COLONIAL HOUSE TOUR PART 2: WALLPAPERED POWDER ROOM

POWDER ROOM
This was a powder room just begging for some statement wallpaper.  It came to us already equipped with lovely vintage hex floor tiles with seafoam green accents, beadboard wainscoting, and even that pretty nickel moravian star lantern.  
We had a great start, but a powder room is the perfect space to pull out all the stops, so we knew we wanted a stand-out wallpaper and that it could be a splurge, especially since we only needed to cover the upper portion of the walls 
Design Tip: This is an excellent approach to hanging wallpaper if you want to save on costs OR if you're afraid it might overwhelm the room.  Install a simple chair rail or wainscot around the perimeter, keep the base painted a solid color, and hang the wallpaper above.
In the design phase I showed you all the wallpaper options we considered.  We were looking for something large scale and dramatic.  We settled on the iconic Martinique banana leaf pattern, which debuted in 1941 in the Beverly Hills Hotel and is still enormously popular more than 70 years later!  That's the staying power of good design.

Here are the BEFORE PHOTOS:

 And the end result!  AFTER:

It's a complete transformation in the look and feel of the space, wouldn't you agree!?   From "boring" to "statement," for sure.

FEMININE FLORAL OFFICE SNEAK PEEK

It's officially Summer, and I've got a happy little progress shot of a client's office to share with you... 

Isn't that wallpaper great fun!?  It's called "Petal Pusher" by Hygge & West, and I'll level with you...it was already up when the clients moved into the house.  But they loved it, and happily the large scale gold and ivory floral print works just dandy in the feminine office space this room will become.  

I must say I think the light fixture we selected plays so well with the floral wallpaper.  It's this brass and scalloped drum ceiling light...





This little room is also getting a teal velvet settee, a lucite coffee table and desk chair,  a great brass accent table, and if I have my way with it, a slew of pretty desk accessories and bright pillows for the sofa.
Which gets me thinking....I may soon have to devote an entire post to Kaffe Fasset and the incredibly trippy but wonderful textiles he designs.  I'd toss a couple of pillows done in these bold florals into this room in a heartbeat!























It's a bold move with the floral walls, but I do believe it would work!

MARTINIQUE BANANA LEAF WALLPAPER

Remember this post when I was brainstorming about a bold wallpaper for a client's powder room?
Well we ended up settling on the classic, iconic Martinique banana palm paper made famous in the Beverly Hills Hotel.  

BEVERLY HILLS HOTEL

And oft-repeated by many a designer...because it's just that good...

NATE BERKUS

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STEVEN SCLAROFF

As far as I know it's only available from here (either as a wallpaper OR a fabric), and it costs a pretty penny but my does it pack some visual punch!

MARJORIE SKOURAS

NIKKI HILTON'S DINING ROOM via INSTYLE

What I hadn't realized before is that the Martinique pattern comes in 4 different colorways: 

ORIGINAL   

PEACH



OLIVE



TEAL



In my research I found this post really informative about the difference between Martinique and another iconic pattern, Dorothy Draper's Brazilliance...which it turns out is significantly less costly than Martinique....like 1/4 of the price I think?










Anyhow, we ordered samples of both papers and wound up sticking with the original Martinique because the greens in it mirror the vintage green accent tiles of the powder room floor, which you can just glimpse here in one of the "before" shots...

And here's a little sneak peek of the finished product...

I love the way the black sconce shades stand out against the cream background and green palms.  
I can't wait to reveal the whole finished space to you!

MORE MARBLED WALLS

Remember this post when I styled the wall behind my bar cabinet with grey and gold marbled DIY wall paper?  Here's my wall...

ROSA BELTRAN DESIGN

Since then I've seen the concept out and about a few different times, and it's always fun to come across in these swanky settings...especially knowing that I pulled off my own marbled walls for only $40!

This display was in the lovely LA interiors store Harbinger in the design quarter on La Cienega Blvd.  I spied it when they hosted a reception after the Design Bloggers Conference this Spring.

And these images recently arrived in my inbox from Z Gallerie...

 Happy weekend to you!

DIY GIANT WALL MURAL

I'm a big fan of wall art in the correct dimensions and the right proportions for a space.  I think it's one of the primary hallmarks of a thoughtfully decorated home.  And it's not really about how much the art cost...it's often more an issue of framing and hanging.  Something as simple as a map or literally just sheets of colored paper can look fantastic if the presentation is right...

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And there's nothing worse than a big wall with small chintzy-looking little frames stuck up there.   Case in point:

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OK that might be an extreme example, but even with the whole gallery wall craze, I really can't stand when little 4x6 and 5x7 frames are thrown in.  This is obviously an intentionally decorated space and some might like it just fine, but those little frames are just not my thang...

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I much prefer the look of a gallery wall using larger frames, and I especially like to use wide matts within the frames....all the white space really helps keep the wall from looking cluttered and gives the art room to breathe...

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Better right?  I tend to think that no frame smaller than 8x10 belongs up on the wall...with rare exceptions.  For instance sometimes you can group multiple small frames together to have the same impact as one larger frame...but you must only use this trick sparingly!

LITTLE GREEN NOTEBOOK

But I'm off on a gallery wall tangent when what I really came here to write about today is the huge DIY wall mural I made in my son's nursery.  

ROSA BELTRAN DESIGN (photo Bethany Nauert)

Sometimes a really large scale piece of wall art is what's called for in a room.  I wrote all about one way of doing this affordably with stock photography here.  
For the nursery, I started with the same premise by finding a free online image of an antique engraving with a mama and baby elephant.  I loved the sweet subject matter, and it worked right in with the classic elements and "tiny explorer" theme I have going on in the nursery.  
I knew I wanted a really large piece on that wall above the sofa, so I took the digital image to the print desk at Office Max and for about $7 they blew it up to 36"x48" and printed it out for me.  36 inches tall is the maximum size that those large plotter printers can do...but you can have any length you want because they're printed on a continuous roll of paper. It's super cheap because it's just basic xerox quality and it's only available in black and white.  
I actually wanted mine with warmer sepia tones, so I made a lightly tinted "wash" with just a squirt and brown acrylic art paint diluted with lots of water that I brushed on top of the image.  The paper got a little wet and wrinkly, but as it dried it took on an aged, antiqued look that I liked a lot.

We nailed some basic stick molding to the wall and painted it white to create a giant frame...no glass needed since this would be a collage adhered directly to the wall.  I made the framed area larger than the printed image so that I could surround it with a map border...essentially creating matting for the picture with a collage of maps and making the whole thing even larger than the max size printed image.  I cut up some old maps I had on-hand, and also used a couple of these $5 decorative paper maps found in specialty paper and art stores.

Once I had the layout I wanted, I used Liquitex Matte Gel medium to stick it all up and decoupage the entire collage to the wall.  Liquitex mediums work the same as Modge Podge...it's just more cost effective if you need a large quantity to buy the big tub of Liquitex from the art store. 


And this is the end result.  I love it, but more importantly my baby boy loves it...kids are SO into baby animals!

  There you have it....enormous, high impact wall art for under $30.