The Library: Part I

My husband and I have not always agreed on home design or decor, but one room where we always found common ground was a library.  We have both always wanted one, preferably something a Victorian Wizard would feel at home in.  Armed with some inspiration photos (yes, some of them are most likely A.I.), Mr. Bleu and I began to tackle building a library.  Mr. B has not always agreed with the decorative choices I've made, but we have both always wanted this sort of library space, so this was a room to unite us if ever there was one.  You'll notice all my inspo pics contain green couches.  This is because I initially wanted this to be the room that housed my green couch.  But in the end, there just was not enough space for all.  

Things that were a must were: sconce lighting, deep colors, lots of books, a fireplace, and plenty of wall space to hang my collection of antique oil paintings.  During the construction of this room, Mr. Bleu built a catwalk so that he could reach the ceiling and I wondered aloud, why we couldn't just keep it.  After a brief discussion, we did and I'll likely do a separate post about that.

Installing laminate flooring has been one of the easiest and most enjoyable parts of all our renovation steps.  Apart from all the cutting, it's very easy and we managed to get the flooring done on this room in only a couple of hours.  Wallpaper on the other hand is less simple.  I ordered this William Morris print from a company that emphasizes sustainability and zero waste.  I didn't realize that meant that I was ordering numbered sheets that had to be used in order.  I ended up being one sheet short of a wall and thankfully Mr. Bleu is a Tetras Whiz, so he pieced together enough to finish the wall and we had enough left over to cover the small wall above the fireplace as well.  After all that, we decided to go ahead and wallpaper the remaining walls and this time, I ordered the right lengths and just bit the bullet on the cost.

Building this faux fireplace was its own job and I'm going to create a separate post for that project.  For this post, however, I will show you where it all began.

The "Billy Bookcase Hack" is all over the DIY internet scene, so we decided to give it a go.  Initially we were going to build our own bookcases, but in the end opted for the speed and convenience of ready-made pieces that I could assemble on my own and then we could install together. We did end up buying two extender units for each shelving unit so they would reach the catwalk, but this photo only shows the assembled units without extensions.

Very important step here is to either sand or prime or both before painting.  I got started only to watch the paint bead up and scratch off easily after drying.  So, I went back and primed all the boards and that allowed the paint to cover nicely, but it will still scratch off easily for about a year or so while it cures if my experience painting MDF panels on the wall or kitchen cabinets has taught me anything.

I got very impatient to get my books back on the shelves.  They've been dominating my dining room table and floor space for a year and I would love to have that room back.  I cut strips of wax paper to lay down under and at the sides of the books while the paint is curing.  I don't want it sticking to my book collection during what is sure to be a typical humid summer.  I chose to put antique books at the bottom and new books at the top.  

I also ordered fabric baskets from IKEA to fit in the cabinets and water hyacinth baskets to go on the shelves.  I applied a light coat of the same stain we used for the baseboards and trim to the water hyacinth baskets so that they would better match the colors of the room.  I really didn't know if this would work, so I started with a test basket.  It took only two coats of stain to get it to a nice shade and cured nicely.

This project was way too big to fit into just one post, so I'm breaking this room into at least 3 and maybe 4 posts.  Join me for Part II of this renovation project to see how the library wall turned out.