Habitat for Humanity Show House

A colleague and myself were privileged to participate in a Habitat for Humanity Show House  for a Tour of Affordable Homes.  Being asked to work on this project was such an honor, and we really enjoyed getting to know all the wonderful Habitat volunteers, as well as some truly amazing Habitat for Humanity homeowners.  I would encourage anyone thinking about home ownership through this fabulous organization's programs to call their local organization today to find out more about the program.  I would also encourage anyone interested in volunteering for this program to do it.  I promise you will come away richer.

As mentioned in a previous post, we designers had certain parameters we needed to work within on this project.

First, no painting.  Absolutely all the walls and trim needed to stay white.  Second, no nails.  The local office did not want to impose on their volunteers to have to turn around and patch walls that they had just finished painting.  Third, the house was still being finished the evening before the tour, so we had to work in cooperation with the many volunteers who were installing doorknobs and hardware, rolling out sod, and so on during our staging process.  Fourth, we were asked to use furniture from the local ReStore and accessories from local second-hand sources.  After all, the theme of the tour of homes was affordability!

One thing we loved was the screen made from louvered doors.  This is something our local ReStore volunteers do.  You can almost always count on finding these beautiful screens made from re-purposed doors in the local store.

We also loved this bed!  This was a damaged piece that had been donated to the store by a local furniture showroom.  We have such a generous community!

And check out this beautiful sectional!

We found lots of vintage bedding and accessories for the boy's room.

The window treatments throughout the house were installed using tension rods and thumb tacks, to avoid putting nail holes in the walls.

And we continued the vintage theme into the office, with lots of old cameras and books.  Don't you just love the old golf clubs in the corner?

Here are some befores:  lots of WHITE!  

We were able to minimize the whiteness of the space by adding plenty of color in our accessories.  Also, by using the height of the room to add art pieces and mirrors on chests, we were able to break up the expanses of white.  Because of the "no nails" rule, most of the art pieces were placed on tall pieces of furniture and leaned against the wall.  Several light weight pieces were secured with thumbtacks.

I am linking this post to Metamorphosis Monday over at Between Naps on the Porch.