Sunday 24 August 2014

The 'Made To Be' blogger challenge with MADE.com and Verything


I was invited by Verything, the lifestyle blog from voucherbox, to take part in their 'Made To Be' blogger challenge hosted with MADE.com. The idea was to pick an item from the MADE.com shop, explain why you like it, and how you would incorporate it into your space. 


If you don't know of MADE, they offer beautifully designed furniture and homeware at affordable prices, and often have things that are just a little bit quirky and unusual compared to the high street. I've actually been browsing recently, as I'm in the market for a bit of a furniture overhaul. My boyfriend and I are moving in a couple of weeks, from a tiny one bedroom flat into a nice spacious house - the few items of furniture that we have certainly won't fill the space much. Not just that, but most of the furniture was given to us or bought second hand when we first moved in together over 3 years ago. As a lot was old to start with its all looking a bit worse for wear, never mind nothing matching! So this challenge got me thinking about how we could update our home.


The item I chose was the Hooper Storage Coffee Table, sold by MADE.com for £149.



I LOVE the very 60's design of this, its a beautiful shape and would really stand out in a room and lets be honest, it has a bit more personality than an Ikea LACK that is currently doing the job in our lounge. Of course, like most people we can't afford to replace all our furniture at once. So I've tried to think about how we could incorporate this into our new lounge when we move, adding a few new items to bring together everything in the room with the coffee table while recycling what we already have (namely, a beige Ikea sofa currently hidden under a big orange throw, and a couple of 'cube' bookcases, which take up the most room.)

Here's my little 'ideas board' of how I would style the lounge around the coffee table, after having a browse around the MADE shop. I've tried to stick with mostly neutral colours, but use accessories like rugs and cushions to pick out orangey-yellow sunset tones...



1. Polygon Shelving Unit in Ash - for our ever-expanding book collections.
2. Juno Armchair - the neutral tones would match with our current sofa, and offer extra seating space.
3. Starkey Cluster Pendant Light - I seriously love industrial looking lighting, and this is only £75 - I've seen this sort of thing so much more expensive!
4. Trio Cushion in Mustard and Sports Luxe Stripe in Red - to add a bit of sunset colour.
5. Astoria Rug, in Yellow and Pink - a bright rug like this alongside the coffee table would help make the table even more of a centrepiece in the room.

And of course, the beautiful Hooper Coffee Table itself. I'm so looking forward to moving somewhere a bit more permanent (we've moved 3 times in 3 years so far), and actually being able to put some personality into our space, so although getting ready for the move is pretty stressful at the moment, it will all be worthwhile when we get there. I can't wait for a bit of a shopping spree, actually!

I've got my fingers crossed for winning the blogger style challenge - the winner gets to take home the very piece of furniture they chose, and I really REALLY want that table! I can't promise I won't be buying that cluster light pretty soon either..


Tuesday 12 August 2014

DIY Chalkboard Frame




For this project I used:

- A picture frame. I got mine from poundland - they actually have a really good range of decorative ones.
- A glue gun (or a bit of strong superglue will do fine).
- Black paint.
- A strong fridge magnet - I had a big ugly advertisement one on the fridge already, so used that.


It's so super simple it doesn't really need much of an explanation, but here goes...



I took the back off the frame and took out the glass... (is there a craft use for a spare piece of glass? Let me know if there is, I never like throwing things away if there might be a use for them)


Then I painted the wooden back of the frame with a couple of layers of black paint (I just used a cheap tester pot from Wilko)...


Pancake was keen to assist, as always...


After I put the wooden bit back into the frame, I got out my trusty glue gun (seriously, the best thing ever) and stuck my magnet on the back.



Ta-da! A chalkboard on your fridge, for shopping lists or cute notes. The DIY button magnets can be found right here too, if you're interested.

Simple and quick crafting is where it's at when I've got a 15,000 word dissertation due in, eeek!