Aug

Basket Case…

Basket case is how I have been feeling lately. I’ve done more DIY in this week and a half than I have in my entire lifetime.

Hence, it has been consuming every thought, action and activity. As much as I am tempted to put everything aside and do nothing for a day, the feeling of accomplishment lingers and I am back to business.

I was eating at ‘Otarian’ the other day in midtown and love their burgers. A friend introduced it to me 2 years ago but upon my return I am hooked since their entire offering is vegetarian. Inside Otarian, were a whole bunch of colorful hand painted baskets of all different sizes and shapes hanging. I loved it. I decided that for a boring, small TV wall where the thermostat rests, it would be nice to do something low key to brighten up the boring look of electronics.

I am not fully done as I plan to build this wall and swap tv stands, but had to let you in on what I have been doing for the past day or so!

Before

I grabbed these baskets from a one-stop store. They varied in price from $3.99 to $7.99 so I grabbed my leftover paints and just started painting away.

To make this process faster, I had a super fan drying as soon as one coat was painted. White is a bit trickier as you may have to do 2-3 coats. Once fully dry, I just started to paint designs.

Then, I started on the smaller baskets.

In three hours, I finished painting 4 various size baskets and left them overnight to dry.

This morning, I nailed them to the walls. I realize that I will most likely have to build and add more to this wall but now is a good start as any!

275 days ago Short URL Comments

Homemade & Fashion Recycled Projects

Basket Painting/Crafting/Interior Styling/Otarian

Aug

Bedroom Progress: DIY Art…

The blog has been a bit quiet but for good reason. I have been working hard to get my apartment ready for ‘Fashion Couch’ and great New York City stories. My goal was major DIY projects such as furniture remodeling. Due to shortage of time, lack of car and not many great finds on local craigslist and re-sale shops, I put the big fish projects on hold. I decided to focus on accents.

I am not sure why, but I always end up starting with the bedroom. It could be because it’s the first piece of furniture I buy. Revamping a basement’s ‘man pad’ with no crafting or styling experience is a challenge. Yet, the alternative would be living in a functional apartment with white walls, wood and mix matched furniture. No can do. Although I am not finished, I had to let you in on some of the progress I am making…

Before

My first task was painting the walls. After painting an 800 Sq. Foot apartment in Chicago by myself, this is cake. I chose a beige for the main walls. Beige turned into more of a yellow when I finished. After all that sweating and sore muscles, I decided not to redo it. However, a contrast wall I painted an ugly shrub green, I felt I had to redo it. I was trying to avoid a fun house look or a University of Michigan look with yellow and dark blue with some leftover blue accent paint. I chose turquoise and it worked pretty well.

Studying wall stenciling, it’s amazing what people can do. I decided to try it on a contrast wall. I ran around Lee’s Art Shop and Michael’s in the city and picked up a bunch of random stencils. I really loved damask prints from the ‘Jones Fix’ in Chicago used in one of their projects. My goal was to stencil the whole wall however, after just a few lines took several hours, I decided to call it quits and do something creative to fill up the space.

Next, I decided to create some art. I saw that medium sized canvases in stores run about $20-$50. It would be more fun to do something myself. I ventured off to Michaels on 97th and Columbus and picked up canvases, Martha Stewart gold paint, fabric turquoise flowers, faux pearls and a glue gun. I didn’t really know what I wanted to do as of yet, but I knew flowers were going to be in the picture…

I prepped and painted my canvas with some leftover accent color I had and let it dry. Then, I laid all my supplies out.

I was thinking of something simple with long stems and flowers and went to work. I laid out all my flowers and attached them to the canvas. Using a ruler, I measured so that the flowers were evenly spaced out and drew gold lines for stems using a fine paint brush.

Unfortunately, due to untamed brissles on the brush, it was hard to get straight lines. At risk of botching it up, I decided not to redo it. I then started to stencil some petals in.

I kept going…

This flower garden needed something more. So I added some more petals and thought it would be nice to include some faux pearls as stars. I guess this DIY art became a nighttime garden…

I have never used a glue gun. I would have documented the process of attaching pearls but it was very tricky and hot. I ended up with gluey mess and slightly crooked stars from hot glue on my hands. Lessons learned!!!

Here is the final piece!

Bedding

I decided to keep my bedding from Chicago including all my throw pillows from World Market. I wanted to make my own pillows since I learned how to make them at the Needle Shop in Chicago yet without a machine, I was stumped. I went to Pier 1 imports on 65th and 3rd Ave. and picked up a turquoise petal pillow, a sequined gold and flower petal pillow and a gold print pillow. All were under $30.

There’s a one-stop store a 5 minute walk away that sells everything from underwear to screwdrivers. I saw a couple of square mirrors for $2.99 each and picked up 2 to hang next to the painting.

I picked up a lamp at Pier 1 Imports on 5th Avenue that normally runs for about $180 average. The price for this particular lamp was $250 and I got it for $60!

So, here is the final look.

The next project will be coordinating a work desk area and a lounge area. Stay tuned!

278 days ago Short URL Comments

Homemade & Fashion Recycled Projects

May

Project Barney.

The Barney Make-over.

It was not my intention to ring in the 2011 ‘New Year’ in Michigan however, a snow storm left me with a cancelled flight to New York, spontaneous New Year’s plans and no party clothes.

That morning, I grabbed a $15 dress from Target and scavenged Payless for some quick fix shoes. I ended up with some very purple pom pom peep toe wedges for $8. Although the shoes were very comfortable, I didn’t find much use for them. As a result, I called them ‘Barney’ shoes after the infamous purple dinosaur since they were massive blobs of purple. I never really saw women in NYC or Chicago sporting purple shoes and didn’t know what to do with them so… they ended up in the junk closet.

So after re-discovering these collecting dust in the closet, I decided to give them a face lift so to speak.

“The Victim”

The source of inspiration is a design based on sketches by designer Jeffrey Cedeno.

The Inspiration.

Jeffrey makes a chic shoe design. His sketch really caught my eye for these very, very, purple shoes for the fact that he successfully created a sexy purple shoe. The feathers and jewels bring an old shoe a new level of sophistication.

Redesigning the shoes was actually a lot of fun. Check out the process below!

What You Need!

Scissors
Crazy glue
Faux feathers (different sizes and colors (blues, greens etc.)
Black felt material
Faux jewel button or flat diamond (2 identical)

The Process!

1. Place newspaper on top of a workstation/table and place all your tools out.

2. Cut off the pom poms. Make sure you trim as short as possible without cutting the base of the shoe.

3. Brush off any debris and inspect the shoes to make sure the edge is trimmed as short as possible.

4. Take out your felt material. Hold it over the front of the shoe and take a quick measure of the width of the edge by hand.

5. Cut the felt so that it covers the length and width of the trimmed pom pom.

6. Take your faux jewel and apply crazy glue to the edge of the felt and place the jewel on top and hold for a few minutes.

7. Now we will play with layering and trimming of the feathers. Take a longer size feather and measure the length so that it wraps around the front of the shoe from edge to edge.

8. Place the faux jewel glued to the felt that you kept aside and place it like a line over the long feather. Center it and make sure that the jewel is at the edge covering the edge of the feather.

9. Start thinking of layering ideas with different feathers. Use your feather bunch to put some contrasting colors. Trim the feathers so that they are not too long in length and carefully place them under the jewel. Get creative! Apply glue to the edge of the feather and small amounts along the body of the feather and hold for a couple minutes.

10. Set shoes to dry. Repeat steps 1-10 for the other shoe:).

Within ten minutes, you can start walking!

372 days ago Short URL 1 Comment

Homemade & Fashion Recycled Projects

Fashion Recycled/Jeffrey Cedeno/Payless

Apr

The Feather Project.

Feather = _____?

A) Big Bird

B) 80′s Hairstyle

C) Flapper

D) Make-do fashion:)

Answer: D

I attended my first crafting party in my life. I am amazed at all these talented folks to see how they start and finish their creative projects.

As we played around with custom cards and stamp presses, an interesting barrette caught my eye. In fact it was so gorgeous and complimented my friend’s overall look that I was smitten. On top of the barrette was a nicely placed faux diamond and a delicate purple dyed Guinea feather.

I have always been fearful of feathers in fashion. But in small doses, a feather can be nice! I decided to venture out and make my first barrette. For someone who has zero crafting experience, this indeed is a very bold venture. This baby step will be the start of future projects on one of my favorite topics; fashion recycled and re-created:).

See the process below!

The inspiration.

This is a very easy project and takes just 5 minutes. Of course, the final product will not look exactly like above but, hopefully it will come close.

What You Need!

Barrette clip(s)

Faux diamond

Synthetic feathers

Adhesive for trimmings

Scissors

Most of these items can be available at any local craft or fabric store. Alternatively, you can visit amazon.com or etsyshop.com.

Instructions:

Lay out all your supplies on a steady work table.
Depending on how large your feathers are, make sure that they have felt attached to the back. If not, you will need to purchase a small amount of felt to attach to the back of the feathers.
Measure the feathers against the length of the barrette. Make sure that the the feathers you trim are not too oversized for the width and length of the barrette.
Turn the feathers upside down and cut the feathers to the appropriate size and shape in line with the barrette.
While keeping the feathers upside down, press a small amount of crazy glue/adhesive on the felt side of the feathers. Put a small amount of glue on the top of the barrette.
Turn the feathers and barrette sideways and place the feathers on top of the barrette. Hold for a few second and set aside.
Get your faux diamond. Turn the diamond upside down and place a small amount of glue on top. Carefully select the position of where you want to place the diamond and attach towards the edge of the barrette. Make sure not to place the faux diamond on the portion where you will use your hand to open the clip for risk of it getting loosened or falling off.
Finished!