The Barrister's Study

Summer school ended on Friday and J had an overnight business trip to New York on Monday. Since I don't have to go into work for the whole day I started a remodel of his study thinking it would be a nice surprise. After 5 tubes of caulk, 1 can of Good Off, and two gallons of paint  it was suddenly Thursday. J's surprise makeover wasn't really the great reveal I hoped for, but he still appreciated it.

Here is the study before we moved in:

And

Like the rest of the house this room has a fireplace that J uses quite often. Since he spends so much time in here he wanted his internet radio and TV so that he can listen/ watch the New York Mets, Jets, and Rangers. 

Before we really redecorated my dad and brother came over to help J mount a flat screen above the fireplace. Usually he really wants to decorate in the time period of the house but I guess the flat screen doesn't count. 

Watch out. City Boy with nail gun. 

My brother and J didn't think the horsehair plaster would support a TV, so they nailed 1X4s to the top and bottom of the mantle. They then nailed ship lap to the studs and mounted the TV to the wood. Since nothing in this house is remotely level (we don't use levels ever. Our eyes work much better) they had to put trim above and below the ship lap. In retrospect I would've asked them to use a single piece of wood because in the winter the individual pieces of wood are noticeably individual, but that would've been a nightmare to cut. After the TV was mounted we put up pre cut and pre assembled moulding boxes on either side to mimick the mantle decor below. 

After :

Grandfather clock made by one of my former students in woodshop. 

Club chair by Bombay company via Joss and Main. The twin to that chair is behind J's desk. 

Painting windows is my least favorite thing. Especially when you've got 24 pane windows. I've found the easiest thing to do is to paint over the dividers and don't worry about the glass. The thicker the better. Once dry use a flathead screwdriver to scrape as much off as possible and then finish up with a paper towel and goof off. The screw driver works so much better than a razor! 

Valences and curtains from a consignment store. They're very high quality and match a Morris chair and ottoman I had recovered for J in our old house. The fabric has elephants wearing saddles on it. 

J went to school in Saratoga and we always purchase a racing season poster for the important years in our relationship. 

Obviously all dens need a comfy seating are to watch TV!!

We also both rowed crew.  This coffee table is made from an old shell. I bought it here. 

There's a lot of stuff going on in this study. Horse racing, crew, and barristers. 

This is part of a series of three pictures and is from Vanity Fair. They were in J's dad's office back in the day. 

While historically one would paint the moulding a color and keep the walls a dull white I changed it up. It is more modern, but I think the room looks far less dank. The dehumidifier that is emptied 3 times a day also helps with that. 

Center Hall

We have one long, rectangular room in the center of the house. It has five doors -- one outside to the driveway, one to the dining room and kitchen on the north side and to the parlor and J's study on the south side. 

In the original design of this house in 1735 the kitchen and dining room were not incorporated. This center room was the kitchen. 

Before:

After:

There is a working beehive oven to the left. We installed a new wood burning stove, "The Defiant" by placing it inside the fireplace.  I would have preferred to keep that a fireplace, but the wood stove is a necessity in the winter.

The two silhouettes of our basset hounds were made by my brother's fiancé 

 We separated the long room into two distinct uses. Next to the wood stove is our reading area. We have a large trunk in front of a loveseat that I go back and forth about. We filled this room with treasures from traveling so I guess it is apropriate. 

Plants on Tootsie's crate and in front of the side door. We replaced the solid wood door with this glass one to let in more light. 

Prints from Korea inherited from a relative  sit next to a golden Buddha. 

I added bookshelves to the beam here using scrap wood from the barn. 

The Garuda is on the door for protection and my family's tartan is seen on the chair back. 

And here is our cross collection. We try to get a cross from every country we visit. It's not that we're super religious, but I like seeing how different cultures and influences change the look of the cross. 

I also put up a thin shelf behind the sofa for pictures. 

On the couch is a blanket from Mexico and the two silk pillows are from Cambodia. 

I painted the shelf to blend with the painted wall. 

There's my little Murphy in front of the "back stairs". We have two staircases in this house. This one is enclosed. 

Since this room is so dark we have two wrought iron light fixtures:

This one has battery operated

candles in it. 

This fixture is interesting. I got it at Crompton Collective and it is made from a repurposed planter. 

Finally two braided rugs purchased at Brimfield cover the unfinished pine floor. 

This is definitely the weirdest room in the house and I try to make it not looking a junk room! We spend most of our time in here, so it is important for it to be comfortable. 

Hosta Garden

I was driving through Shutesbury to get a calf hut from Craigslist and saw a sign for free hostas. We pulled over and got 7 giant plants. 

I wanted to soften up the entrance to the barn pub so I built a stone wall around the maple in front of the door with stones found in the yard. I then added top soil, but at an angle as to not cover the tree roots. 

The mixture was 1/3 alpaca beans 1/3 peat moss and 1/3 top soil. 

Before:

Sorry for the glare!

After:

Firepit

I didn't get a before picture of this space, but trust me when I tell you it was really, really overgrown. This spring I covered the area with gardening cloth and the weeds just pushed through. I weeded again and put down tarps and then covered them with gravel. Wheelbarrels full of gravel. Over and over pushed around the house from the driveway. 

First: this was my inspiration from Pinterest:

And here is how ours came out. Pretty nice, I think. 

This was the night we finished. It's awesome and I think a good use of the space. It's right below our deck and right off of the barn pub (that post to follow). 

Unfortunately those weeds oy took 2 weeks to sprout THROUGH all the tarps. I don't want to spray round up so looks like I'll have to weed and add more rocks. 

Back --finally.

I had every intention of actually updating this blog weekly. I do feel like I have a new project every weekend, but apparently the last 2 years got away from me. I realized it has been two years because the two-year lease we signed with the people renting out old house in Connecticut is up in a month and we're currently looking for new tenants.

Even though I'm still working on the house, and my project list keeps growing instead of shrinking, I thought I should post something and get back into this blog!

For my first post back I’ve chosen the parlor.  This is the fanciest room in the house and it was hard to decorate.  I don’t want it to look contemporary, but I also don’t want it to look like we’re elderly.  This is the almost-complete parlor. I still want to repaint and we need to repair the ceiling, but decor wise I think it is looking good!

Parlor Before:

One of the 5 working fireplaces in the house. The fireplaces are so shallow that they really throw a lot of heat out into the room!  Even though we heat the house with a wood stove in another room we use this fireplace a lot.  

Three windows facing south and south east.  This is definitely the brightest room in the house.

Parlor Now:

I really like how it turned out.  I feel like the room is a lot warmer and inviting even though it's a fancy sitting room and we usually keep a gate up to keep the hound out.

My mom bought us these “Claudio Wing” armchairs from Pier 1 when we moved in.  You can find them here.  I love these chairs.  I think they are a nice mix of an updated old style. My aunt bought us that Federalist mirror between the two windows on an antique shopping spree on Cape Cod with my cousin Lisa.

Most of the stuff in this room is vintage and was compiled from family. The white sofa was left behind by the family that lived here before us.  Most of the other things came from my Aunt Sue who was serendipitously redoing her parlor.  The curtains were a nice find on craigslist and the mirrored candle sconces are from etsy. The only new things in this room  are those throw pillows on the two green chairs... they match my Claudio chairs pretty closely and they're just cheapies from Walmart.

The bookcase has an internal light and it also opens up to a desk.  I use the drawers below to store wrapping paper and ribbons!

The ocean picture was found in J’s mother’s basement.  It was painted by one of his distant relatives.

The shelf on the left was my grandmother’s and I’ve had that in every place we’ve been.  It held my tea pots and antique tea cup collection in our first couple apartments...of course that was before Tootsie Roll went blind!  The shelf itself is very wobbly so I store wood on the bottom shelf to anchor it and protect it from rogue Labrador tails. The vase on the top shelf is marked that it is from Japan.  I bought it at Crompton Collective in Worcester, MA and filled it with peacock feathers from the craft store to remind us of all the beautiful peacocks at a resort we stayed at in Mexico.  A giant peace lily softens the corner and sits on vintage storage trunks.

Throughout the room are antiques from around here and also knick knacks from all over the world.  On the shelf we have a wooden box from Costa del Sol in Spain that has a lot of Arab influence, and a marble figure from Mexico.  Above the plant is a little lacquer piece that I bought in Cambodia this past April.  In addition to getting to live in this awesome house my job also sent me to Asia to chaperone the school trip!  

The chess board is marble and from a friend of my aunt’s that passed away.  I bought the pieces from the UK...they’re replicas of some chess set that was found on the Isle of Man and the same were replicated as the chess pieces in the Harry Potter movies when Ron Weasly plays wizards’ chess.  John taught me to play chess and we have a game going on indefinitely. We just move and leave and check back later to see if someone else took their turn.

I like to fill our house with things from our travels because I like to pretend that whomever lived here in the 1700’s traveled, too.  Like some British aristocrat traveled the world and ended up in Hardwick because why, not?

You will also see that I pull some British Colonial style in sometimes for that reason as well-- Tropical plants especially. I love using plants to fill in corners, cleanse the air, and add texture to a room. Plus I think it is nice to have your home full of live things.

arm chair

I started off with an arm chair from our old dining room set.  

It was perfectly fine but I want to put this chair in our sitting room which is whites and tans.

I took advantage of the nice weather (low 50’s in December) and I spray painted 2 coats of flat white followed by sanding the edges with a fine sandpaper.  You can’t really tell but this chair is nicely distressed.  I then recovered the cushion with canvas from the fabric store that was on sale for $4/yard.

Tootsie's New Dish

I bought this little tiny chair on Craigslist and asked the Wood Shop teacher at school to cut a hole in the middle. I then inserted a dog bowl so that Tootsie, my Chocolate Lab, could have her dinner elevated to prevent the  bloat. Some research has suggested that elevated bowls actually lead to a 110% increase in bloat but many vets have pointed out the confounds of that study--- the population was large and giant breed dogs that were already at a high risk of bloat.  Our vet said that the health benefits outweigh the concerns.

My friends think it looks like a potty but I think it's super cute!

Oh well.  Tootsie seems to be enjoying it and it did slow down her eating -- fast eating is a cause of bloat because the dog tends to swallow more air.  Anyone with a Labrador Retriever knows how fast they wolf down their food and how much of a concern bloat is!  I may cut down the legs a few inches since Tootsie is what we call a "Little Lab".