Zanzibar Chair

Had to share this chair with you guys.. I just dropped it off at Slate this afternoon.



I LOVE Schumacher's Zanzibar, but you guys already know that.

Check out more booth updates over at the FOUND blog.

Mid-Century Furniture Graveyard

Our living room has become a graveyard where mid-century furniture goes to be resurrected from the dead. (note to self- when the weather gets warmer, I will be cleaning out our garage to make it my "studio" aka where I paint and hold furniture).

I have to admit - I love having a booth. It makes me incredibly happy rescuing amazing pieces of furniture that people have tossed to the curb and giving it new life and a new home.

Let me tell you the story of these chairs I'm about to show you. Yesterday I stopped into a thrift store and these babies were sitting there. I just about ran over to them and searched for a tag to yank off. There wasn't a tag! I figured they had been sold but I had to ask anyway. After hovering and talking to not one, but two employees, I found out there was a table that was being sold with the set, and there was another man who already claimed it and was waiting for the table to be delivered.

The man saw how much I loved the chairs, and worked out a deal with me. He bought the whole set and sold me the chairs. He was an antiques dealer and was a really nice guy. He did make a nice little profit right there in the thrift store, but not as much as he could have if he had kept them.

So here they are!









The upholstery is in PERFECT condition. It's cream small-scale patterned microfiber.

And here is what I mean about my living room being a furniture graveyard...



[ the naked settee is for our master bedroom. I am painting it white. ]

Here are some other mid-century chairs that I saved. They are missing some buttons but are waiting to be fixed:





The vinyl on these are original and is in perfect shape. The buttons will be recovered in suede (I think!)

And last but not least, this big beast of a cabinet:





If you see, the top is a faux-burl wood laminate. It's pretty ugly. I'm going to have a glass top made and gold leaf underneath it (very similar to what Jenny is doing with her glass fronts here).

All these items will be going into the booth at Slate as soon as they get their TLC.

Speaking of the booth, here are some shots of what it currently looks like:






If you have any questions about items, shoot me an email at brynalexandra@gmail.com

Art Deco @ FOUND

I posted about these Art Deco style pieces over at our FOUND blog. Check it out here!

The FOUND Blog

I'd like to introduce the new FOUND blog!



If you are new around here, FOUND is a booth Amanda and I have in the new Slate Interiors here in Charlotte, NC.

This blog will be great for those of you who live locally - we'll be posting all about the items that are going into our booth. If you see something you love, you can also get a chance to snatch it up early!

For those who aren't local, we'd still love for you to become a fan. We are always willing to ship small goods so if you see something, just shoot us an email!

At the end of each post you'll see it's either posted by me or Amanda. But we'll both love to answer any questions you may have.

On this blog, the link above this post titled SHOP will now go directly to the FOUND blog.

Head over to the FOUND blog, we just posted new pictures of the booth and I just posted some new items I just found (hehe) that I'll be making over soon. Here's one of those items (loove it!)

Painting a Stripe

It's been a while since I've had a DIY project on the blog! This one I did yesterday for FOUND (our booth located in Slate).

I started with this console we had in California:



Ew to the faux finish! But it has really good lines.

We don't need this piece in our new house, so I painted the piece to sell in our booth. I thought a stripe down the middle would be pretty cool. This was the first time I've done this, but it was SO EASY and turned out perfect! Here are the steps...

1. First you prime and paint the piece like you normally would. I used some mis-tint paint I got from Lowe's a while back in a Satin finish. I won't walk you through this step but you can check out my painting tips from this post.

2. Once your piece is primed and painted and has dried completely, tape the stripe down the middle (or where ever you'd like the stripe). I used a ruler as a guide to make sure the line was completely straight, so my stripe was 12 inches long. (this made things really easy)







3. This is the most important step! Paint over the tape with the SAME color as the piece. This "seals" the tape so there are no yucky drips underneath. I don't care what the advertisements say, there are ALWAYS seepage.





4. Once the "sealer" coat has dried, paint on your contrasting color. In my case, this was white.



I did two coats.

5. Now for the fun part!! Peel the tape off and you'll see a PERFECT line. I peel the tape off when the paint is still wait.. mostly because I am impatient.

(paint is still wet in these pictures)

Let everything dry overnight and then lightly sand with a fine grit sandpaper and you're done!

I'll take a final picture with the hardware when I bring the piece to Slate. If you are local, this piece will be for sale!

Booth Update

Amanda and I stopped by Slate today to update the booth. By the way, have I told you the name of our booth? It's FOUND. And we just had some pretty tags printed with our (simple) new logo:



See if you can spy the new items. One big addition are the six chrome and cane back chairs I added.




I also added my branch watercolor and a winter-y plaid pillow. Amanda added the great diamond rug.

I'm Back!

I didn't intend to take a little vacation from work and blogging, but the full house and the holiday (and the booth!) kept me busy. I'm sorry for the absence!

Now that Thanksgiving has past, it's officially "The Holidays". I set up our Christmas tree a couple days ago. I originally wanted to get a real Christmas tree, but we went out to look at them and I couldn't justify the extra cost when we had a tree up in our attic. Someday I'll get a real Christmas tree, but this year the fake will do. I have a booth to fund, after all ;)

I wish I were one of those people who had a super fancy tree, but ours is your generic variety. Here it is:



I hung only red and pink baubles on the tree, mainly because that's what we had ;) But I like the monochromatic look during the day.



Along with the baubles, I put our meaningful ornaments on our tree. I have ornaments from when I was a baby all the way up to recent years. My grandmother always gave us kids an ornament each year, and I continued the tradition when Matt and I started dating. I these special memories are what makes our Christmas tree.

Here are a couple..

1985 - I was one year old.

1990 - I was six, and I L-O-V-E-D that dress. I remember crying and crying because I didn't want to take it off to take a bath.

I could go on and on about the special ornaments, but I won't bore you :)

The only other decorating I've done so far is our entry table.



The wreath was given to us by my grandmother this year. It's from William Sonoma and is made out of bay leaves.. it slowly dies and then you can use the bay leaves in your cooking!



The feather trees I got through the shop I work at. See the little red tray? That's a sneak peak at one of the items in the December giveaway!!

And that's my Christmas decorating thus far.. maybe I'll add some more soon!

What kept me the busiest during the Thanksgiving break was getting items ready for the booth. We've made some changes (and improvements). Here is what it looks like now:







It's definitely a work in progress but so far has been so fun. I've mastered the art of an invisible zipper and have been sewing pillows like crazy. We eventually want that entire shelf FULL of awesome pillows. If you are in Charlotte, be sure to stop by!

I'm So Thankful

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!! I'm sorry for no post yesterday.. I was busy making a pie (with caramel from scratch). All. Day. Long. I hope it's good! :)

There is so much to be thankful for. Wonderful family, great new friends, a supporting and loving husband. Health and happiness. But today I have something especially exciting to share with you, which I am very thankful for...
I'm opening a booth!

I am soo excited. This is something I've always wanted to do and in a matter of weeks, it happened! It was the perfect circumstances that came together.. like it was meant to be. I'm running the booth along with Amanda, a fast friend and a talented designer. The booth will be called FOUND.

The booth is located in a brand new interior design "studio" called Slate Interiors. It just opened on Monday and is (in my opinion) one of the best places in Charlotte. Check out the blog here.



We are in amazing company, with some of the best designers in Charlotte. Here are some pictures of booths at SLATE:







Our booth is a major work in progress.. I probably shouldn't share these pictures but I promise, once we are done it will be GREAT!

(there will be hardware on the dresser)

(don't worry the IKEA table is not for sale.. just for display)

We have a lot of work to do, but I am so excited for all the possibilities! Please stop by if you are in Charlotte.

And have a great Thanksgiving everyone!