Printer Friendly
The Free Library
5,679,181 articles and books
Member login
User name  
Password 
 
Join us Forgot password?

Coolest room on the block: have a bedroom that's way drab and boring? Hang on for the excitement plan....


Ever hear of color-blocking? It's a technique that uses squares of color not of the white race; - commonly meaning, esp. in the United States, of negro blood, pure or mixed.

See also: Color
 to pack some punch. It can be a cheap and easy way to give your room a whole lotta WOW!

The Wall

Head on out to the home improvement store because you're on the prowl for paint. But no need to mull over mull over
Verb

to study or ponder: he mulled over the arrangements [probably from muddle]

Verb 1.
 a million mind-boggling tiny color swatches. Most paint departments, like at The Home Depot The Home Depot (NYSE: HD) is an American retailer of home improvement and construction products and services.

Headquartered in Vinings, just outside Atlanta in unincorporated Cobb County, Georgia, Home Depot employs more than 355,000 people and operates 2,164 big-box
, have "Oops" racks stocked with Adj. 1. stocked with - furnished with more than enough; "rivers well stocked with fish"; "a well-stocked store"
stocked

furnished, equipped - provided with whatever is necessary for a purpose (as furniture or equipment or authority); "a furnished apartment";
 cans of already-mixed paint that picky pick·y  
adj. pick·i·er, pick·i·est Informal
Excessively meticulous; fussy.


picky
Adjective

[pickier, pickiest] Brit, Austral & NZ
 people rejected. And they're practically giving them away: $5 per gallon, $1 per liter. The colors can be funky, but that's what you're going for here. Pick out half a dozen or so contrasting colors--just go for the luck of the draw. As long as it's an interior flat latex, you're good to go. Our color combo? We went for a pumpkin orange, sage green Noun 1. sage green - the color of sage leaves
green, viridity, greenness - green color or pigment; resembling the color of growing grass
, lovely lavender, pretty pink and periwinkle periwinkle, in zoology
periwinkle, any of a group of marine gastropod mollusks having conical, spiral shells. Periwinkles feed on algae and seaweed.
 blue. Five colors, five liters ... five dollars. That's a five-spot to paint the whole room!

Next up? Mark off the areas you're going to paint. Grab a pencil and a yardstick, and draw away. Rather than going for uniformity, make blocks of varying sizes--squares, rectangles and L shapes. Figure out which colors you want where, put on your coveralls, and break out the rollers. Dropcloth, please!

The Door

We confess--we're not perfect-circle creators. That's where Wall Candy comes in. The company makes easy-to-apply decorative adhesives (eyespyteen.com), and the beauty is that if you don't like where you've stuck 'em, they peel right off. Yep, peel and stick! And while we love the Dotti-Licious line, we won't be held responsible for flashbacks to your Colorforms days!

The blue-floral squares to the right of the door? More Wall Candy. The shiny pink-meal squares to the left of the door? Vinyl placemats! We hit the discount store, picked up a couple two-packs at $2.50 a pop and stuck them to the wall with double-backed adhesive squares.

The Decor

After you're done devouring de·vour  
tr.v. de·voured, de·vour·ing, de·vours
1. To eat up greedily. See Synonyms at eat.

2. To destroy, consume, or waste: Flames devoured the structure in minutes.
 your box of vitamin-fortified whole grain, save the box. You're turning it into a super-inexpensive wall-hanging! We filled eight empty cereal boxes with styrofoam peanuts for sturdiness, then covered the boxes in colorful fabrics (from a clearance rack at only $1 per yard). To make your own, just lay the box on a piece of fabric large enough to cover the box, then wrap it up like a birthday present. Carefully secure the edges with a hot-glue gun (don't bother with Scotch tape--it won't hold!). Stick your creations to the wall with more squares of double-backed adhesive (one to each corner and one centered), and walls are a bore no more.

We also needed to hide some unsightly shelving. So we simply stitched a hunch of bandannas together, folded them over in pleats and tacked them to the wall above the shelf. Fast, colorful and easy!

The Floor

Keeping in line with the color-blocking theme, we went with colorful carpet tiles. It's called Toy Poodle poodle, popular breed of dog probably originating in Germany but generally associated with France, where it has been raised for centuries. There are three varieties, differing in size only. , and you can get it at interfaceflor.com. What we love about it? It's peel-and-stick, and might as well be called floor candy. It's not cheap ($14 per square), but it's a total do-it-yourself project. If you don't have the cash to do a whole floor, just order a few tiles for an area-rug effect.

And More

Going for the splurge? We love, love, love Pottery Barn Pottery Barn is an American-based chain of home furnishing stores with stores in the United States and Canada. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Williams-Sonoma, Inc. History  Teen's locker-look pieces (pbteen.com) for back-to-school cool. That's where we got our bedding, too, and the everyone-loves-it lime phone. We filled the rest of the room with accessories from Wal-Mart. For around $50, we scored lamps, a clock, a bouncy ball and a bright-red mascot. He's pretty happy in his new home....
COPYRIGHT 2004 Monarch Avalon, Inc.
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.
Copyright 2004, Gale Group. All rights reserved. Gale Group is a Thomson Corporation Company.

 Reader Opinion

Title:

Comment:



 

Article Details
Printer friendly Cite/link Email Feedback
Title Annotation:Your Room
Author:White, Kelly
Publication:Girls' Life
Geographic Code:1USA
Date:Aug 1, 2004
Words:617
Previous Article:Friendship.(You Wrote It)(Poem)
Next Article:The secret identity of Sam Mullins: no one believes in superheroes. Or do they? Megan's not so sure. But new kid Sam Mullins may just be the real...
Topics:



Related Articles
Sensational spaces: Design awards.(Mississippi Magazine's Sensational Spaces Design Awards)
INNER SPACE TV'S POPULAR SHOW ``TRADING SPACES'' TEACHES DO-IT-YOURSELF DECORATORS A FEW CHEAP TRICKS.(Business)(Statistical Data Included)
Deck out your boudoir!(Your Room)(Brief Article)
Knockout room re-do's.(Your Room Special!)
Cherry smash! Splashes of bold color and mod accessories make for one totally groovy pad.
Day at the beach: take an exotic vacation without ever leaving your room.(IT'S ALWAYS WARM AND SUNNY IN THIS ROOM)
Cut the clutter! We give this tidy, bright new bedroom an A+.
Polka dotted paradise: grow up your room with a fresh pop of color, shape and stunning details. And do it all for cheap!
Refeathering the nest: with children grown, a Starkville couple reinterpret their classic home with help from a favored family designer.
Transforming with paint.(Consumer Corner)

Terms of use | Copyright © 2009 Farlex, Inc. | Feedback | For webmasters | Submit articles