Pinterest is an endless source of inspiration. It’s easy to spend many hours clicking on one magnificent picture after another. This virtual space is almost magic: everything is dreamy, perfect, and sugar-coated. For people like me who make their living being creative, Pinterest is an interesting tool.
Pinterest is also a great platform for finding ideas, especially when they’re for a specific project we have in mind. In this case, the little junk room across from my bedroom.
It was probably originally intended to be a drawing room for the lady of the house in the Downton Abbey era. This adorable little room, which has a small brick fireplace and attractive architectural details, had been very underused since we moved in five years ago. I tried to turn it into an office, but I work on my laptop in the living room. I then tried to turn it into a TV room for the children, who would much rather crowd onto the couch with us in the living room. The room ended up being the place to pile all the items no one knew what to do with.
To give the little room a vocation, I had a crazy idea. Why not turn it into a walk-in closet, a luxury I’d never had before? The room is right across from my bedroom, which makes sense logistically, and it isn’t being used for anything useful anyway.
So I opened Pinterest and avidly searched using all possible and impossible keyword combinations: walk-in, garde-robes, closet organization, shoe storage… I found that using English keywords yielded more results. Having found all these ideas, I dragged my husband away from his desk, put his tool belt around his waist, and we tackled the project head on.
My dream closet
Two weeks later, I had bags under my eyes, and a bright, original, useful room that worked well thanks to a combination of inspiration, compromises, and improvisation. The results really surprised me.
Previously fairly formal and sophisticated, the room is now totally hip, a little industrial, with a kind of “Stockholm meets Manhattan” feel. When we removed the small closet at the back of the room, we were surprised to discover there was a brick wall behind it. I quickly painted the wall and oak floor white to make the room as bright as possible, and to reduce the visual “noise” the clothing and shoes would generate.
What Pinterest doesn’t show, however, is the dust, sweat, and cuts to fingers that go with projects that the platform labels “weekend projects.” All it shows is the beautiful end result, omitting the work that goes into the process, which is probably why it makes us daydream.
Regardless, once my mini-reno project was done, I quickly took appealing, light-filled pictures myself, and shared them. Where? On Pinterest, of course!
Passionate about colour, vintage decorative elements and hand-made items, Vanessa Sicotte celebrates décor in all its splendour. Vanessa is the mastermind behind the Damask & Dentelle blog—and author of a book in the same name—where she has been sharing her favourite décor discoveries since 2009. She is also the host of Sauvez les meubles and Marché Conclu on Canal Vie. Since fall 2015, viewers can reap Vanessa’s valuable advice by watching the Marina Orsini show on ICI Radio-Canada Télé, where she is featured as décor commentator.
