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Living Rooms

Kitchens

Furniture

5 In kitchen/dining/ tables/dressers

High Alert

Distressed furniture is the cat’s meow. However, too much of it can be a bad thing. There is a difference between ‘distressed’ and ‘falling apart piece of crap.’ If you get splinters when you sit down at the kitchen table, or your children are peeling chunks of paint off your dresser … you may have crossed the line. Distressed shouldn’t be distressing.

Take the following two examples, for example. Distressed, and not in a good way. They are hovering in the red/orange zone of unacceptability:

But the afters are just divine! Perfectly distressed. Crisis averted. And now we can all sleep soundly at night. From Better After readers Grace (dining table) and Jayme (side table). Thanks ladies!
















14 In kitchen/dining

Prudently Pretty

Michelle’s before kitchen was by no means in NEED of a makeover. But you know how it is, sometimes you just want a change! Sometimes you get a little sick of your paint color.

Sometimes you paint your entire house in a color that you don’t love and then you live with it for the next two years because you certainly don’t feel like painting it again and then one day you finally snap and passionately declare that the entire house simply must be repainted or you are guaranteed to have a nervous breakdown. Not that I know that from experience.

Anyhow, I love the new blue hue! Check it out on Michelle’s blog Prudently Painted Vintage.












6 In desks/hutches/buffets

Rusty Renegade

Public Service Announcement: If you plan on picking something up from the “FREE” section of Craigslist, do it during the day. Otherwise, you might drive out to the sticks at night, load up your free item under the cover of darkness, get it home and realize that the 1940’s steelcase tanker desk you thought you were getting is actually a desk-shaped hunk of rust.

Fortunately, Better After reader Nick ain’t scared of no rust. He attacked it with a power sander, chemicals and sheer determination. Hours upon hours of man-labor later, he has a beautiful desk that can probably withstand a nuclear war. Nice job Nick!











4 In chairs/ottomans/seating

Thanks! Surprise! And also, Chair!

Hot dang! I asked for feedback, and I got it! Thank you so much to everyone who offered their opinion. 99.9% of you voted NAY on the rollover doodad. I hear you loud and clear; no changes will be happening around here! Thanks again, I almost feel like I should pick a winning comment, there were so many! Oh what the heck, why not.

Kimi Coopet said…
In theory, it’s great! But, in reality, not so much! I do a lot of reading on my phone and you can’t see it that way!

February 28, 2011 3:45 PM



Shoot me an email Kimi and I will send something fabulous your way! (Um, it probably won’t be that fabulous, since I don’t know what it is yet. Heck it could be this empty yogurt container sitting next to my computer right now, but we all like getting surprises in the mail right? Ok, ok, I promise it will be cooler than that, but don’t get overly excited.)



And, for your viewing pleasure, here’s one last before and after for the day, a dumpster find from Sean. This is probably the nicest thing I’ve seen pulled out of a dumpster yet. Looks even better with the yellow and fuchsia tiger print! Loves it. See it here: Q Projects.










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