House and Home – Audrey's 74

Modern Nautical Glam Basement Reveal with The Land of Nod

Giulia Doyle — Wed, 08 Jul 2015 12:53:38 +0000

It’s been a while since I talked about our basement reno – the reason is simple. It took us forever to complete it! As per usual in home renos, we underestimated the time we really had available to us to work on the project and everything took longer than we thought it would. But here we are – project complete, ready for us to hang out and guests to sleep comfortably.

If you recall, I had created a mood board with the help of Creative Director, Danielle Kurtz at The Land of Nod. She helped me push my ‘ho hum’ nautical design ideas and make this basement a bit more fun and glam. I think all the pieces work together beautifully and play nicely off the neutral whites. This basement is now a fresh, bright and happy space.

So what did we do? We insulated all the walls, framed, ran electrical, dry-walled, painted, and installed sub-floors, vapor barriers and our wallpaper wall. We brought in much needed storage in neutral white, brought down our guest bed and made things much cozier with rugs, bedding, and pillows from the Land of Nod, added storage baskets, night stands, some great art and a mirror, a reading lamp and table lamp and seating for the kids. I was also so excited to use the giant D on our crazy wallpaper wall!

So, along with a couple DIYs, such as the rope wrapped support post, the white sconces I sprayed painted navy blue and the leather pulls to update my old dresser, I think this Modern Nautical Glam Basement is a success and I could not have done it without the amazing help from the Land of Nod. What do you think?

Shop the Look: Wood Rock Lamp with Black Shade / Hempisphere Floor Lamp/ Ahmaze Quilt / Swiss Dot Sheets / Wood Cubby Shelf / Not Giant Enough Letter / Ice Cream Art / Half Tone Basket / Pinstripe Storage Bins/ In Print Storage Baskets / Sunburst Mirror / Geo Throw Pillow / Hello Pillow / Patina Rug /Faux Leather Seats / Wall Hanging/ Wall paper / Additional art on wall already owned and from Minted / Sofa / Closets / Dresser / Bookcases / Sconces/

The Land of Nod provided me with items I used in my basement. I wrote about it on their blog Honest to Nod. There was no payment for this blog post and review. All words and opinions are my own.

Modern Nautical and Glam Basement

Giulia Doyle — Mon, 02 Feb 2015 13:39:33 +0000

Right now we are in the messy trenches of transforming our unfinished basement into extra living space and some room for guests. This is a slow transformation and still looks very much like this, even though wiring is now complete and my husband framed out all the window wells in preparation for drywall. While the dust is flying, Danielle, Creative Director at The Land of Nod, and I were brainstorming how this space could look like down the road.

Wood Rock Lamp with Black Shade /Anchor Hook / Ahmaze Quilt / Swiss Dot Sheets / Wallpaper / Small Wood Cubby Shelf / Abstract / Ice Cream Art / Half Tone Basket / Sunburst Mirror / Geo Throw Pillow / Hello Pillow / Abstract Pillow / Patina Rug

I had nautical intentions for the space and pinned beautiful beach side inspired interiors on Pinterest, with lots of nautical blue. But Danielle helped me add a little ‘oomph’ to my ideas by adding bits of modern and unexpected punches of color. In addition to shades of blue, black and white we also added some pink and mustard yellow/gold. We ended up with a Modern Nautical Glam Basement that I’m sure will transform the space into something comfortable, fun and relaxing.

The room is about 600 square feet and I already own most of the large furniture pieces, such as white storage closets, a large white sofa, white bed, white dresser and black and white striped rug. Our goal is to use all of the existing neutral elements and to tie the room together with a bunch of fun Land of Nod accessories – many of them just launched last week!

Check out the full post with inspiration photos on the Land of Nod blog! I’ll be back with progress on the transformation soon.

*I was not paid or compensated to write this post.

Dining room sideboard

Giulia Doyle — Sat, 10 Jan 2015 18:02:33 +0000

It’s been a year since I posted something about our home. We weren’t doing much on our house for a while and the pace of renovations slowed down for a bit. But my existing sideboard in my living/dining room was something that was bothering me for many years now. While I liked the cabinet itself and it was featured in HGTV magazine, the proportions were never quite right. It was just a bit too tall and a bit deep – taking over too much visual space.

So, we sold it for more than I was hoping to get and I went out and bought this simple, low, floating white sideboard. I love it! It’s more streamlined, takes up less space, fits almost as much as we had in the other cabinet and can serve as a serving station if we have dinner parties. Just to show that a small fix can really make a difference.

We store our liquor, our bar utensils, extra glasses, sets of cutlery, napkins and placematts in this space and we still have space to spare.

Pattern, Texture & Colour – Creating a new playroom and office

Giulia Doyle — Fri, 10 Jan 2014 11:08:33 +0000

I’ve been sitting on this big reveal for months now – impatiently waiting to share this great space with you. I’ve been working on this room with the Land of Nod since late summer. I’ve been contributing to the Land of Nod blog for over a year now, and luckily I had a chance to have them help me transform our how-hum multipurpose room into a comfy and welcoming space we can use every day.

My favourite thing about the Land of Nod brand? I love how their products are appealing to kids, but can fit into an adult space. They offer high-quality home decor items that I’d want even if I wasn’t furnishing a playroom. And how appealing their things are is evident in how we used their items in our playroom/office/guest room. It’s a space we play in, a space we work in and a space we have people stay when they visit. Everything works well together, it’s efficient and no longer looks cobbled together.

So, let’s take a tour together – our playroom/office and sometimes guestroom is on the main floor, a couple of steps below our kitchen and living/dining room. This room is a challenge in many ways, as it not only serves multiple purposes, but also has the door to the basement and connects to the mudroom. Tackling the odd layout (3 doorways, 1 window, 9 corners) was our first challenge – after that, Danielle Kurtz, the awesome Creative Director at Land of Nod created a shared Pinterest board where we could share our ideas and decide on a design direction.I wanted to ensure that the room connected visually to the mudroom that was visible through a large open doorway, but we also wanted to add some interest to a 14 foot long wall that you see right when you enter the room. We decided to make it the focal wall and to create different zones throughout the space. After pinning many things we liked, we saw a theme. ‘Woodland Inspired Menswear’ is the direction we were going…something playful, but masculine – a mix of patterns and textures with some tongue in cheek references to woodland animals. Neutrals and pops of colour here and there – just like you’d add a fun tie or a checked shirt.We looked at different wallpapers for the feature wall and considered a hounds-tooth pattern and a buffalo check, but I was drawn to different versions of herringbone. I couldn’t find wallpaper that matched my colours or scale, but I did find a stencil. So that’s what I did – I stenciled and stenciled and stenciled some more. Albeit far from perfect, I love the end result, but truth be told, it was tedious and painful and I would not do it again. My stenciling days are over! (I also have to do some touch ups on less than perfect edges, but I’ll get to that later this year)

In addition to the feature wall, we also created a double desk area, put in place a shelf and a book trolley next to the sleeper couch, added an area rug, a coffee table, extra seating, a large storage unit and tons of baskets and bins to store our toys, craft items and office supplies.

A fun light added whimsy to the space and serves as a perfect reading light. Adding a low hung mirror above the dress-up basket encourages play. The acrylic book trolley helps the space not go too country, is light and airy and references the acrylic office chairs. It’s also the perfect space to keep all of my husband’s old children’s books.

Three large scale vintage style Swiss travel posters have a big impact on some big expanses of wall and connect different areas of the room, while maintaining some of the blue colour palette. Adding a picture ledge above the desk allows for a fun rotating gallery and display of small items.Once the wall was stenciled, the walls were painted and the rug placed, I turned to my friends at Tonic Living for fabric. I wanted the menswear inspired patterns and textures, but I also wanted that take on the woodland theme we were looking for. We opted for a dark grey pinstripe fabric for the window panels to give some weight to that wall and connect it to the darker colour on the feature wall. More grey and a obvious woodsy feel was brought in with the willow pillow. We introduced the light blue colour and referenced the wall pattern by adding the spice market pillow. Small lumbar pillows in a red Herringbone were added to the office chairs and two covers for the existing sofa bed pillows were made with a neutral buffalo check fabric. I also added the fun racoon pillow and bow throw pillow from the Land of Nod.
We made two mall changes to the mudroom. We replaced the window treatment with a faux roman blind made from the same red herringbone fabric as the pillows. The texture, pattern and colour of the fabric work well with the new large Zurich poster, but also connect the room to the playroom/office.

We also sprinkled bits of red throughout the room to connect to the red bench in the mudroom. Examples are art on the picture ledge, lumbar pillows, buckets and baskets and the small mirror. While the main colours are grey, white and shades of blue – adding pops of red, yellow and green make the space less contrived and more manageable.

Until we finish the basement (next project on the list!), we decided to keep our existing sleeper sofa. Once our guests can move to a separate space, I will upgrade to the twin sleeper in a darker shade of grey. The smaller scale will work better in the room and the darker grey will ground everything a bit more. I also decided to use my vintage low chinese coffee table – I like the size and height and the dark work wood tone brings some warmth to the space and plays well off the acrylic and metal elements in the room.

Whew – I think this is the longest post I’ve ever written! This was such a fun project – so much work went into this and I can’t thank Land of Nod and Tonic Living enough for working with me on making this space a great place for everyone. I hope you are inspired to tackle that odd space, that forgotten corner.

Get the Look:

Curtain Panels, Faux Roman Blind, lumbar pillows, pillow covers and two pillows from Tonic Living.
Stencil from Royal Design Studio

Wall colours:

Grey walls: Thunder by Benjamin Moore
Blue in mudroom and on feature wall: Blue Echo by Benjamin Moore
Light blue on feature wall: Sunken Pool by Martha Stewart
Dark brown on feature wall: Willow by Benjamin Moore

Disclaimer: Items were in part provided by Land of Nod and Tonic Living. All opinions are my own.