DIY: Hardware Store Window Treatments!

When I decided to embark  on fixing up the Florida room to become my office we were on a very small budget!

We ran out one Saturday morning to our local LOWES and decided to not only pick up some Oops paint for our stripes, but all of the supplies for window treatments.

The room is full of windows that are UGLY and need to be replaced, but since we are on a budget I thought it best to just HIDE them!

Here is a little reminder of the BEFORE:

 

Here is the after shot with window treatments up:

Here is how we did it:

At LOWES we picked up the following supplies:

Finish Factor 6' x 9' canvas drop cloths

Eye Hooks

Wire Rope Cable Clamps

1/8” steel cable {not plastic coated}

Cable tensioner

STEP 1: Put eye hooks at opposite ends of walls.

STEP 2: Thread cable through eye hook and secure with wire clamp. Make sure you tighten clamp.

It will look like this on wall:

STEP 3: Cut the cable that has been threaded through the eye hook 2 ft shy of the ending wall.

i.e.: If the space between the eye hooks is 10 ft long then make a cut at 8ft long.

You will now have two pieces of cable. An 8 ft section already attached to an eye hook and a remaining 2 ft section by it’s self.

STEP 4: At the end of the cable that is already attached to an eye hook (i.e.: 8ft section) thread cable through one of the loops of the tensioner. (Loops on tensioner should be almost fully extended) Secure cable with a wire clamp.

Here is what it looks like on the wall:

* Note we place a bit of electrical tape on the exposed wire, because we didn’t want it to snag the fabric.

STEP 5: Starting at opposite wall eye hook thread 2ft section through and secure with wire clamp. This is exactly like STEP 2  you are now doing it on opposite wall.

STEP 6: Take other end of 2ft cable and thread through the empty end of the tensioner. Pull with all your might and then secure final loop with wire clamp. This is exactly like STEP 4.

Here is how it will look with both loops on the tensioner threaded:

Cable should now be installed and taut. 

STEP 7: To place curtain panels on tension rod simply unscrew one loop of the tensioner and thread panel. We left a 1” and 1/4 opening on panel so that the cable and hardware could pass smoothly.

 

STEP 8: Have some one assist you in supporting weight of curtains to prevent the cable from drooping you are now ready to reconnect the loop to the tensioner.

STEP 9: Spin center portion of tensioner to tighten cable. If you have a very large window and want additional support you can add an additional eye hook in the center of wall to support weight.

STEP 10: Sit back and relax and enjoy your new chic and cheap curtains! Give your husband a big smooch for doing all the hard work!

We continued and made one more tension rod for the other wall of windows. When placing these eye hooks you will have to place it a tiny bit higher than the existing eye hook from the previous rod so that they don’t interfere.

This was a super easy and inexpensive solution to my window dilemma. Depending on your local hardware store the cable should run around .20 cents a foot, the wire clamps around .50 cents, tensioner from $1-$2 a piece, eye hooks from $3-$4 for a bag and canvas drop cloths around $10 for 6’ x 9’ section.

For one wall you will need:

4 clamps

1 Tensioner

2 Eye Hooks

Drop Cloths for curtain panel. Depending on wall size you will know if you need 1 or 2, etc to cover the wall.

The drop cloths I purchased had finished edges so I only needed to sew the section for the curtain rod to pass through. I do recommend that you give them a wash before you use them. They had a bit of smell to them from being in the package.

I liked the look of them so I left them as is, but you could dye them whatever color you like, add  ribbon trim to the edges, fabric paint, nail head trim to make a border, iron on transfer for monogram the possibilities are endless.

It just goes to show that even if you have a next to nothing budget you can still improve on what you have! I love nothing better than a budget re-design.

If you need any help in decorating rooms in your home on a budget I would love to help! I have reasonable rates, no mark-ups on to the trade items and can work with any budget!

You can contact my office at 516-661-6993 or send me an email at cpavone0107@gmail.com. I’m in the NY tri-state area, but also take on e-decorating clients as well.

Effortless Style Interiors: Office Progress

Hi Loves,

I wanted to keep you all posted on my office re-vamp. I few one additions got finished over the weekend!

First let’s remember what the space looked like before:

This is how it looked when we first moved in and it pretty much stayed that way for a year and half. When I started my business I knew I needed a space to call my own and this was going to be it. So we got to work!

Over the weekend window treatments came in along with a little friend for my loveseat aka meeting area.

I snagged that lovely bench at a thrift store a couple of months ago. When I was taking it apart I found a tag that stated it was from the 1920’s! I then went out and got some contrasting fabric to have it reupholstered.

 

I know that the loveseat fabric is pretty loud, but I didn’t want to get a basic neutral for the bench, so I found a  smaller pattern in neutral shades to not distract, but still give some interest. Since the loveseat pattern had a bit of orange I decided to pull that color out and use it for the tufting and piping.

Close-up of fabric:

Now here is where I ask for help. What color should I spray paint the frame? It is originally gold. It would work in the room, but I was leaning towards painting it white and then out of no where this morning I decided I wanted orange.

Decisions are the worst (If you know what old movie that line comes from then I know we are destined to my life long friends)

If you have a chance I would love a comment and let me know what color you are leaning towards.

As you can see some window treatments also arrived. Practically the whole room is incased in UGLY windows! We are getting new ones, but that is not happening right away. So to hide the UGLY I went to Loews and picked up all my supplies including fabric and rod system. I’ll post more on that tomorrow.

* I would love to say that I won my battle with the sewing machine and produced that myself, but alas I did not. I was going to try it out, but then figured why ruin the fabric, give myself some gray hairs and never get it finished when I can just hand it over to Julie and for the exchange of $48 bucks we are both happy campers.

xoxo,

Camila

Progress in the office!

The office re-do in my house is finally starting to come together. The desk is finally finished waiting for a reveal, the floors got done, hardware for window treatments are up, fabric has been purchased for the window treatments, coffee table/ottoman is being slip covered as I type.

We are almost there!

The most exciting update in the office is that  my slipcover is finished and it makes me love the room even more.

Here is what the loveseat  looked like before:

It had amazing lines, unbelievable price and the fabric was actually in great condition it just wasn’t the look I was going for.

After Julie got her hands on it here is the fabulous new loveseat:

Here is a close up of the fabric: It’s a bit Josef Frank inspired with a tad of grandma chic and I’m in love.

 

Hope you enjoyed a little peek into the headquarters of Effortless Style Interiors!

Business side note: I was hoping to launch my business site by the end of August, but there have been some delays with the web designer.

Fingers crossed blog re-vamp should be taking place within the next two weeks! We are moving to Word Press! With the business site shortly following that.

While that is waiting to happening I have begun taking on clients this summer!  It’s been going great. I love what I do and it’s great to share it with all.

If one of my lovely readers finds themselves needing design help please feel free to email me for rates! Hiring an interior decorator doesn’t have to be a scary or expensive experience. I guarantee you that you will actually save time and money by hiring a professional the first time around and getting it done perfect.

Marianne summed it up pretty perfectly here.

You can reach me at: cpavone0107@gmail.com

Knock on wood (kinda)

This weekend we decided to come home early from out east and get an additional project finished. Wow talk about determination. We ended up getting home around midnight on Saturday night and then Sunday morning (ok it’s was really early afternoon) we got started on putting down laminate wood flooring in the Florida room aka my new office.

Here is what the floor looked like before:

The flooring was concrete, which we then primed and painted with the left over paint we had. We liked the way it looked, but the main problem was our pups. They were leaving claw marks everywhere!

So we went to IKEA and found an inexpensive fix to our problem.

We went to just to look and see what they had, but we came home with the TUNDRA click lock laminate.

I was surprised at how simple it was do. I kept asking Jon what I could do, how I could help, but I ended up just cleaning up the little bit of mess it made and finished reading The Beach House and Trail of Crumbs.

So, without further ado here are our steps for laying down the flooring.

1. First you have to clean up the floor. So a quick sweeping job and a little vacuum action and we were in business. Since we were laying it on top of concrete we had to buy a roll of plastic sheeting as a moisture barrier.

We just rolled it out and used a small razor blade to cut the excess. Pretty simple.

2. Next step is to lay down a floor liner. Which meant we had to roll it out and again use a razor blade to cut off the excess. For the floor liner you need to make sure there is no overlapping, because that would cause the flooring to not be leveled.

3. We were now finally able to open up the packages and get to work! We chose to go with the antique oak, because it had a weathered look to it and we figured it would helpful to hide any scratches that the dogs might do to it.

4. In laying down the flooring you have to do it in a subway tile format and stagger the pieces. So our table saw came in handy to trim down some pieces.

5. Then the pieces simply click and lock into place. In order to get a good fit Jon was taking a small piece of excess wood he had and butting it up to the piece of flooring he wanted to lock into place. The extra wood was there so that when he knocked in the piece into place he didn’t hit the flooring.

Gap:

Hammering:

Finished piece:

6. Since wood expands due to humidity you need to:

A. Leave the panels in the packaging for at least 48hrs in the room they are going to be laid in.

B. Leave a border around the entire room so that when the wood swells it has space to go into.

We found out that a CD case is the perfect size for the spacing that they recommend so we went around putting those in to make sure we had enough spacing.

7. Now when you are done laying down the flooring you are going to want to lay some sort of trim place to hide the spacing that you have now made. We made a quick trip to Home Depot and came back with 48 feet of trim. You need to make sure that when you are nailing it in you nail it to the wall and not the flooring.

8. Now you get to pat yourself on the back, because you did it all by yourself and you are DONE!

We are so happy with the way it came out.

It was super easy and not that pricey.

The room was 8’ x 16’ which meant we had 128’ sq ft.

Each package of flooring comes with 25.73 feet of flooring for $29.58, which means that we needed 5 packages and that came to: $ 147.90

Floor liner was: $ 24.99

Plastic Sheeting was $ 19.99

48’ of trim was .59 cents per foot, which is: $ 28.32

So the whole project came up to : $221.20 plus tax it comes to around $240 and took from around noon till 6:30/7pm to finish.

Ok so I wanted a totally relaxing weekend and didn’t truly get that. We did get to relax on Saturday and on Sunday a lot of the “We” I kept typing above we’re actually just Jon so I got a bit of relaxation in as well on Sunday along with crossing something off my to do list, which always feels fabulous.

She’s got curves….

So lately I’ve been making weekly trips to a thrift store I found. While I was in the mist of helping my SIL find a sofa I was making bi-weekly trips to the store and kept finding things I was falling in love with. Of course since they were all at amazing prices all of my favorites were quickly going home with other people.

While my SIL decided to go another route and left empty handed from our thrift store trips. I found a little number that I knew would look amazing in my new office.

I didn’t pick it up on the first day. I wanted to go home and sleep on it. Really see if I had to have it. Well I did so this time instead of going back and simply seeing it gone I called ahead of time and had them put a HOLD sign on the piece.

The latest object of my affection has to be my new/old wing back love seat. It has curves in all the right places, which helps it look more feminine and totally perfect for a stylish gal’s office.

Of course now my main problem is what to get it slipcovered in!

Do I go with stripes:

Or do I go with my animal instincts and get zebra :

Or do I go with a touch of bamboo ?

Or maybe I should go with some florals?

Or do I go more neutral and simply get a linen?

Originally I wanted to with this fabric, but at $30 a yard (I need 12 yards for the loveseat) it’s so not going to happen. I love that it a has a neutral base with the white and black toile, but then has punches of colors that I could use throughout the room. I’ve been searching for something similar and have come up empty handed.

I love color and mixing patterns and since the floors and walls in the new office are pretty neutral I wanted to have fun with my fabric pick.

Click here to see the current look of the florida room aka my new office. The walls are still the same. I love those stripes. The floor is getting a little redo with a faux wood floor in antique oak and the slipper chair and bench are no longer going in there. Oh also you can see my inspiration for the space is Rory’s pool house, which is full of different colors and patterns.

Any ideas?

What are your favorite online fabric resources? Please share.

I’m off to continue painting the trim. So not enjoyable. I have three doors, 2 windows and a staircase to do today along with putting my living room back together and sanding a bookcase that needs to be stained.

I’m tired already.

Home Improvement: Florida Room

Well I’m sure I still have paint somewhere on my body, but yesterday afternoon I finished painting the Florida Room.

To recap this is what the room looked like when we first moved in:

We lived with it that way more or less for pretty much a year and half. It just became a dumping ground for things that didn’t have a home.

Then on Sunday I went a bit nutty and by late Sunday evening it looked like this:

In the top right corner you can even see where Sunday night at around 10pm or so I knock over a gallon of white primer. We were painting the floor anyway so Jon just started spreading it around.

Monday morning we woke up early and continued the madness. Here is what the room looked like this morning:

Ah I’m in love. The floor just needs an additional coat and the then a coat of poly to seal it in.

This morning was spent searching my local thrift shops for a daybed. I didn’t find any, but I did find two other pieces that will now be residing in the Florida room aka den,office, breakfast nook.

This bench is going to be getting a complete re-do. I’m painting the frame and then finding some fabulous fabric to reupholster it it will also need a lucite tray for on top and voila a new coffee table.

It was only $38. Not too bad.

The thrift store I went to has another location in a town about 20 minutes away so I took the drive and came home with this:

It is a slipper chair and ottoman that of course needs new fabric, but it was only $18!!!!!!!!

Still need a daybed and some sort of desk, but I’m happy to see it coming along.

I was totally inspired by Rory’s pool house that I guest blogged about today. So I’m in search for some fabric in the pink, green and yellow family.

Once I find the perfect fabrics I only need to worry about learning how to sew. Hmm let's hope it's not too bad and I can talk my MIL into helping me out!

I will keep you all posted on my progress!