Monday, December 8, 2008

Rental living: kissing the home goodbye


Rental living can be tough. No matter how much effort is spent making a blah rental into a spunky home, you leave it behind someday. That being said, it's important to us for our space to reflect our style. So how is this possible without breaking the bank?


Having lived in four different rentals in the past five years, we may have found our niche in affordable design solutions for rental living. Our number one lesson? RECYCLE! For example, the above old farmhouse window turned room divider was purchased at Urban Ore Ecopark in Berkeley for $40.

Our number two lesson? Find creative uses for every day products. Our floor, pictured above is made of oriented strand board and stained a dark brown. Very cheap at your local hardware store!

Our number three lesson? Dumpster Dive! This large galvanized container holding our orange tree was a curbside find, and free! Although, we have found similar containers at Ikea. It would look oh so funky with a Christmas tree in it!


Our final lesson? Repurpose! The above side table, used as a nightstand for our 2 year old, was a $4 find at an estate sale. With a vibrant coat of paint, it does the job! Craigslist can be a great resource for Estate sales happening in almost any area.

Where do you go for affordable design solutions?

3 comments:

Michael said...
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Sofia said...

Here in Portugal we do not have yet those places to find used and old items, so... I just go trough the garbage! haaha People just throw away furniture most of the times that just needs a paiting and some creativity.
Christmas is a good time to find cool things. I have in my small attic two armoirs found in the garbage: one for plates ans kitchen stuff and another one to keep my shoes and some cloth. The other one it's a sofa, barelly used and I alrteady bought the fabric to change it to my lovely purple:)

We just need to get out of the rules:)

Kat said...

Yes, thinking outside the box is important. So interesting that there are no "salvage" stores in Portugal.