Budget Minded Modernist
The house exterior is officially done. The windows, foundation and garage door (until we figure that out) have all been painted, so now we can really start to focus on this hot mess of a yard. It’s pretty humid here right now and the idea of tearing out rotten railroad ties isn’t appealing…at all.
I scored this Alexander Calder print on one of my junking expeditions…but was disappointed in the lack of information available on the Calder Foundation website. I knew that the original drawing was done at the same time he was performing his “Cirque” while living in Paris…but I needed to know more.
I remembered that Rago Arts, one of my favorite auction houses, has sold quite a bit of his work, so I headed over and found my piece right away!  Apparently a portfolio of 12 drawings were printed commercially in the 60’s…so I’m guessing that’s what I have. No title, but at least a bit more info. Now to figure out to clean it up a bit..I’d love to get rid of the water damage. Back to research….
Here is a performance of his Circus…It’s really something.
Gotta love upcycling. I was really pleased to see all the “back to school” upcycled products at Target this summer. Nothing like a Capri-Sun pencil case.
Anyway, this works for me on many levels. sofa city sweethearts has made this pendant from 3 45s and 1 LP. It has a mod, feminine, yet sinister quality I’m drawn to…..like ruffles on a biker suit…..
One of my more recent junking expeditions yielded a nice Burke, Saarinen style tulip chair. I had just read the posts here, and here on fiberglass shell restoration so I was feeling pretty confident that the condition of the fiberglass wouldn’t be an issue. Granted, all of the posts I’d found focused on the colored Herman Miller/Eames shells, but the consensus seemed to be that white ones were easy too…just coat with a different sealer to avoid yellowing…simple enough right?
Armed with different grits of sanding sponges, I start at it…at first it looks like the dirt is coming off easily…until I realize the white grit I am sanding off is just filling in all the gouges and as soon as I wipe it clean…it’s there again. This continues for several hours over 3 days. Even with wet sanding..the itchy arm syndrome exists.
Finally, I realize I need to just let it go and say enough is enough…it will never be perfect and I wouldn’t have wanted it if it were, so just seal the damn thing already. I used a spray lacquer/high gloss clear coat and it just kept sucking it in. I had considered linseed oil, but liked the low maintenance a sprayed coating would provide.
I had a few fabric scraps in the attic I tried to picture it with…but I think at the end of the day…I want a pretty obnoxious print on here so the search continues to complete the job….
I’ve been trying to figure out how we can give our garage door a modern DIY makeover…or a budget replacement door. This is the look I’m drawn to at the moment, but I’m not sure how difficult it would be to simply install metal on top of the “wood” material we currently have…..if anyone has done this, I’d love to hear about it.
OR… perhaps if we had to replace rather than refurbish..we could do something like this?
But I keep coming back to the copper….but that’s too much metal, right? Boy, these are cool though….but no…must… resist… urge… for more metal….
I WIN. Tree rats can eat it…or at least eat something other than my house from now on.
It only went about a month over schedule…mainly due to Nashville Electric’s inability to communicate within its own departments…but it’s done. What a difference!
We are better insulated, tree rat free and looking a helluva lot better to boot. The final guttering etc.. was done while I was away so it was exciting to come home to the finished project. There is one tiny piece of guttering to be fixed and some scraps of metal to be dropped off, but that will take 10 minutes, so in my book..it’s done.
Dale Portman and Barry Choate aka The Coupe did a really fantastic job and brought an awesome crew. They understood what we were going for and did us proud. They stayed on top of things, communicated everything clearly and that is hard to come by these days…Thanks guys!
Now that I have this nice siding…it’s time to paint the windows, foundation, garage door…find some affordable outdoor porch lights….get rid of that nasty lattice….rebuild/stain decking….start rolling change to save up for some serious landscaping..those old rotten steps are crumbling more and more every day…..phew….onward!
