My house needs an underhaul: a budget project thread.

Yeah, I'd do a ceiling color, or a very very pale version of blue. Definitely on the big flat part. And most likely down the skinny wall-like bit and onto the angle above the tub. Make it more spacious.

Blue. Preferably funky, gusty.


Flooring.... What were you thinking of doing in the future of that floor? Tile? How about a nice rug for now?

For fashion's sake I would call the color jade. It reminds me of a 1930-40's vintage green. I think you should stick to the all white marriage of ceiling and floor and go for some beautiful, colorful accessories that work with the jade. I think the worst feature is the floor. How about a really nice throw rug that has that jade color in it? What about the addition of some good quality,vintage art pottery on shelving and a few well framed pictures? Think 1930's-40's in feel.

ooh, I love that green accent tile

I'd also go with a bold blue - and make the room mmmm wider rather than taller, so I'd make the ceiling colour go to that section just above the window.

For flooring, I'd do cheap and quick click wood flooring on top of the laminate. You could probably do that in a couple of hours max. It'll come up pretty easily when you're ready to do something SERIOUS.

Throw rug in white with blue/green on top. Kinda Scandinavian overall.



(that must be the smoked eel I just ate speaking)





(I really really love that green tile - if it was my joint I might even go bold pink - I love pink and green lately - very Lily Pulitzer)

(oh, now I have to take a picture of my man's bath in his house... Extreme pink and green!)

Peel and stick vinyl flooring goes in eally quick and for a small room it doesn't cost much. I agree with those who vote for blue. You can use splashes of green in the accessories so it looks like you aren't just ignoring the green tile.

You're inspiring me, boomer.

Caribou - take that photo - please!

Boomer, you should put the photo into Photoshop and try different colors on your computer before buying any real paint.

On the floor... one of my favorite underhauling methods involves peel and stick vinyl tile. They can be quite handsome these days and very durable and simple as heck to install. When you can't pull it up and do the proper thing, it can really give you a boost. We had that problem in our old kitchen in PA. I found several boxes of heavy duty Armstrong tile on clearance and did the whole floor for about $100. You have a very small space there so you can probably do it very cheaply.

Not sure about the colors, but I would say every surface that is clearly perpendicular to the floor is a wall and everything else is ceiling. The green is a challenge. Let me look again and think on it.

Dang it, Swimpy beat me to it. I need to learn to type and think faster.

Is the flooring vinyl or linoleum? Is it flat or sort of bubbly? Will you take it up in the future? I presume it is on plywood but maybe on some wood strips..

Dunno, I'd want to be taking the flooring and what's under it up, I feel myself reaching for the crowbar... and agree with going for some kind of wonderful rug for now. Kind of agree re keeping the white, or A White of some sort, even though I'm usually for more color play. I'd hurl money at better lights/faucets/mirror(s)/shelves/art too.

One of my favorite companies, Rejuvenation Lighting, is in your neck of the woods, not cheap but I used their lights in my 1920 CA bungalow and wasn''t sorry one bit. Not sure re what they have re your house's architectural time and I don't have a catalog handy. They have less old fashioned lighting too, under their Satellite website. Whether you like their lights (etc) or not, it might get you going on what you like instead.

I might play with the windows - they are great. Are you going to want to curtain them? Be nice if you could avoid that..

Right now the only thing I have on the walls is this poster (it's pretty big):



It kind of picks up the green in the tile. It also has a lot of blue but for some reason looking at blue just hasn't clicked with me yet. Maybe it's because the color deck I have is old and kind of dated.

I would love to do a floor like this:



And then use black accents in the room but I can't really spend that kind of money on it yet because the toilet needs to be moved (that toilet is the first thing you see when you come in my house because nobody here knows how to close the damn door).

Mr. B will not allow laminate flooring in the house and insists hardwoods cannot go in wet areas. Mr. hardwood guy has serious hardwood hangups.

Peel and stick! That might work.....

I think I've even seen peel and stick in that pattern.

On the green, after looking closely I've decided that I like it but that butt ugly flooring is making it look bad. The green against the white is actually really nice, and a paler green of the same tone on the walls with white ceiling might be cute.

Re: My house needs an underhaul: a budget project thread.

I'm a partisan of one color, but that's just because I like to keep things simple. If I had to use two colors, I would apply the second to lines, not areas. What I'm thinking of is the house of a family that's friends with my family. They painted the walls in ochre and every edge in the room white. (Thie stripes went from the edge about six inches wide on each wall.) I like this effect because, instead of hiding the goofy angles, they emphasize them and thereby turn them into something interesting.


My grandmother had tiles in Vermeer yellow. (That's probably not the official name.) I think it goes well with white.

Boomer
A very easy was for you to decide is to go to a fabric store and find a panel that you like and transfer the colors to your bathroom paint colors. You can even buy small samples to bring home to test.

Here are some fabric colors that may help you make a decision. One is a combination of green and blue. One is good for a wall color and a rug to cover the floor. One is a good combination for wall and trim color.

http://www.fabric.com/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=e9ebad70-06e2-4404-af5e-574395a4eec2

http://www.fabric.com/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=3be0f1ba-77ff-401f-af1b-6ab89ae38276

http://www.fabric.com/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=f1595d4b-bc1d-4de8-941a-78fd5f6243f6

Not that I don't like the blue..

the one color I wouldn't do is a green, but that's me.

Also, I might not try to pick the paint color right away. I like rooms to flow together.. Again, that's me. Not to be the same color, so much, as to amuse together.

To appall you, I'll say that one bedroom in the venice bungalow was a cool grey with some blue in it, including the ceiling, with white trim, another was a sort of maple caramel color, with more white trim, and between those, the old closet turned into new hallway was a sort of lime, with white trim, and the bathroom, past a white door, was a sort of light purple-y brown with scads of white cabinets and trim and a shower tile that looked like it had bits of candy in it up close, but was from afar a kind of beige. The hallway went out to a living room and dining room that was a very pale pink. You went into a pantry (the old kitchen) that had its cabinets all newly stacked and painted a sort of green-aqua with the rest of the walls.. wait... light apricot, going to the kitchen, again apricot, with green formica counter and white cabinetry.

Now this may sound horrid but we loved it, the whole thing worked for us.
It was a small cheerful house, 750 sq ft, with a whole lot of windows and fairly high ceilings... and excellent porch across the whole front of the house..

In a way, the dominant or at least the tie-in color was white, even though no room was white.
Unless a lot of light is landing in a room, I think of white as smudge grey, and prefer color.. even Smudge Grey. Again, that's me. Which is why my liking white in your bathroom is a little odd for me, Boomer.

We are in the process of replacing the carpeting and kitchen/bathroom flooring in one of our rental properties and are facing a similar problem to yours, Boomerang, in the kitchen. We chose what we thought was a good combination of carpeting and vinyl flooring. When the installer from Home Depot came out to give us an estimate for the installation, he said that trying to take up the glued on flooring underneath wasn't a good idea. He recommended Trafficmaster Allure to be installed overtop of the existing flooring.

The reviews that I've read on Home Depot's website appear to be positve, overall.

It's true there could be stuff under the vinyl (whatever) top stuff.

I'm a late purist. Get rid of it.

Poor choice of words, and "glued on flooring underneath" should be "existing glued on flooring", but ...

I agree with you, Osso, in theory, but I'm told it's well nigh impossible to scrape off all of the old glue, practically speaking. I guess you could replace the ... what's it called ... subfloor ...

(We're not do-it-yourself people, just listening to what we've been told.)

No time right now but I'll be back. We've done underhauling all over this house. Curtains, paint and little accent pieces (particularly those that are storage-oriented) rule the day.