home decorating ideas blog

- hey everyone, so today,i'm going to fulfill my dream of being the host of one ofthose home makeover shows like you see on hgtv andshow you how i redecorated part of my apartmentfor very little money. i didn't actually takea ton of before shots, but right here you cansee how it looked before and how it looks after. what a big difference! let me take you throughsome of the changes i made

and how little i spent on them. so, first up we have the coffeetable, which is literally just two ikea lack tables,which cost $8 each, $16 for a coffee table, that's crazy! and then to dress up the boring,white tables a little bit, i have this green lace,which i actually got at a recycled craft supply store years ago for probably, like, a dollar. now onto the couch.

i got this gray couchcover, which is probably the most expensive thing i bought for this redecoration project. i think it was $120,but it definitely beats buying a whole new couch. and changing out the couchcover from red to this dark gray just instantly completely changed the entire feel of the room. i also got a few accessories to replace

all the red stuff i used to have. so for example, i gotthis lime green blanket, and i also found thisstuffed broccoli at ikea, who i immediately put sunglasses on, because he is just thecoolest broccoli ever. unfortunately, the bestname i can come up with for him is "mr. broccoli", soif you have any better name suggestions, feel free to leavethem in the comments below. moving up, we have theseawesome typography sheets

that i literally just cutout of this free catalog from photolettering.com. i'm not affiliated with them in any way, but if you sign up on theirwebsite, they'll send you a catalog, and i love it. i literally just cutthese out of this book and attached them to my wall. underneath that, i coveredthis beige sideboard with this blue artist tape.

if you're renting like i am,or if you live in a dorm room, and you're not allowedto paint, then using tape is a great alternativeto add a pop of color. it's really easy, and it'll be removable whenever you have to move out. and now, my pride and joyof this space, the shelf. i'm gonna hop up on the couch here and hope i don't breakmy ankle or something. first, this shelf itself.

i used this patternedtape to add a bit more visual interest to it soit wasn't just stark white. so before, the shelf wasn't very exciting. it was just a hodge podgeof different glasses and 3d google letters. the color scheme was all over the place. so, when i was puttingtogether this new composition, i really paid attentionto the colors to make sure everything went with each other.

a lot of the stuff is pretty neutral, but then i have somebright pops of colors, like these, eek! excuse me while i knock everything over. as i was saying, like these 3d glasses that i painted brightgreen and can now use to chromakey and be awesome. i also played with scale,putting this huge globe next to these tiny little cows.

and while the shelf itselfisn't perfectly symmetrical, the glasses on the sides balanceout the whole composition. and again, i barely spent any money. i was thinking aboutbuying a vintage globe, but instead, i justhad my mom send me this old school globe we had at home. it used to be thisreally gross brown color, and so i just paintedit this nice dark gray, and now it looks so sleek.

so if you have something that you think would be really cool, andyou just hate the color, don't be afraid to just paint it. so lately, i've acquireda few more wine bottles and rather than collageon them, like in that last tutorial that i made, i just painted them, and then i masked off stripesto put the varnish on, and so i end up with this really nice, really subtle pattern.

the only thing i boughtspecifically for this space were these two glassbottles, which i got for $20 for the two of them at thisreally cute thrift store. this one, i filled with old corks and this one with old letter beads. the colors are pretty neutral,but the forms are interesting enough that they reallyadd to the composition. and you can see how gooddesign doesn't have to mean giving up all of your interests.

you can see how i worked in the tardis and the little ood figurine. and since it's so subtle, ittotally works without being like, "omg, doctor who everywhere!" and finally, the map in the back. when i was designing thisspace, i really wanted to create these triangular lines comingdown from the light up there. like i said, i'm not allowedto paint, so i literally just cut foam core intothis triangle shape

and glued a map onto it, andthen stood it up on the shelf. so this is a super easyproject, really cheap, but it really adds a lot ofvisual interest to the wall rather than just having thisplain, boring white wall. but as with any interior,it'll never truly be finished. here you can see the sketch that i made, and you can also see why iwas not an illustration major. i was thinking aboutputting these big ampersands to the sides of the shelf,but i'm just not sure

anymore if i really want to do that. so, i'm still thinking it through. i'm sure i'll let youknow if i decide to put anything there on my twitter or my tumblr, but let me know in the commentsif you have any suggestions. so, thank you so much for watching, and i hope you enjoyed my explanations of this makeover, andi hope it inspires you to maybe try some of the samesort of projects yourself.

thank you for letting mepretend to be an hgtv host. maybe someday davidbromstad will see this, and he will like my designs, which is all i ever wanted out of life. let me know if you haveany name suggestions for mr. broccoli here. i'll see you all next time. (upbeat quirky music)

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