Note to self: Don't make promises. Ever.

Remember that promise I made in the close of yesterday's blog entry?  I lied and I'm ashamed of myself. I do have a good excuse involving molten metal and smoke alarms, but I won't go into that.  The one thing I did do related to the room yesterday was pick up a luggage rack at Bed, Bath and Beyond ($24 plus tax with my 20%-off coupon).  I don't think I've ever seen a collapsible luggage rack outside of a hotel room, and I don't really understand why more people don't have them.  Every time we have overnight guests I wish we had one to make it more convenient for them to live out of their suitcase, but it never occurred to me to actually go out and look for one.

Back to the walls:  I'm going to share my rambling thoughts on the very different and opposing ideas I have in the hopes that maybe one of you will have something to say on the topic that will finally budge me off the fence.

If you've been reading from the beginning, you'll recall this pattern...

and that I was thinking of using this along the perimeter of the ceiling, two or three rows deep, using the five accent colors randomly.  If I go with that, I have three different ideas for how to incorporate the colors on the walls, and you're just going to have to try to visualize two of them because I don't have access to a decent program to render it since I switched to a Mac.  (I hope to rectify that very soon.)  The first option would be to lay out random tone-on-tone stripes by simply taping them off on the flat/matte base coat and painting over those sections with a satin or semi-gloss waterborne polyurethane or glazing liquid.  Then I would do the same pattern as above on the walls, but letting the staggered blocks of color fall down the wall more on this stripe, less on that, etc.  I prefer an organic look rather than a strictly ordered one in this room because I think it's more relaxing (and this is a bedroom).  The second option would be to do the tone-on-tone striping the same way, but to add the metallics in here and there as narrower, floor-to-ceiling stripes, possibly centered in the tone-on-tone stripes, or perhaps flanking them.   The third option was inspired by this....

Eijffinger Bijoux Designer Range Wallpaper

featured on French Dressing

I love that look.  Hate wallpaper, love the look.  Love it so much I think this wins if I decide to go geometric.  A big plus to this is that I wouldn't need to do any tone-on-tone striping at all; in fact it would detract from it if I did.  Laying it out would take a bit of time, but I could probably have the walls finished tomorrow if I decide on this.  On the other hand, I don't think it would be as striking in the colors I'm using as it is in this photo.  Of wallpaper.  Ugh. That's a topic for another day.

The other, opposing idea I have is a variation on this theme....

This is a raised, or dimensional stencil that I fell in love with and purchased several years ago with absolutely no clue when or where I might use it.  Here I've only used some of the branches, but in my guest room I'd want to incorporate the whole tree...

From Victoria Larsen

By the way, I think Victoria Larsen is in Idaho, and I've just got to ask anyone who might know:  Don't they have aspen trees in Idaho?  Because she calls this an aspen and as a Coloradoan who sees aspen trees every day, I can tell you it's no aspen!  But isn't it pretty!?!  I love the detail on the bark and think the trunk could be so stunning in silver and white, with the leaves painted randomly with the other accent colors.  If I go this route, I'd plant one tree on the wall next to the window at the end of the room opposite the bed, and I'd continue the leaves here and there all the way around the perimeter of the room on the ceiling, and perhaps trailing a bit down the walls.  Beyond that, I'm undecided.  I could leave it at that, but also do the tone-on-tone striping - I'm thinking very wide stripes, 3" and up - so that my ceiling lighting still had something to play with on the walls.  Or I could paint a few stripes relatively evenly spaced throughout the room in the various accent colors with white leaves and branches placed on top.

There you have it:  Two very different ideas that I simply cannot seem to choose between.  Going geometric would certainly help give the room a more masculine feel, and would help to continue the art deco aspect as well, but I think that the deeply colored fabric I picked up for the headboard and plan to use on a footstool will help add a bit of that, as will the barrel chair if I actually am successful re-uphosltering it in the way I see it in my mind's eye.  Quite honestly, I'm leaning toward the tree though.  I don't think my son - the main person I'm trying to please by masculinizing the room to begin with - would be opposed to the trees.  He liked another tree theme that I did so much he asked me to duplicate it in his first apartment in Los Angeles, but it's also a much more masculine looking tree...

Looking at this photo again makes me sad I didn't keep in touch with the client. Betty was roughly my mother's age, and so open to both color and bold patterns in the rooms I did for her.  And every afternoon around four 'o clock she'd convince me to set down my brushes and join her for a glass of wine and we'd sit and chat and laugh and it was just a lovely way to end my workday.  I really miss her.

There I go, rambling again; sorry!   Please, if you have any opinion about the ideas I'm mulling over, leave me a comment.  I'm really sick of thinking about what to do with the walls; I want to just do the walls already!  Oh, and I take back what I said in a previous blog about it being a "luxury" having myself as a client.  I'm a PITA!