than $20.00. This room was full of potential just wanting to be unleashed.
For the walls I chose Benjamin Moore White Opulence in an eggshell finish. The color itself is actually an incredibly pale pink, so it manages to be warm and luminous at the same time as being fresh and reflective. It pairs well with many natural wood tones and is modern and bright without feeling cold. I have not seen the pink tone from that shade in my dining room at any time of day and with any type of light. It’s a perfect shade of white for me.
Now for the antique hutch. I picked out Benjamin Moore Historical Black paint that I knew would be fabulous on that piece. It’s not an in-your-face black. It’s soft. I also had to order some new hardware for the doors as 2 were missing. The brass pulls on the 3 draws were in desperate need of some Brasso and some elbow grease. I found the door pulls on House of Antique Hardware website. I decided to leave the interior of the hutch the antique cherry stain that it was. I loved the juxtaposition of the stain against the deep black. All that was left to do was to put some lights inside on the three shelves and we were done. Once the piece was dry and cured, it was time to decorate the shelves as well as the top. I couldn’t be happier with the outcome. It’s a stunning, anchoring piece in the room. If you are interested, you can watch this hutch makeover on my YouTube channel by clicking here.
Now the table REALLY looked bad in there. I took a picture of the interior stain color of the hutch and brough it to our local decorating center. They matched the color to Old Masters Gel Stain in Cherry. I stripped the top of the table down to the bare wood and use this stain on it. Then I used the same Benjamin Moore Historical Black I used on the hutch on the double pedestals the tabletop sat on. It took me 2 coats of stain, 5 coats of polyurethane and 8 solid hours to complete this table start to finish. At the end of it my hands were cramped up from the vibration of the sanders I used. My feet were on fire from standing and my entire body ached from laying on the ground in multiple positions painting the pedestals. But I would do it all over again because this table came out positively stunning. It looks better than I expected. Now the chairs REALLY need to go. God thought so too apparently. You can watch the entire table makeover by clicking here.
I was sitting at home in the living room when all of a sudden out of the blue I heard a voice telling myself that I needed to go to the local Antique Center. So, I did. I had walked all around for a couple of hours and had acquired myself quite a little pile of treasures when in the very last room possible I spotted 8 ladder back chairs in pristine condition, and I mean pristine! They were absolutely perfect for my dining room. The tone was a little different than my table but yet I knew they would harmonize together. I had to have them and I can tell you 6 of them came home with me. I paid $175.00 for all 6 of them and I consider that to be a reasonable bargain that I wouldn’t be passing up. I’d honestly been looking for the perfect ladder back chairs for my dining room revamp for over 3 months. They were a little more than I hoped to pay but I was still ahead of the game. So far I’ve spent $280.00 on this makeover and I am convinced that I can do it all for under $700.00. That’s the top of my budget for this room and I’m closing in on that number with still so much more to do.
Another that remained outdated and out of place in that room was the side table I found on the roadside over 20 years ago. It had the same bland finish the table originally had and to keep my costs down, I decided to use the leftover stain and paint I’d used in the room thus far. There was certainly enough to do the job, and this would just give the entire room the cohesive look. I started by sanding down the top and the fronts of the 2 draws to bare wood. I would use the stain on those surfaces and then paint the body using the black. It was a nice and quick late afternoon project that was completed in under 3 hours, which included the prep time, 2 coats of stain, 3 coats of paint and new hardware installed on the draws. The piece originally had single draw pulls in a Nickel finish, but I found these inexpensive brass draw pulls for $9.66 each from Lowes and thought they would be perfect for the redesign of this old piece. I was absolutely right.
Now let’s talk natural light. My dining room faces West, and it really doesn’t get any sunlight until early afternoon. I had made drop cloth curtains which you can view on my YouTube channel by clicking here, and I loved them, but they blocked out the majority of the available daylight the windows would get. I decided that with this revamp, I would be doing away with the curtains all together and I wasn’t going to replace them with any other curtains. But the problem is that I don’t live in an area that is private and out of the view of others. My house is located on a moderately traveled road and removing the curtains would turn the front of my home into a fishbowl for all to peer directly into at night. Can’t have that. I’m the type that needs to be able to pull all the shades down when it’s time for bed. I don’t like being in a lighted room at night with no window covers. It makes me incredibly nervous and paranoid. So, what would be my solution that would allow light all through the day and then close it all off at night? An upgrade of my window blinds. There were the cheap, plastic blinds you can get for under $10.00 each. They were dirty and some of the slats were missing. I decided an upgrade would be best. I decided on cordless cellular blackout blinds by allen + roth in the color linen. A tone that also compliments the existing tones in this room. It’s important for my home to look cohesively collected, meaning different finishes with varying tones and textures that complement each other and not fight against each other. Mission accomplished and my total spent now is $413.29.
The windows still didn’t look right to me. They looked bare and unfinished in some way. They still needed something to dress up the exposed windows when the blinds are up. After thinking about it for a day, I decided on some shelves to go over the windows. This would give me a focal point above each one to draw your eye to and to contrast off the soon-to-be white walls. I went to Lowes and grabbed a 1″ X 8″ 12′ long board or $9.99 that I could cut into the custom sizes for my room. I ordered brackets off Amazon and got (12) 8″ X 12″ wrought iron brackets for $40.00. After pricing them out at Lowes, I knew this too was a bargain I wouldn’t pass up. They were delivered to my house within 2 days and installed at the height dictated by me to my husband. He then proceeded to cut the wood to fit each custom shelf. And once again I would be using the Old Masters gel stain in Cherry to stain them. This was exactly what each window needed. Now there is less than 6″ of height for each shelf, but that is plenty to put silk greens and bobbles that would be proportionate for the space. Just enough to make each shelf a focal point and draw you eye to the contents on each. I even added two battery-operated, remote-controlled lights just like the ones I used in the hutch to each shelf. I love the focal point they provide when they are lit up and they give the room a little something-something. The juxtaposition of the contents of the shelves and lights against the white walls is fabulous and such a welcomed design element to the room. I’m at $463.28 now.
There is a flatscreen TV on the wall in the dining room. Every room in this house has a TV. I asked my husband if we could do away with this one, but he wasn’t having that. He watches this TV often, so it was staying. The compromise was that the TV would stay and the cords would be hidden using ECHOGEAR TV Cord Hider ordered of Amazon for under $25.00. It even came with the correct hole saw drill attachment for easy installation. Even though it was still on the wall, it looked so much better with no cords visible and I would now be able to live with this in my newly designed room.
I found a rug at Lowes that was the perfect colors, and it was on sale for $99.00. Needless to say, that came home with me and under the table it went. I also used the treasures that I found at a local yard sale for a total of 12.00 as the decor on the walls and every last piece is perfect for this space. I couldn’t have planned this better if I tried. For an impromptu DIY, I used a scrap plywood piece and some rustic farmhouse hangers that I had from another project to create a beautiful hanging rack that I placed between the windows. I also used the same stain that I used on the table keeping this DIY project cost at zero. For the items hanging on the rack, I just shopped my own home and found some treasures that weren’t in the right place until I hung them on here. Now it’s perfect. It’s honestly one of my most favorite things in this room. This entire project up to this point is still under $600.00. ($599.28 to be exact)
This room came out beyond my expectations of what it would look like. I am so in love with the colors, the decor and the natural light that floods in this room now at all hours of the day. But there are still two aspects of this design that are not complete and need to be so I can move on to the next space. I found this tall console table at my favorite antique dealer. it’s made of solid wood and is quite heavy. They wanted $20.00 for it… SOLD!! It came home with me, but it needs a makeover. The paint is nicked and chipped in various spots. I’m just not entirely sure what I want to do with it. So once I figure out what color to paint it and the exact details of revamping the console table, I’ll change it. I’m getting closer to a decision. The last project that needs to be completed is the one that will actually create the most visual impact in the entire room. I decided that I wanted to add faux beams to the ceiling, one on each side of the chandelier. We took a ride down to my husbands friends sawmill. I explained to him what I wanted to do, which was to create a three sided box that would be antiqued and could be secured to a 2″X4″ on the ceiling and give the look of beams. He took me to the other side of his lumber yard where he keeps architectural salvage he removes from old factories and barns. After visually sifting through the salvaged pieces he has, my eyes fell upon a giant beam. The aged character and charm of the beam is what caught my eye and because of the sheer size of it, he would be able to run it through the mill and sister the beam in two giving me exactly what I needed and wanted. The beams are outside on my husbands trailer. I just need some strong men to come and move them so I can spray them and get them ready for my brother to install. THEN the room will be done.
Until then, I am extremely happy with the final design and the decor of the dining room. I find myself looking into it several times a day and smiling. That’s how you know you achieved exactly what you were going for. You can watch the entire makeover on my YouTube channel by clicking here.
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