i’m a firm believer in that william morris quote, and i consider it my guiding principle in decorating my house. i’m kind of a minimalist (plus lots of everyday clutter, hehe) but i feel like pretty much every furniture/decorating piece in my home has meaning, usefulness, or makes me happy in some way. as a result, it takes me a long time for spaces to feel “finished,” since i can’t just head out and buy everything all at once…i collect over time. that’s how it’s been with our bedroom – we’ve lived in the house over 9 years now and actually switched rooms a couple times as we added kids and different layouts worked better for us. i like the current setup the best, though.
my husband and i tend to be drawn towards sort of a mix between the arts & crafts era of design plus mid-century modern plus straight up modern. those three are all about clean lines and nice detail, so they do seem to play well together. here’s a little tour!
as i pinned rooms i liked, i noticed i was really drawn to a high contrast wall with neutrals and pops of color. and i know i told the story once before, but my husband painted it for me as a mother’s day surprise this year! it’s super dramatic and i LOVE it. the color is devine penguin, and with the white duvet as giant reflector, it makes a great blog photo background. hehe. we have a queen crate & barrel bed frame that looks sort of antique-ish (we got it when we were first married and they’ve got nothing like it anymore, boo!). i’m a big fan of the texture our pintuck duvet cover adds to the space. the watercolor on the upper right was painted by Em.
on my side of the bed i have dried billy balls in a pretty arts & crafts style vase my husband gifted me from rejuvenation (i love gingko leaves), sitting on a MCM-ish west elm night stand. the vase rests on a great little craft book by one of my favorite creative bloggers, abbey. my water coaster is a pretty tile from anthro. the lamps are from restoration hardware (similar here – sometimes they have big lighting sales and their lamps get super cheap, which is when we nabbed these).
oh and that pillow on the bed? that perfect pillow that draws your eye and ties everything together so nicely?! it was made by jessica. she sent it as a surprise for my birthday a couple weeks back, and i’m obsessed with it. check out that pebble quilting! the luscious anna maria horner field study! the tie in to the wall color! it’s so wonderful and really was the final thing to make the room feel complete. so meaningful, so beautiful, so perfect. the girl can sew for reals, lemme tell ya. thanks jess!
when i’m in bed, this is my view, which i like to call “amish chic.” it’s my swoon mini quilt, hung over a simple wooden chair from my father-in-law’s childhood desk set. we didn’t have a chair in the room until i hung the quilt and it needed something below, but i like it a lot. we’re lucky to have original mouldings up by the ceiling too; it’s fun to hang stuff from them. the closet is on the left here. it’s technically walk in, but it’s just 24″ wide so don’t get all jealous.
here’s the top of my dresser.
the chalkboard canvas is an idea i saw on cakies a couple years back, made when Em was a toddler, and it’s so fun. i take it down every so often, have the kids do some chalk art, then throw it back up there. right now it sports a purple elephant climbing a ladder, drawn by Em of course. on the left, O drew “helicopters.” underneath i have art from a family vacation, a bowl gifted from my friend erin, and a couple hourglasses (need another one – not a collection until you have three, right?). i cut Em’s silhouette out a long time ago and need to make one for O too…
here’s the view looking out toward the living room, dining room, and kitchen. we don’t have a coat closet so we put an Eames hang-it-all knock off up in the hallway recently. it’s hard to keep pared down enough to stay pretty, but it’s highly practical. more kid art beyond.
and here’s looking into the room. yes, a TV – my husband watches it with headphones on as he falls asleep. we’ve swapped out most of the light fixtures in our house over the years (which had been replaced with cheap big box awfulness by prior owners) to schoolhouse type fixtures from rejuvenation and schoolhouse electric. can’t really see them here, but the floors are fir. we tore out burber carpet and had the floors refinished soon after moving in (doing the floors right away was my personal must when we bought the house). we repainted both dressers black a long time ago – they used to be in my husband’s childhood bedroom. i’d like to have clean-lined natural wood ones someday, but these work and they were free, so…
most of the original glass knobs are still in the house. love them.
and that’s it! small room, see? i think builders in the 1920s were smart in devoting most of the square footage in a house to living room, dining room, and kitchen. our bedroom isn’t huge and that’s fine – it’s not a big hangout space, it’s a bedroom! the original bathroom and closets are tiny too. the house clutters fast since it is pretty small, but having 4 people in 1300 square feet of main living space (plus a 500 square foot finished basement) means you can’t just accumulate a bunch of stuff for the heck of it. gotta be thoughtful about what’s brought in and really mindful of scale, you know?
so. a little break from my typical sewing posts but i still snuck some sewn goodies in there. you know me.
skirt as top 
Your house sounds a lot like mine, same era etc, same thing with dedicating most of the space to living areas and kitchen, and our philosophies are the same. Less is more! Wish I put as much elbow grease into decorating as you do. I keep saying that we will do it once the kids are older and less interested in spending time with us! Its all so simple and beautiful!
thank you!!
your house is so perfect ~ it should be in a magazine
so lovely, kristin! i love simple, minimalist style. and yes, jessica did an amazing job with that pillow!!
you did an amazing job, the bedroom is beautiful and peaceful. And yep, that pillow is awesomesauce!
I love this post! now onto the rest of the house tour!!! You’ve got great style and I adore your house. I dream of painting our woodwork white someday, but I’m sure it’ll never actually happen. I love the blackboard canvas too, Never thought of doing it that way.
thanks anna! it was funny, my husband walked into the room and was like “woah! you cleaned!” so i’m sure a house tour would be appreciated if it meant each room got the blogworthy treatment. 😉
You have such fantastic style and I am in love with the details in your house! Those doorknobs! The light fixtures! They are all so beautiful! Excuse me while I drool over your beautiful room…
haha thanks carolyn!
I agree that bedrooms aren’t really the best place to splurge on square footage. I like small houses. I don’t like small, ugly, student housing (where I live right now), but that has to do with things like rubber (!!!) baseboards and a commitment to stupid layouts. Coincidentally, I just started to put up some house tour posts today too. The toddler room is tiny, but I love it:
http://www.thevelvetaubergine.com/2012/11/30/house-tour-toddler-room/
a beautiful and peaceful room – you did a great job with it! That accent wall was a terrific gift!
What a great space! Love the door knobs and the personal touches. And that pebble quilting is amazing!
Seriously, I can’t stop thinking of all that natural lighting in your house! No wonder your pictures are always perfect 😉
And I hope you show your downstairs… that set up is brilliant!
So fun to see, thanks for sharing! Made me laugh (shudder?) to think about what a tour of my bedroom would look like, though! 😉 You have such great taste and I love that quote. I’ll keep it in mind when the post-holiday spring cleaning urge kicks in…
haha yes! purges feel so good, especially in small houses like we have!
ohhhh, i’m inspired to de-clutter! your house is lovely, i can vouch for that! i love your new birthday pillow 🙂
Love it! I’m a minimalist in decorating too. Perhaps even more so =) Though I’m big on clutter. Put it everywhere.
Seriously though, your room is perfect! My room is nearly double that size and has floor to ceiling mirrors covering two walls. The other walls are sponge painted gold. I’m not sure why I never painted over that. Oh yes, because I sew instead. But having a great bedroom for photos is appealing!
oooooh boy. mirrors make me twitchy – i hate staying in rooms where i have to look at myself in a mirrored closet door. and yeah i’m usually a big clutter person too – took a while to clear it out for these photos! i used to be better about that but…oh yeah, i sew too. 😉
What a beautiful bedroom! I love the dramatic wall color and the white bedding is perfect (grey + white = my favorite combo)! I love mid-century/minimalist style too and the way you pulled the room together is so serene and stylish!
Your painted furniture looks pretty perfect. I have many pieces of hand-me-down furniture in the house that are in desperate need of updates, but I haven’t had great painting results in the past. Do you have any quick tips to share? Do you strip, sand, and/or prime first? What kind of paint do you use, and how do you apply it? Thanks!
thanks! let me try to remember, it was a long time ago. i think we did a light sanding, then used a high quality primer that the paint store recommended. then we did multiple coats of rustoleum spray paint type paint (only in a can) and rolled it on with sponge rollers. it has held up really well, actually.
I think you have one of the prettiest houses of ever. 🙂
aw thanks girl. 🙂
What a sweet serene bedroom. I love the charcoal wall and also the light beige/white walls. Could you share the paint color for the light walls too? Thanks for a great blog.