For a while now I’ve been a bit over our home office. I’ve wanted to mix things up and more importantly, make our apartment a bit less IKEA-y. Don’t get me wrong, I heart IKEA, but thanks to our landlord’s [IKEA] furniture that we can’t change, our apartment was starting to look a bit like a catalog. So out with the new, and in with the old.
I wanted an older and darker desk with more character, so I took to the internet. I sold our IKEA desk within a couple of hours and that same evening I found a pretty sa-weet mahogany desk. It was petite, compact and fill of pretty. I even haggled it down to the same price that I sold our IKEA desk for, making it a direct swap of IKEA for mahogany! Not bad …
My grand ideas for this small space kept bringing me back to Christine Dovey’s, aka Bijou and Boheme’s, basement makeover. There are no words. It’s just insanity. I’ve yabbered on about Christine many times before, so I’ll keep my drooling to a minimum today. But there’s something I just really adore about the dark accessories, white walls, old school painting and gold accents going on. A perfect mix of old and new. So ideally, I’d love if I could work the following into our new office space …
– Include our existing upcycled charity shop lamp. I’ve had a hankering to update it a little by adding MOAR DANGILY TRIM Done!
– Add some more teal candles from Tiger [you cannot go wrong with 2 candles for €1], as well as adding another metallic antler candle holder, similar to the one on our living room shelf
– A giant piece of art of some sorts. Kinda old and maybe kinda new and I might even try my hand at something. This section is a bit up in the air. Can you tell?
– The moment we got the desk, I wanted to change the door knobs. They don’t look too bad below, but the current hardware is in no way in keeping with our living room [our office sits in the corner of our living room]. I’ve spent a couple of days searching for some yummy knobs [oh dear god, hello SEO!] in hardware stores to glitz up our desk, but no luck. Going completely against my ‘less IKEA look’, I spotted these ORRNAS door knobs on the IKEA website and I like what I see. Bringing a little bit of IKEA back in is okay, right?
– I would just die if I could have a black ghost chair. Or dark grey. I’m not picky
At the moment the chair I’m using I found abandoned on the side of the road. It’s a lot less dirty than it sounds, trust me! If the whole ghost chair thing doesn’t work out [which let’s face it, probably won’t because of €€€], I’d contemplate reupholstering my skip-chair in black velvet. It seems like it would be a fairly straight forward job, the only thing deterring me at the moment is the thought of all the cat hair.
Oh and before I forget, above is a better picture detailing the top ‘drawer’ in our new old desk; it folds down revealing a rolling shelf that I use for my keyboard and mouse, and when the desk isn’t in use, we store our laptops in there. Out of sight, out of mind. This little desk isn’t just a pretty face, and I couldn’t be more smitten.
xx A
You're just the sweetest- thank you! I can't wait to see your office come together!
Thank you Christine! It's almost there 😉 xx A
i saw on your facebook page about not buying new wood and i really support that idea. and your new old desk (not your old new desk LOL!) is a perfect example. thats a really, really nice mahogany desk. im going to try not buying new wood and see how difficult (or easy) it is!!
I'm so glad I'm not the only one who liked that idea! I've been thinking about it a lot for future projects I have in mind, but I don't know how realistic it'll be. I'll be trying my best though.
I thought I'd commented on this already – clearly not!
Loving the new desk – and very practical with it's handy rolling shelf. Looking forward to seeing how this area progresses and seeing your ideas come to life!
I think your current reupholstering of the chair looks really smart – especially with the matching footstool. Although, I'm sure whatever you decide to will look fabulous!
Maria xx
(Excuse all the comments – major spammage)
It's actually a complete coincidence that the fabric on our chair matches the foot stool! But I like to give the impression I spent hours sourcing just the right skips to acquire that chair. Not just any side of the road.
I bought the new knobs the other week and they make the desk look SO sleek. I really heart this desk.