Painter Girl

Wall Unit Finished, Laundry Room Started

Yesterday was a busy day for me, running around in two different directions.  I spent the morning finishing up with the Wall Unit Project.

The doors all went on quite easily, much to my surprise!  Sometimes you can spend hours trying to line up doors.

Here's a closer look at the finish.  I edged the inside frame of each door and drawer with silver.

The closet doors were given a fresh coat of paint and the panels were done in the same way.

I will return to this home in a few weeks for one more project in this same room.

In the afternoon, I headed west of Boston to another long time client.  I started my prep work in the new Laundry Room.  I was able to roll on the first coat of a very pale yellow Portofino plaster.  Today I will return to trowel the next layer and begin some prep work in the adjacent hallway/mudroom.

Wall Unit Progress Continues

Good progress yesterday.  I am more than half done with this Wall Unit.  Here you see the Lusterstone finish on the end shelf piece.

Below is a close up of the finish and a view of the top portion of the Wall Unit.  Today, I will bring the doors that I have finished in my studio and hopefully complete this project.

Last Saturday, I gathered with four decorative artists/friends, in Susan Siefer's wonderful studio, to have a Play Date. We all purchased Melanie Royal's Faux Marquetry Modello kit and spent the day creating some great sample boards.  You can read more about this day and view some photos of our creations over at Stencil Talk and also on Melanie's blog, Design Amour.

The Wall Unit: On Site Work

Last week I was in my studio working on the doors for this week's Wall Unit Project.  I originally did a finish on this very same Wall Unit a good 10 years ago!  I was amazed to see just how well it held up, but now it is time for an updated look.  When you see some of the photos from the on site work, take note of the finish on the walls, which is also at least 10 years old.  I'm trying to get the client to let me do a new finish on these walls, but she still loves it and is reluctant to cover it all up.  I may be able to convince her to do an accent wall to keep us both happy!

I found the copy (very faded!) of the blue print given to me when these shelves were being built 10 years ago.

 This is the old finish that I am going over.

And here is the selected finish on a sample board.  It's a very simple rolled on Lusterstone.

The far right side of the Wall Unit has this shelf unit.  I have it primed out and base coated now. 

It's difficult to maneuver around this room, but this shot shows almost all of the Wall unit, except for the shelves seen above.  The four doors that I still have in my studio, cover the open areas that have drawers.  The middle unit has no doors.  It is all primed and partially base coated at this point.  I'm using a Ben Moore Aura color.  I'm using the Aura for two reasons: 1) it dries very quickly and 2) I will only need to do one coat before I apply the Lusterstone.

I will also be doing the same finish on the raised panel portions of these closet doors. 

Here is one of the finished doors. I've added a little silver detailing around the inside edge of the recessed panel.  I will work on this more today and hope to finish up on Wednesday.  In the meantime, I will try to come up with something for the accent wall and a floorcloth idea for the kitchen. :-)

Last Day on the Job

The Powder Room is finished. I added the stencil design using Golden's Iridescent Green Oxide paint.  The design is repeated in a random pattern and because the paint is iridescent, in some light you see the pattern and other light you do not.  It's a mysteriously elegant finish!

Here's a close up.  I took these pictures before the mirror was hung over the sink.  The mirror now hides that design, but it the lighting was the best on that wall at the time, to take the photo.

Last November, Stacy and I transformed these once, blah oak kitchen cabinets.  They were that standard, medium brown stain tone, from the 80's.  The homeowners had already upgraded their counters and lighting.  We stained the center island a deep walnut brown and the remaining cabinets were painted off white. A brown glaze was added for detail.  This week we also painted the walls, in this room and the adjacent breakfast room, a soft gold tone. 

We also stained the woodwork around the window to match the island.

Here's a close up of the cabinet doors.  More work is planned at this home in a little while.

Catching Up

I see I've been a bit remiss about my posting since the 4th of July holiday!  Well, sometimes Life just gets in the way and there just are not enough hours in the day.  Today, I am spending some time in my home office, catching up on mounds of paperwork and phone calls, so I thought I'd take some time to update my blog.

Right after the holiday I returned to this project to add the border around the insert of the panels.  I used a green metallic on this vanity and a blue metallic on the cabinetry in the Play Room.  Oh, I also sealed everything.

Here you can see a close up of one of the panels before the blue was added, and after.  The decision to add the border was the home owner's and I think she was right on with this idea!  It really made the panels "pop"!

  

I ended up really liking this project in the end and having a lot of fun.  I will miss this cute little couple!

Next, I returned to the Beacon Hill Job.  This client decided she would like a few more leaves added to my trees and some more pearls in the bathroom.

I love this shot!  Are those Lipstick Towels too cute?!! I did not do those.  The home owner had them in there when I arrived to add more pearls.  She is away again, since this is not her permanent residence.  If you recall, I had just done the large strand of pearls, all around this small bathroom.  I added the smaller pearls and that strand of pearls you see here.  I used a strand of pearls for my model that my Mom had given me some time ago, that used to be hers.

 Here's a longer shot of the room.  When I returned to this home a few weeks ago to discuss the work, I brought her a mirror I thought would look great in this room.  She had asked me to be on the look out for something special.  Well take a look at this one!  Could it be more perfect?  

You're going to have to look closely because the frame from the skylight window is reflecting in the mirror.  Right where the frame is, you will see a little Crown, with pearls and "diamonds" embedded.  When you look into the mirror, the crown sits on your head! That's my hand there, taking the picture.  I would have showed you the Crown on my own head, but I was having an extremely bad hair day due to the very high humidity and did not want to frighten anyone.

I emailed this client some pictures with the new additions and she sent back a very lovely, heartfelt thank you.  That made my day because I am experiencing a lot of grief from Ms. Control Freak again at the Apartment Complex/Clubhouse Commercial Job.

Ms. Freak was supposed to contact me no later than Tuesday of this week to let me know if I have access to the walls in the Clubhouse.  Marc was on that job site on Tuesday and said they were ready and the only issue would be if the 2 bathrooms were having the vanities installed, then I could not work in there.  There are other areas I can be working on though.  I had told Ms. Freak I had today and Friday on my schedule to  begin that work.  When I arrived home last evening, still no word from her.  I sent an email off to her supervisor outlining her lack of communication and letting him know she is delaying the progress of my work.  I had already explained to her that this was the only window of opportunity during July for me to be able to work at this site.  I have other work booked now for July and will also be away for 5 days at the SALI convention in SC.  I asked her supervisor to call me to discuss scheduling.  So far today, no word from anyone at this company.  I will fill their time slot with another job by the end of today and take them off my schedule until they can get their act together.

A Little Add On to the Cabinetry Job

  I am finished now with the painting of all the panels for this cabinetry.  This is the best full view shot I could get in this room.  There was no where to move the couch.  The Add On piece is to outline each panel in blue.  You will see that in a little bit, after I show you some close ups of each set of panels. 

I consider these fish and starfish panels to be the focal point.  The 3 drawer fronts, done with the waves, are not secured back on yet.  They are just resting on the top of the doors so I could take this picture. 

< A closer look at the stenciled fish panel.

Coral and shell panels.

Seahorse panels.

The Add On is to edge all of these panels in blue. At first I did not think I would like the look, but as soon as I did it, I saw how it really made the panel designs pop, so now I like it! :-)  It is VERY time consuming to outline each panel.  Since this is a metallic paint, it takes two coats and a steady hand. 

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I was able to complete outlining all of the bottom panels before I left at 3 pm today to get started on my 4th of July long weekend.  It took me almost 2 hours to just do the bottom panels.  I will return on Monday to finish the top panels and also outline the bathroom panels.  I may put the sealer on then too, to save a trip.  On my way home I stopped and treated myself to a giant hot fudge sundae to kick off the weekend! ;-)

Small job completed

I am finally posting the pics from the small job I did last week.  This was at the same house I did the additions to that lakeside mural. 

Here's the "Before" shot of the blank wall.

This is the sample board I made to show the client what the design would look like.  I only did half of the design on the board, just enough to get the idea and colors across.  The board is base painted with her wall color.

                                                                                 

Here's the "After" pic. I used parts of 3 different stencils for this design and added some hand painted embellishments.

Let's see if I have a good close up shot, so I can separate out the 3 designs used...

The center spray of flowers, with the roses is from Royal Designs, as well as the ivy, which is done in white.  The trumpet flowers come from  the Mad Stencilist.

Next, I did the 2 doors to the vanity in a small bathroom off of this room, as well as the oval mirror.

Here's the "before" shot, with my blue tape already in place.

 

Here are the doors, "after".  I used the leaves only, from a large stencil that had lots of flowers. I outlined the leaves, very loosely, with white.

Here's a close up of the leaves.  I stenciled through a piece of screening to give the leaves a little more interest.

And lastly, here's the matching mirror.  This was a quick, easy, and inexpensive way to give this room a little personality. 

Kitchen Cabinet Job Completed Today

Today I was able to finish those kitchen cabinets.  I almost finished them yesterday, but because it was so humid here, the glaze on the bottom cabinets just would not dry, so I couldn't seal them.  That meant I had to make the 45 minute trip, each way, one more time today, just to seal those base cabinets. :-(  I really like the way they turned out and this quick fix gives the homeowner a new look at a fraction of what it would cost to replace these cabinets.

The lighting is very poor in this kitchen, so getting good shots was difficult.  The top cabinet panels are done w/a multi-plaster finish and have a gold tinted wax sealer. The bottom cabinet panels have a copper metallic glaze over a black background.  These panels were sealed with an oil based varnish.

More top cabinets.

Here's a close up of the top cabinet panel finish.

Here's a close up of the bottom cabinet panel finish.  Big glare :-(... varnish is still wet and poor lighting.  It looks much nicer in person!  The look is almost a metallic leathery look.

How Did I Get Paint THERE??!!!

Today I began the Kitchen Cabinet Panels job.  I almost forgot to take the "before" picture!  After I began the taping out of the door panels, I remembered...

I will not be doing the drawers.  Those will remain white.  The top cabinet door panels will have one finish and the bottom another.

These are the cabinets at the other end of the kitchen.There are a few on the other side too, surrounding the fridge.

Today I just sanded each panel a little and did the taping.  (Have I used enough blue tape this week????  I put a coat of primer on all of the panels and then the basecoat on all.  The bottom cabinet panels now have a black base coat of paint and the top cabinet panels have 1 layer of tan plaster, rolled.  All had to dry, so that's as far as I could get today.  Even though I don't like to work on Saturday's, I feel I am getting too behind with some upcoming projects, so I will work a few hours tomorrow... 9-1. 

Can I tell you how nice these clients are?  Today they handed me a menu from their local pizza place and told me to order what ever I wanted.  I had a delicious veggie calzone.  Both the husband and wife were home and they have someone else there doing a mural in their living room, so we all sat down together and had lunch!  This is very RARE for me. I do have a few clients who always make me lunch when I am in their homes working, but for the most part.... I eat while I work, resting my sandwich or yogurt on my ladder. 

It is a bit awkward for me, having this other painter there, doing the mural.  The client had told me she already hired this guy to do this castle mural because supposedly that is what he specializes in and that's what she wanted.  The guy is doing a very nice job, but I still am a bit hurt that I was not even considered for this mural when she knows I do murals.  She did say she saw his work some place locally and it was exactly what she wanted, so I should just suck it up and let it go, but gee.. I could have done that damn mural.  Also, in 1999 I did her entire bedroom in a stone block look w/a faux arched window... and she claims she still loves it.  Ok, ok... I'm letting go. ;-)

When I got home today and jumped in the shower, I discovered a big streak of white paint on my thigh!  How on earth did that get there?!  It's not like I was wearing shorts today. I had on my bib overalls.

Cabinets/vanity work completed.

I forgot to take before pics for this job, but the cabinets were just a medium color oak, with most of the clear finish worn off.  The homeowners had the counters replaced with this nice granite, which instantly upgraded the bath.  They replaced the old gold toned faucets with these new silver ones and have picked out a great grey tone for the walls, which will be painted soon.  The ugly green carpeting that is found on the floor in the dressing room area of this room will be replaced with a neutral tone carpeting.  For now, they will live with the tiles, which already look so much better.  For a few thousand dollars this Master Bath has been given a face lift! The homeowners had struggled with tearing everything out and starting new in here, but the cost was too high.  They would like to move in a year or two, so a major renovation was not something they wanted to undertake at this time.

The new finish is black, rubbed back to reveal some of the bare wood, then waxed.

Here is another view, which shows the ugly green carpeting that is found in the dressing room area of this master bath.

This desk is found in the dressing room, built in.  The chair was unpainted pine, so I finished it to match the desk.