Hello! If this is your first time here, welcome to Postbox Designs! Before I let you peek inside my house, I figure I better give you a quick intro: I’ve been an interior designer in my family owned design firm for the last decade. I got to design gorgeous bathrooms and killer kitchens. But then we started having these sweet, but totally time consuming kiddos (now 9, 7, and 5), it got a bit harder to balance this work life thing. So about a year ago, I launched Postbox Designs-it is 100% E-Design so everything is done online. I custom design each room, then include all of the drawings and goodies (who doesn’t love free samples?!) they need to pull together their new room on their own time frame. We’re talking Mood Boards, Floor Plans, 3D Perspectives, a customized Shopping List, and more. It is like getting an entire room in a box. My clients can order their entire room over a cup of coffee (or wine) in under an hour. Plus I get to work crazy weird hours in my PJs while Gilmore Girls plays in the background. I’m living the dream!
But back to why I’m showing you a sneak peek into my most embarrassing room in my whole house.
So this past Spring I discovered the most fun six weeks in the design world that happens twice a year. It is called the One Room Challenge by the website Calling It Home. This biannual event showcases twenty designers as they makeover any room they want over a course of six weeks. Over these six weeks we get to follow their progress and then finally see the big reveal. Besides that, anyone can follow along from home, making over their own spaces in the same time frame. Back in April I even tackled my first ORC Challenge and turned our boring hallway into a triple kid’s homework area. Check out more on this project HERE!
So I have eagerly been awaiting another chance to makeover a space in my house. And One Room Challenge is just my style: there is a short deadline and lots of motivation to finish that last ten percent of the project. Like you know when you have finished a room but never got around to tacking up that last piece of molding? Or painting behind the bed? Not that I speak from personal experience or anything (cough). However, it wasn’t too hard to choose what room to tackle this time. This room has been the biggest eyesore of our ENTIRE HOUSE. Like it was so bad the realtor didn’t even post photos of it during the listing.
I have your attention now, don’t I?!
Welcome to our Bathroom.
Wowzers, I know.
We always joked that the homeowners must have had a killer time in Mexico, because they wanted to bring the vacation home with them. The bathroom was done up floor to ceiling in Mexican clay tiles. They were on the floor, on the countertop, around the mirror, and of course-the entire shower was tiled in the stuff. Hand-painted, flowery Mexican clay tiles. No detail was left-even check out the coordinating hand-painted clay cabinet knobs and toilet paper holder.
Now, no offense to Mexico-the culture and the landscape and the food are perfection. It makes for a great time on the beach. But we live in Michigan, and this look isn’t quite so popular. Maybe because it snows here. Besides, I’m more of a Cottage girl myself. But this homely little bath’s time has come….my makeover sights have been officially set!
Wanna see more?
I can’t even. So much tile. Ahhh…no words.
So we have three different types of clay tile at our vanity, and to make it even worse, the tile started falling off. For some reason, I wasn’t inspired to fix it
It is hard to tell in the photos, but to make it sting that much more, the entire room was wallpapered. Yup, in a mottled yellow wallpaper that was starting to peel off. When we moved in, I considered removing it and painting the walls. But this is the type of room where the band-aid solution wasn’t going to work. So I knew I had to patiently wait until we could do the whole thing in one big demolition swoop.
And here is a close up of the beauty. For any of you that have tile on your countertops, they are IMPOSSIBLE to get clean. And that seriously grosses me out in my own bathroom. While I thought the faucet was kinda sorta cool, it is way too low for the sink bowl and made it hard to use.
Oh yeah. And we have the matching toilet paper holder. And towel bar holder. Our four year old broke the TP holder about a year ago and we have been placing the toilet paper roll on the back of the toilet ever since. It just keeps getting better, doesn’t it?
Plus the toilet had to go. It had rusted spots and could never get clean, no matter how hard I tried. And I know you are shocked, but the shower is 100% tiled in hand-painted Mexican clay tiles. Floor to ceiling….literally.
However, our vanity wasn’t a total throw away. The painted finish was a little beat up and worn away. But I liked the layout and size of it, and all of those drawers made it super functional.
Plus here is a close-up of these oh-so-sexy floors. I know you can’t smell it, but every time someone showered and the floors got wet, they smelled. I think the sealed finish wore off, and the water just absorbed right into them. It took a full day for the smell to go away. Good riddance.
So what do you think? Think this baby needs a makeover?
So here is the checklist:
Check back in Week #2 where I reveal the plan of how to turn this eyesore into a thing of beauty. In the meantime, check out how the featured twenty designers are doing this week and get inspired for your own project! You can find them all HERE. All during the week I’ll be giving updates and sneak peeks into the project on Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram!
If you don’t want to miss a week, plus want insider access to freebies, including a discount on your first Postbox, sign up HERE!
erin@whalingcitycottage says
Wow. This is gonna be epic.
Erin @ Lemons, Lavender, & Laundry says
Wow! That is a whole lot of tile! After seeing what you did last time around, I have no doubt you are going to make this space look gorgeous. The good thing is, it can only get better.
PostboxDesigns says
I know…it can only improve from here! Are you doing ORC again Erin? Hope so–I’m looking forward to checking it all out!