Before/After: Living Room
"To thine own self be true" -- Shakespeare, Hamlet Act 1, Scene 3
I have always felt drawn to Lake Michigan, on whose shore I was born in Chicago, and I decided to celebrate lake life in the Great Lakes theme of the summer serenity cottage.
Ironically, my regular place downtown is closer to Lake Michigan than the cottage, which is almost 2 miles inland, but Lake Michigan's water flows from the taps at both locations, so I bathe in her every day whether at the regular place or the cottage!
I wanted to state the Great Lakes theme and provide a beach house feel the moment you walk into the cottage. As soon as I walked into the empty space on my first visit, the 1906 bones and energy of the place, built before the area was incorporated into Chicago city limits, gave me the feeling of being in a cottage in the country, near Lake Michigan on the Wisconsin or Michigan portions. I explored that feeling through art and decor, including photos of the Lake taken by me, some old furniture, some new furniture, and some yard sale furniture, as you'll see below!
The living room of the summer serenity cottage has a before, an intermediate stage, and an after:
Before
- House with good energy, good bones, and a beach cottage feel,
- also filth and grime on walls, floors, and windows,
- peeling paint,
- dead flies and bees
- additional Before photos, of the entire house, here
Intermediate
- Preliminary cleaning,
- I order some new furniture and art for the space,
- I have some of my photos framed for the space,
- I find two useable and theme-aligned light blue chairs in the basement and give them a quick cleaning to start (and then never go down into the mildewy basement again, as it is one of the spaces in the house I decide I just don't have time for, as this is a summer-only project),
- I have some old things moved in, and
- I move Jorji the Cat and myself in
After
- The comfy casual beachy sofa I found at a yard sale anchors the room,
- I layer additional decor elements added to suit the Great Lakes / Lake Michigan / Chicago theme,
- I fulfill my blue-and-white color scheme,
- I add books to suit the theme,
- I add vibrant original art by Blanche Eden that I selected for the cottage and framed myself with a Blick frame, hang the framed Ork Posters I bought for the cottage, and hang my photos that I had framed online by Keepsake Frames,
- Jorji claims the full domain as her own and ultimately the full domain of the house as her own,
- Cleaning is ongoing....
The "after" is still a work in progress: I estimate the house hadn't been properly cleaned in around 5 years, and more than 1 scrubbing proved necessary to let the place sparkle. For example, after my cleaning service washed the living room floors, they were still dirty. I washed them 2 more times; they were still dirty. Progress became visible on round 4 of floor washing. Walls and windows were/are yet another chapter of the story.
I thought I'd be mainly decorating, reading, relaxing, and dreaming the new Golden Age of empathy and equality into existence during this summer escape from the roof noise and vibration at my regular place. Cleaning has been a much larger part of this project than I'd anticipated. You may think I was naive not to expect this, but there we are!
In what now seems a bit of foreshadowing, I held a virtual chocolate tasting this spring for a team of data experts who work for the Mrs. Meyer's cleaning products brand, and I held up some of the items I use and told them I like their products; they were delighted. This was a month before renting the cottage; I had no idea I'd be going through so many of the products very soon!
I believe in clean, and in the renewing water of Lake Michigan, and there we are!
[Update] Curtains! I needed to add and did add anti-peeping-tom, pro-serenity curtains to the living room and elsewhere!
Your friend in decorating,
Valerie
Feel free to say hi via email as well: valerie.beck@post.harvard.edu.
Thank you!
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