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That's a wrap on my modern coastal home office renovation! My first One Room Challenge was ALL OF THE THINGS! I'm so thrilled with how my home office turned out. This is a recap of what it took to get this room completed and my favorite home decor items for the shelves!
Week 8 of the spring 2022 One Room Challenge is all about the big reveal! I can't believe this day is finally here! If you have been following along since the beginning, you know that I started this project in January 2022. This is the first whole room renovation that I've completed entirely by myself. It created opportunities for me to try a plethora of new things. I learned how to use new tools and jigs, I created a countertop from 2 x 8's, I refinished furniture, and the list continues!
This blog post will highlight my favorite modern coastal home office features and a few tips on how to find great decor pieces. Ultimately, I hope this encourages you to DIY a space of your own!
Modern Coastal Home Office Renovation
1. The Highlights
Wow, what an experience this has been! The One Room Challenge has been an incredible event full of camaraderie and joy! I have loved browsing through everyones spaces and getting to know everyone through their ideas and design! The featured designers and guest participants have such drive and creativity. All of the reveals I have seen over the last 2 days have been incredible! You can check them out on the One Room Challenge blog! These spaces are inspiring and I've gathered so many ideas for my next project from them!
My favorite part of this challenge has been that the reason behind creating it was to inspire people to finish that room transformation. That motivated me to stay focused, despite the fact that I started this DIY project early to make sure I could accommodate my busy life and work travel schedule. I'm so thankful that Linda Weinstein created this challenge to bring the DIY and design communities together!
I want to give a huge thanks to Rockler Woodworking and Hardware, Love vs. Design and Curtarra for sponsoring parts of my home office project! They were all so easy to work with and their products are every bit of amazing!
And last, but certainly not least, my 2 favorite thank yous! To Steven for never saying anything about all my long nights working away in my office, for bragging on me when he doesn't realize I hear him from the other room, and for helping me cut the 14 ft boards, carry that heavy a** countertop into my office and for helping me lift the bookshelves on top of the countertop! And to my dad for allowing me to borrow his tools, for coming over and giving me some advice when I asked, and of course for being the driving force behind who I am and for being a DIYer himself and showing me the way, whether he knew I was paying attention or not, as I grew up!
2. The Big Reveal
The reveal and sources are the real reason everyone is here. So without further ado, here is my finished modern coastal home office!
Can you believe it? I still have to pinch myself and remind myself that, not only is this my home office, but I DID THIS! Those built-ins are an Ikea hack! I saw a ton of Ikea hacks using cabinets and billy bookcases, but not any using drawers. Personally, I love drawers over cabinets and this combination of Songesand dressers and Billy bookcases is perfection!
Here are the things I achieved during this home office renovation:
1. Ikea Hack Built-ins
2. Created a countertop out of 2 x 8's - This is a fantastic extra workspace and crafting counter.
3. Painted dark brown wood furniture white or light blue to brighten the space and add new life.
4. Created shelving to house decor, books and memorabilia
5. Added a curtain rod and curtains from Curtarra to add some privacy
6. Used peel and stick wallpaper from Love vs. Design to add dimension
7. Created a printer drawer out of 1 of the dresser cabinets using a rev a shelf mixer lift from Rockler
8. Replaced all the Ikea provided knobs/pulls with upgraded brushed bronze knobs and pulls from Rockler
9. Created a filing cabinet using two drawers and a filing system from Rockler
10. Took out the boob light and replaced it with a modern sputnik chandelier from overstock.
11. Created a gallery wall that highlights some of my favorite memorabilia from my grandparents
Overall I created a more organized space that feels much lighter and brighter and allows me to be more productive as I work.
3. Home Office Decor Pieces
The fun part of this coastal home office renovation was definitely choosing the home decor! I knew right away that I wanted books to decorate my shelves! As my color scheme included Carolina Blue and Hot Pink, I searched for books with that color spine.
I used etsy as a place to search for what books I could purchase that fit my color scheme. The jackets on books do not always depict the color of the spine, and etsy was an easy place to search and figure out what books I wanted to purchase. My thought process when it came to selecting the books included choosing books that I wanted to read or that theme or title fit my space. I chose books that focused on decor, fashion or medicine when it came to theme.
My final tip for books is to check out used book stores in your area! You may not be able to find the most up to date books or trendiest books, but there are tons of options to choose from at a terrific price!
For other decor pieces, I choose items that fit my likes and style. Since I have a lot of gold elements in my home office, I wanted gold decor pieces like those baskets, frames and the piece on top of some of my books. You'll also notice chess pieces and travel themed items to fit my love of travel and the fact that I travel for a living!
4. Tips for Displaying Old Momentos in a Modern Space
This one is always tough. At least it is for me, as I hold onto items that are special to me. I have a lot of my grandparents momentos that I wanted to display in my office. Here are a few things I did to modernize those displays.
Photos:
This one is simple! I switched up the frames. Replacing the frames with ones that fit your style and your color scheme help to tie those photos in!
Shadowboxes:
Choosing to display items in a shadowbox that is framed with simple lines in white or black will make the entire display more modern. I put old photos, ticket stubs and other special items from my grandparents in a shadow box! Can you believe I even had an old scarf/handkerchief of my grandmas that had Carolina blue and pink in it?!
5. How It All Began
Eek! Now that you see how it looks now, can you believe this is the before image! Yes, I'm sure it's the same home office! I can't decide if I'm more shocked that this is the same room or that I lasted a year and a half in this chaotic, dark and dingy space! My goals for this space included shelving, places to hide office and craft supplies and to make it brighter! Dare I say I 1000% achieved my goals!
6. Where Should You Begin?
The answer is, begin with measurements! Measure your space, write down your goals for the space and then begin to do your research! Ikea hacks are fantastic because they make things a lot quicker and there are so many options to customize your space!
Next create a mood board or start pinning your ideas! You can check out my home office board on Pinterest! I love that you can create different sections within a board so that you can place all desks that you like or all light fixtures you like in one area. Pinterest is a great tool/search engine to use for home decor and DIY projects!
7. Just Do It
Dive in, you will gain so much, even through your mistakes! The countertop was the part of the project I believe I was most worried about! I didn't want to spend the $1000 I was quoted for a countertop. After purchasing my Ryobi Planar, my countertop cost less than $90! I had never used a planar before or secured wood together using just wood glue.
It was a labor a love. You can read more about it in my week 2 blog post!
8. Rockler Woodworking and Hardware
I discovered Rockler Woodworking and Hardware this winter and fell in love with several of their jigs and products that they gifted me with to use for this project. I featured Rockler in my week 3 blog post and highlighted them throughout my Spring 2022 ORC blog posts.
Their jigs are pretty spectacular and really decreased the amount of time and energy I spent installing the knob for my desk and the drawer slides for my printer drawer hack! While I don't love my printer drawer, it's going to stay how it is for now! I use my work printer so infrequently that I think it will work until I come up with a plan G! (There have been numerous revisions to my printer drawer hack and I do not know how many plans I've gone through at this point!) Also I'm slightly obsessed with my filing cabinet drawer and love that I still have room in that drawer to house larger items!
Rockler also has so many other amazing items. They also gifted me with these brushed bronze square bar drawer pulls and brushed bronze square knob! The color of these pulls and knob match my gold light perfectly.
My LTK houses most of my sources, if I did not list them specifically above! Thanks for following along with my first One Room Challenge! I can't wait until the next one!
This post was all about my modern coastal home office renovation reveal for the Spring 2022 One Room Challenge!
The ORC Spring 2022 Post Round-Up:
Week 2 - The Best Ikea Creative DIY Projects for your Home Offie Reno
Week 4 - 4 Makeover Tips for an Inspiring Home Office Space
Week 5 - The Secret to Simple DIY Projects for your Home Office
Week 6 - 2 Cool DIY Projects that will Elevate your Home Office Renovation to the Next Level!
Week 7 - 4 Key elements you need to incorporate into your Home Office Renovation
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Wow! It all looks amazing! Great job!
Thank you! It’s such a great working space now!