Miss P's Room

  Miss P's Room 
  Originally uploaded by emira

I don't know how many eleven year olds your in current contact with, but Miss P seems to me to have pretty much everything a girl could want. For her birthday this year she got a Nintendo DS (a joint gift from Martin, me and his mom) and a cel phone (from her mom) which was then added to her electronic/digital gadget collection with already included a pretty skookum digital camera. Add to that a healthy set of grandparents supplemented by my family who spoil her like the lone step-grandchild she is and she's really generally pretty kitted out for stuff. If that in and of itself wasn't enough, one of Martin's clients opened a new clothing store for tweens this Fall and Miss P was treated some hardcore shopping on credit that Martin had built up over the year. This meant that as the holiday season rolled around we were at a bit of a loss for what to get her until she suggested that we redecorate her room for her as her gift.  And so we set to work.

To be totally honest, Martin set to work. I helped with the prep, the planning, the picking up of paint (Benjamin Moore's Lavender Lipstick in their Eco-Paint), the ordering and pick up of the wall graphics from Surface Collective, but then Martin put in the bulk of the elbow grease. The logistics broke down like this: on Monday, December 17th Miss P went back to her mom's place meaning we could begin the work (the final product was a surprise, she only knew she was getting her room done). The work then needed to be done for the following Sunday, December 23rd. Meanwhile there was the usual working to do all week and of course additional Christmas prep, sewing and baking to be done. It was, to say the least not going to be a slow and considered project. Martin had the Monday off work and managed to get 80% of the painting done that day after breaking down her old room, which then resided in our livingroom (with the Christmas tree) for the rest of the week. Tuesday evening we painted trim. Wednesday evening Martin modified her bed to add two drawers below it to replace the dresser that was in her room (she doesn't keep much in the way of clothes in the room and we were trying to maximize space). Thursday and Friday, we rested. Saturday night the walls were dry enough to apply the decals. As you can see in the photo Martin painted big white circles around the room which continues his circle theme, and has the effect of making the room seem much bigger. We decided to put the decals in the circles and to cut them on the edges to make it look like they were being windblown "through" the circles around the room. The end product is -- I must say -- pretty awesome. And Miss P has declared it a roaring success, in the squealing, jumping, happy way of eleven year olds.

The whole project felt a bit like living a home reno show. With a limited budget and very limited time we were able to pretty much transform the room from a hodge podge of discarded furniture stuffed into a room into a very cool, modern pre-teen girl's room that feels more spacious than our wee house's actual square footage generally affords. You can see more photos here all of which were taken by Miss P herself.

Comments

[Nikki]

It's so pretty! A room for girls of all ages. Excellent work!

[suzanne]

i am impressed and thrilled. you and martin have inspired us to decorate aiden's new room with surface collective decals... using the space theme. i need to call you for some design advice after we've painted the walls!

[Faux Wood Blinds Gal]

Wow, what a great blog full of real "live" life experiences. You two are so creative I love what you did with Miss P's room its perfect for any little princess.

[Beata]

Love it!