{Renter's Room Reno} Tips and Tricks

We make it look really easy, right?

WELL IT WASN'T!!!

I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to yell, but this took a lot of time! And brain teasing mathmatical measurment caluculations. Was it worth it? Well.... yes, but it was still really hard! (But for the results we got, I'd do it again in a second!)

Earlier I promised that a few tips and tricks, and I'm not one to go back on a promise, so here goes....

TIP #1

To make your small room appear larger, paint a faux recessed ceiling and chair rail.

This little element has a lot of visual impact and is oh, so easy to do. It's actually easier to do than not to do...(did that make any sense??? Well anyway....)

Here, you can see that I've painted the enitre ceiling bright white. I painted it without any regard for the corners. Then I taped a line all around the ceiling about 10" in.

I also taped in a 3" faux chair rail at about 26" high. Usually a chair rail is installed at about 3' or 36". Making your chair rail lower than normal enhances the feeling that the room is taller, and therfore larger.
(You can see the chair rail tape in all of the pics above.)
The purpose of the "recessed ceiling" is to give the ceiling visual depth, also making the room look taller.

After we had all the taping done, we painted the entire room with Valspar's Tempered Gray in Satin Finish. The faux recessed ceiling made painting the corners and wall crease so easy to paint because we didn't have to worry about keeping the wall color off the the ceiling and the ceiling paint off the wall. (That is, if you are used to painting your walls and ceilings different colors.)

That brings us to

TIP #2

When painting over painter's tape, to achieve a crisp line, always paint with a light hand.

This will probably require that you dip your roller in paint more often, and perhaps even change out your roller mid-job. But it's really, really worth it. There was a spot where I noticed my hubby pushing very hard on the walls with the roller, and when I removed the tape, the line was not very crisp. Where he had plenty of paint on the roller and was able to roll pretty lightly, the results were much, much better. (It's pretty counter intuitive, I know, but hey! Whatever works!)

TIP #3

If you want a really crisp line, smooth a thin line of paintable caulk over your tape.

I haven't used this tip yet personally, but my next-door neighbor demonstrated it on his painting project with professional results. It takes a little more time, but if you want to look like you reeeally know what you're doing, it's the way to go! (you'd better belive that's what I'm doing next time!)

Those are all the tips I have for you today. Let's hurry up and get to the reveals, right???

Here we gooooo.......



Borrrr-iiiing.



Oh, so classy!

I was a little nervous deciding if the Flaming June would work with the new wall color...

....but was instantly relieved once I saw it all together. (The wall color actually cradles the painting!)



We replaced our very sophisticated air flow system from

to.....



an inexpensive and attractive ceiling fan. The fan was $120 at Lowes.

Headboard was given to us by a friend when we moved in. See what we did to it to fancy it up.....later!!!

What??? That's all you get???
Yep! I gots to string you along just a little more!
In the next post I'll show you what I used to inexpensively style our guest room to make it feel like a luxurious 5 star hotel room..... or at least a really nice B & B....;) !!

Feel free to leave me a comment. I'd love to hear what you think so far. Also, submit your email address in the "follow by email" spot if you'd like me to personally deliver all of my adventures directly into your inbox! I can, because I'm magic like that!

Kisses!
Autum