Cape 27

Mood Board: Ashley’s (Boy) Nursery

May 8, 2013 by Jessie R. 12 Comments

I am beyond obsessed with one of my latest mood boards, so I’m skipping ahead a bit to share it! Ashley had contacted me back in March to see if I’d be wiling to help her out with a nursery for her newest addition. Of course, I was elated and welcomed the opportunity. Nurseries definitely have a sweet spot in my heart, for a few reasons. A-Babies are adorable, and their rooms are too. And B- the very first space I ever shared on the blogosphere was Zoey’s nursery, and I like to think that design is responsible for really getting my name out there. Aka – Pinterest loves Zoey’s nursery.

Back to Ashley’s space. I love this nursery. Like, lurve it. I want it. So bad, that I want a new baby JUST so I can copy it. (kidding mom, I haven’t completely lost it just yet)

Here’s what Ashely had to say about her hopes for this new space:

“The purpose of the room is something that can grow as they do. Also, we’d like the room to be a place that is comfortable and functional, since we plan to be spending a lot of time in there. i think i really want a twin bed or daybed to be in there for long nights as well.

I don’t have a specific color scheme in mind. I tend to gravitate towards rooms with a neutral base and pops of color (hot pink being a fav) & i am always a sucker for black and white accents. I want it to be a fun room without being overly themey. i am literally in love with your oldest daughter’s big girl room, so i’d love something with a feel similar to that. if it is a boy that is where i am really stumped. You’ll notice that my pinterest board is heavy on the girl stuff and super light on the boy stuff just because i tend to not like any of the boy rooms that are out there. (UPDATE: we later found out Ashley was in fact, having a boy)

I have a gold mirror that has just been sitting unused for months now, so if it worked in the room then it would be available as well as two white ikea expedit shelves. Neither have to be in the room.We are basically starting from scratch. I do loooooove the “for like ever” poster and have been looking for an excuse to buy myself one…i also love the chalkboard in the entry and our room has a similar opening.

If it matters, my dad is a contractor so i have a handyman at my disposal. I’d love to get an area rug to cover (at least a portion) of the crappy carpet. i think i want to remove the closet doors in the room and add a closet organizer with curtains where the doors would be.”

Here’s what I came up with!

Note: As some of you may have noticed, I did not include links to the products within the mood board. Unfortunately, I’ve made the choice, based on several reasons, to no longer provide them here on the blog. As much as I’d love to, providing links a second time is extremely time consuming. HOWEVER, that doesn’t mean you won’t have access to sources! I create Pinterest boards specific to each and every mood board that I create. You can simply hop on over and scroll to find any product you may be interested in! Here’s the direct link to Ashley’s Nursery!

Update: We’re taking a quick leave from mood boards and will NOT be accepting new clients for the time being. I’m currently booked through August, so we plan to reopen shop (or at least give an update) around that time. Thanks for your patience!

Check out more details & past examples.

Filed Under: Mood Board

It’s Not White

May 7, 2013 by Jessie R. 13 Comments

Let’s talk color scheme. And if you haven’t figured it out already, it’s not white. Why do I mention this? Because nearly every house on our block (all 1950′s ranches) have white trim. Which I love. Well, loved. Now it’s more of a distant friendly relationship. Like, hey girl.. I like that polka dot shirt you’re wearing. Mmmk. See ya later.

Anyway. When we first bought our house I was all gung-ho about painting all the trim white. White trim around the garage door, white trim around the front door, white trim around the windows. You get it. One problem. We have black windows. Call it what you will, but someone was obviously a little house-smitten and committed some serious overlooking in that department.

Now, I’ve mentioned these windows before when designing our kitchen. Long story short, I despised them, and now I’m hopelessly in love, and wouldn’t trade them for the world. Black windows for the win. Plus, ironically they’re making quite the comeback on Pinterest, which has me a little happy and a little mad. You know the whole… “but they were mine first”. It’s whatev.

Sorry, it’s a rambling kind of day.

Moving on to the color scheme. I pinned this next photo over a year ago and never looked back. I’d never imagined an all-dark color scheme could look so good. And we were in luck, our home was nearly the exact same shade of red brick. Alert – DO NOT bother trying to find the paint color names behind this gorgeous photo. They do not exist. Take my word.

via

We played around with a few test swatches and finally landed on this color combination. It’s rich, moody, and dare I say.. sexy? Yes. Yes, it is. Heyyy there.

Here’s the plan: We’re going black (Black Magic) on the shutters, garage door, gutters and roof. Charcoal (Ashwood Moss) on all the trim, soffits, and to frame out the peek above the garage. A medium gray (Sabre Gray) for inside the “triangle” above the garage and possibly for window boxes. Then, we’ll bring in pops of vibrant color to really lighten things up with a bright yellow door, modern green landscaping, and various shades of purple with flowers. That’s definitely not an extensive landscaping plan, but we’ll get to that part when we get there. We just have a basic idea in mind for now.

Now, here’s my lovely photoshop rendering

It’s going to be quite the transformation. Hopefully..

I’m thinking paint alone will do wonders for our house. And maybe get the neighbors off our backs for a week or two.

Psst – The painting process has officially begun, so we’ll be sharing more progress this week as we go!

Filed Under: Inspiration, Outdoors, Paint, Sources

Let’s Take this Outside

May 6, 2013 by Jessie R. 6 Comments

Two weeks ago I declared our outdoor to-do list for this spring on the blogosphere, so it’s officially ON. No backing out now. We’re unbelievably pumped to get our paint on for the exterior of the house, so that’s priority one. BUT it just wouldn’t make sense to paint everything, only to add more architectural changes just days later, so we tackled those first. Three things: the garage header, the porch column, and the porch railing that did not yet exist.

Yes, this photo is from nearly a year ago and unfortunately that’s not very noticeable, except for the sconce lights on either side of the garage. That’s about to change

The header above the garage has been falling apart, piece by piece, since the day we moved in, so it was beyond time to replace that bad boy. And while we were at it, we went ahead and extended it beyond the garage and into the porch area. It just made sense to formally cap off the bottom of the triangular pitch in the roof. It’s an easy switch since it’s not technically a header or supporting anything, and more just siding. Basically, we just did a little of this:

Second, porch column. It’s tough to see in the photos above, but the porch column was made of some sort of super rough, very unfinished looking material. It wasn’t something that could be sanded down (we tried) so our next option was to cover it. We took a similar approach to John & Sherry, by just boxing in the previous post with a few pre-primed 1×8′s. It beefed it up quite a bit too, almost matching the size of the new header, which is an added bonus.

And that leaves us here:

Pretty right? Kidding. We’re getting there.

I always envisioned our forever home to have a huge front porch, so that was a definite downfall with this house. We’ve considered adding one down the road, but for now we’re making due. In order to make our tiny covered area feel a little more cozy, we added a railing from the column back to the front of the house. It frames the area in and makes it feel less… slab of concrete leading to the door.

Now, we’re even toying with the idea of adding a skinny bench with the railing as the backrest. Are you thinking what I’m thinking? PILLOWS. Or maybe a hanging flower box.. but that may be too many boxes since we’ve already set out to DIY some for the front windows. We’ll be sure to share either way.

So, next up is paint! I’ll be back tomorrow with our plan of attack in the color scheme department And hopefully some reveal pics very soon!

Filed Under: DIY, Outdoors

Caroline’s Living Space Revisited

April 30, 2013 by Jessie R. 13 Comments

Remember Caroline’s mood board for her living space? Well, it’s almost complete and she’s kindly offered to take us along for the ride!

Before: We started with a living space that was overwhelmed with brown on tan on cream on tan. The large windows on one side of the fireplace and high ceiling were making this room all kinds of awkward.

(before) Custom Mood Boards | Cape27Blog.com

We made a several tweaks post mood board, but here was our starting point.

Custom Mood Boards | Cape27Blog.com

And here’s where Caroline’s space stands today!

Custom Mood Boards | Cape27Blog.com

We kept several of the original features like the flooring, wall color, and coffee table. The fireplace and high ceilings are now balanced out with a larger mirror and the addition of a wall of frames mimics the lines of the windows opposite the fireplace. Everything is grounded with a large area rug and of course, we brought in some major life with brilliant pops of color in teal, aqua, and lime green. Hasn’t Caroline done a fantastic job?? I’m so impressed with the turnaround on this space!

Side note: We’re taking a quick leave from mood boards for the time being. I’m currently booked through August, so we plan to reopen shop (or at least give an update) around that time. Thanks for your patience!

Filed Under: Mood Board

Lockers, Letters, & Luggage

April 29, 2013 by Jessie R. 16 Comments

The weekend before last, we hit up our favorite local antique show and scored some amazing finds, that I’ve been itching to share. Every spring I anxiously await the arrival of the Burlington Antique Show, and this year it did not disappoint. Antique shows are definitely a nice change from the familiar thrift stores that I frequent, but you really have to prepare you mind (and wallet) before you venture inside. You can almost always expect something worth bringing home, unlike thrift shops that are usually hit or miss, and products are often in great shape. That being said, I always brace myself for the price tag. Don’t expect those 50¢ deals. You’re typically going to pay a little higher for the convenience of all this awesomeness (real word) in one place. Which, I’m more than willing to do when I find things like this…

Hello, gorgeous yellow lockers. Where can I rub my face against you? I love yellow. I love industrial. I love storage. I LOVE YELLOW INDUSTRIAL STORAGE LOCKERS.

We stumbled upon this guy early in the morning, but were hesitant to buy so soon into browsing. A few hours later, it was still there (surrounded by a crowd of interested buyers) at which time I was more than willing to pull out the cash. Halfway to the car, as the dealer was helping us load up, I overheard him tell another interested buyer not to worry because he had yet another identical locker in the back. Say wuuuut??

We quickly decided that the twin must be ours, whipped the car around, and I frantically ran back to the dealer to snatch it up. The other interested couple was ever so happy to see that I’d bought the matching locker before the dealer was able to bring it out Shucks.

We paid $150 per locker for a total of $300. I’ve seen similar lockers go for MUCH more, like this one on Etsy going for over double the price at about 3/4 the size. Score.

It’ll be a bit of a switch in plans, but we’re hoping to use them in the laundry/mudroom. Hang up coats, backpacks, and the smaller storage cubes are perfect for purses, even laundry supplies, pet food, etc. I’m loving the color they are already, but there are a few rust spots that might force us to give them a few new coat of paint.

We also ran across an entire lot filled with these black and white marquee letters. We grabbed a medium sized “R” (Rettinger) for about $20. Not exactly sure where this will call home, but it’s neutral enough to work anywhere! I’m thinking maybe one of the future walls in the family room addition or maybe it’d be fun in the entryway. We’ll see

In efforts to completely fill the back of our SUV, just kidding, I picked up a set of these fun yellow suitcases for $30 (there are actually three). No, we will not be strolling through the airport with our vintage luggage. Instead, I’m planning to use these as toy storage in Zoey’s room! Barbie doll central. They’ll slide perfectly underneath her bed with the addition of a few casters.

Not sure yet if we’re keeping the mustard yellow. It’s looking a little dingy now that they’re home next to all the bright yellows, so they might need a fresh coat of paint. Maybe something fun, like a stripe or polka dots? We’ll be sure to share as we go!

How about you guys? Any antique shopping going on? Anyone have a preference of antique vs. thrift? More importantly, did you guys see Lizzy’s pigtails… cause holy cow cuteness. I died. (not biased)