Bed-mood!

Hello Peeps!

It’s been a whopping month since I last blogged… soz.  I really am.

I was only going to take a fortnight off when I was away in France… but on returning home and having plumbers in the house sorting out the ‘imbalance” of our the heating system (freezing downstairs, roasting upstairs), there was no usable room in the entire house during most days… and by the evenings, I was just too knackered.

However, good news for my blog is that the builders are finishing up a different job this week (though this does mean delays on our renno’s,) so whilst they’re away, I have been able to claim my home back from the summer holiday mess & with the kids back at school, I am once again able to gather my own thoughts without fear of a “MAMA!!!” interrupting me every 23 seconds! #winning #sortof

So today, although I am talking fashion, I’m not talking about clothes fashion… it’s bedroom furniture I’ve got on my mind.

Or bedframes to be exact.

With our current bit of re-modelling we are re-newing / renovating our two (tiny) bathrooms, the down stairs loo and knocking a single bedroom plus box room into one larger room (with an ensuite) as a “master bedroom”… and my husband, good old Mr T… gave me free reign on styling and colours.

This, if you knew Mr T… is a really, really, big deal.

When we bought out first flat together, a first floor maisonette in Tooting Broadway… we were more or less on the same page when it came to colours & rennovations.

Which was good because the whole flat needed gutting.

We still squabbled a great deal though over the “details”.

But, the thing is – it’s been some 10 odd years since we’ve had to choose a bathroom or make lighting decisions and frankly, having free reign and not having to fight tooth and nail for each and every detail was music to my ears.

However… he lied.

I’m literally on my knees ( – not a euphemism!)… no, it’s worse: I am almost on the verge of giving up to potential drab-boringness… and I need you guys.

I need you to spur me on in my efforts to fight in the name of style!

I have managed to get the shower room ensuite of my dreams (yet to be fitted, but let’s just say Mr T more than objected to each and every single detail – nay, he “vehemently objected” to my monochrome colour scheme – more on that in another blog post!)

And so it is, with my poor, pathetic, tired brain – which has gone completely haywire after having to choose 3 lots of flushing plates, cisterns, pop-up wastes vs plugs, rounded shower tray vs square, black vs white shower tray, 3 “pans” (i.e. toilets), taps, tiles, lights etc etc… when it comes to my new bedroom: I now can’t remember my own identity and am in a complete “tizz” about which bed frame to go for.

So firstly, let’s rewind back to that first Tooting Broadway flat and the first bed-frame we ever bought:

13 years ago, I was in a “shabby chic’ phase for bedroom furniture and we bought a lovely vintage Louis XIV style dresser with matching wardrobe from eBay and this new, over sized (King) rattan bed frame for our teensy 12 by 12 bedroom.

I mean, there are no words really… how on earth did we think we could fit ALL that furniture into such a modest sized room? (The photo is actually of the bed in our current house in my old bedroom… bland as hell I’m sure you’ll agree.  I was allowed to “white wash it” 18 months ago but was vetoed on any stronger colours. *insert rolleyes emoji x 100 here!)

We did the classic first time home owner / first time furniture buyer mistake (as covered in the fabulous Lisa Dawson Styling’s last blogpost – do go and read it, you’ll no doubt recognise your own early interiors mistakes, I know I did!  Live and learn though, right?)

Anyway, we’d ended up having the bed flush against a wall in a corner where I had to sleep on the wall-side with no bedside table and, in the middle of the night I had to clamber over my husband when nature called  (although he did eventually concede to me going on the outside “side” of the bed when I was pregnant and having to get up every 17 minutes for a wee, or a midnight banana or 2am cheese & chocolate-chip cookie feast…)

3 years down the line, when we moved to our small town and looked to rent a house I recognised immediately that we needed to get rid of our over sized bed frame because the houses were all pretty narrow and the master bedrooms were pretty much the size of our bed.

The house we did eventually rent, was rented simply because it had a decent spacious bedroom – a room in which our monster rattan bed frame didn’t look out of place and in which there was at least a 3 ft gap in-between the end of the bed & dressing table.

Hallelujah!

However, that rented top-to-toe-magnolia, north facing dark, cold and dingy house was quite nearly the end of us.

Really – it nearly was. #badtimes

We’d by now sold our flat in Tooting and our money was burning a hole in my maternity jeans pocket… heavily pregnant with my second child I was on a nesting mission; I had more tantrums than my 3 year old son, mainly about  the heating-scorch -stained walls being the backdrop in “all my new-born photos!” (we hastily white washed a couple of rooms and bought a rug, but you know – it was still a dark and dingy house).

All the houses for sale in the vicinity were tiny and none had bedrooms big enough for the rattan bed which by now, a mill-stone round my neck.

I wanted to sell it and I wanted this Scandi inspired bed from Dunelm:

We’d grown to despise our first martial bed… we need to shed the old, and start a fresh… a new mattress on the rattan bed hadn’t quite cut it.

By now, I was all about the minimal aesthetic of Scandinavian interiors.

So, as I lay on the operating table for a c-section, unbeknownst to me, Bill the estate agent had left me a voicemail on my Nokia 3310 which was locked in a drawer up on the maternity ward.  The message said “I’ve found the house for you – it’s got everything you want!”

Once I was discharged from the hospital we went home to leave the baby with grandparents and went straight to a viewing of this “ideal property”. #truestory

And Bill was right!  He’d already shown us (approximately) 39 turkeys, including an ‘almost’ suitable house which happened to be next-door to a home owned by the council for “tagged teenagers”… but, he finally showed us a good house and the rest, is history.

Since buying this house 4.5 years ago, we’ve had very little money to do anything to it, let alone replace any furniture.

Mr T did win a €10,000 bottle of Whisky 3 years ago though (by writing a poem about what Whisky meant to him – another #truestory) and whilst the sale of that un-opened, 60 year old, vintage single malt caused Mr T to silently weep inside for weeks… the sale put a skip in my step as we ripped out the very manky carpets and lino from the entire ground floor of the house and had some beautiful scandi grey washed oak flooring fitted.  The sale of the whisky also contributed to new kitchen work tops & a wall of metro tiles all of which made me very, very happy.

Sorry – I just can’t seem to stop myself from digressing… I’m clearly conversationally deprived!

Back to the bed: we have both grown to despise beds that have a massive foot-board.  So criteria for new bed are:

• Mr T is 6’2″ and insists on a Kingsized bed…
• The width of the wall against which the new bed will sit means that we *cannot* have a bed wider than 160cms if we both want a small bedside shelf
• No rattan

So what should we go for?

For me, bed shopping has become a bit like those times when you haven’t been clothes shopping in ages, and although you know that you have specific wardrobe needs, be it jumpers or work boots… when you get to the shops there’s nothing but a pair of diamanté silver strappy sandals, or green lurex trousers that you want to buy…

And so it is, I find myself in that danger-zone of making a rash decision.

I had long forgotten about that old Dunelm Bed… I was now thinking more boho and maximalist:

I had visions of lots of sheepskins, and was thinking a mix of natural materials against a peacock blue wall…

But when I showed Mr T this La Redoute Tio Rattan Headboard (£279 – also available in blue) he rolled his eyes out loud and said “no. more. rattan. ever.”

I had to concede and went to my second choice… a classic style, which was very much me (given my magpie tendencies):

This Alana Copper Bedframe (from Made, £449 for the Kingsize) was perfect.

I loved the simplicity of it; that it has no “foot” and it’s a petite Kingsize, coming in at 158cms wide.

Perfecto!

I could mix metal & ash-washed wood…. with an over-all look being something like this:

We have a very slim ‘alcove’ in the new bedroom and were thinking of having a floating dressing table built in until I came across this beautiful, slender La Redoute Dressing Table (£205 pre 25% discount) which I think would work really nicely with a copper bed frame.

More than aware that a shiny copper bedframe is rather ‘in your face’… to tie the dresser & bed area in together, perhaps some floating wooden bedside shelves?  I also like the idea of one “dingle dangle” side light and one wall light… though I’ve become really unstuck here as I struggle to find a single wall light that would be suitable… and I’d like a bamboo dingle-dangle light (this one’s from Ikea) given Mr T has banished any more exposed edison light bulbs or cage lights (we already have 4 in the kitchen) but again, Mr T says it’s too rattan like.  (The two lights in the main image are from Rocket St George).

The Made Frame Chair in blush pink (£599) is a bit “blow” the budget for us, but we have a perfect corner for it in the new bedroom….

[And please ignore the choice of flooring on the mood board… my thoughts simply haven’t gotten that far yet.]

AND… the all important Mr T verdict: a resounding NO!

He suffers from sleep… er… issues: he felt like any bed which has “bars” would cause him to not sleep well, and in turn disturb my sleep even more than he already has over the past 10 years; he also said metal bed’s squeak and creak. Oh, and… he said it would get fingerprint smudges constantly from the kids… etc etc.

I felt crest-fallen.

His parting – fatal shot was “I thought you wanted a Scandi-style bedroom?”

Hmmmm.

I really, really wanted this bed… but, as anyone who shares a bed with a partner with sleeping issues will attest to,  sleep deprivation over a prolonged period of time is absolutely soul destroying.

Back to the drawing board… I started looking at scandi inspired beds… although this time round I decided against any fabric headboard… just a good old wooden headboard.

Finding one petite enough that is still classified as “kingsize” has been a nightmare, but I did find such a bed:

This is Habitat’s Tatsuma Bed Frame in Ash (£425) which is ok… I kind of think it will have more longevity than the copper frame, but the wooden headboard is so low, it’ll disappear behind pillows and cushions?

Well, anyway… this was my (concerted) effort at compromising… and, in a glass half full kind of way –  it turns out that “ash” goes nicely against peacock blue… and instead of a copper bed, I could have copper accents in my lights… and perhaps a copper framed mirror-valet (from Made again, £299 – and no… I am not working with or sponsored by Made.com – I promise!)… both lights are from Rocket St George.

And Mr T’s Verdict: “I thought we were getting the COPPER bed?!”

Aaaaaaaarrrrgh!

I mean seriously…

After taking several deep breaths and calmly explaining that I’d taken on board his objections about a metal bed frame and reached a compromise… it seems Mr T has also had enough of the whole thing as well.

He’s refusing to help in making the final decision and we really need to know what we’re doing/ordering in terms of measurements as an electrician is coming on Monday to wire-in for new lights…

Now, it’s over to you:

• Wood or Copper mood board?
• If copper… which dingle dangle light would you go for: bamboo ikea one or the white glass?  I had considered one of those pretty feather shades, but how the hell do you keep those dust free?
• If wood… what colour bedside shelves should we have: I say wood/ash… Mr T says white?

I would, more than ever before, really, really love to hear from you on this one – please leave a comment below as I’m in desperate need of clarifying my own thoughts.

And in terms of my identity & remembering who I am?

Well, when it comes to fashion… I’d like to be a minimalist, but can never suppress my magpie tendencies:

 

Basically, I kind of want it all… depending on what mood takes me.

And I guess, I want a bit of everything in my bedroom too…

We haven’t even started arguing… I mean choosing… choosing the flooring yet!

And for the love of god – someone send me a bottle of stolli for when the gallery wall /deco’s start going up!

If you got this far… thank you so much for reading… hope I haven’t ‘drained’ you too much!

Bx