SPRING 2020 ONE ROOM CHALLENGE WEEK 7

Hello again friends! And welcome to week 7…the final stretch for the One Room Challenge. We’ve been through all the ups and downs, the emotional roller coasters, and the “I don’t think I can handle much more of this” moments, and we’re alive and thriving! This is a big week over here and we’re going to bring you along for all of the amazing updates we have, and just how we plan to finish for next week’s final reveal. 

But before we dive in, be sure to get caught up on all of the progress from the start.

Week 1 – Space Plan, Design Board and over all inspiration

Week 2 – Demo and Electrical

Week 3 – Drywall, Paint and Design

Week 4 – Flooring, Cabinets, Appliances and our Dining Nook

Week 6 – Hardware, Furniture, Dining Nook and Art

Also, if you’re finding us for the first time from the One Room Challenge, welcome! We’re Danielle and Michael Gutelli! And together, we’re Clark + Aldine.

Clark + Aldine is named after the Chicago streets where we first met, and was born out of a love for purposeful design and everyday functionality. What we didn’t know then was that our passion and design influence would continue to grow, and we would soon leave our established careers to pursue Clark + Aldine full time. But like they say, when you know, you know! Learn more about us.

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All The Moldings

This week is all about the details. We have a thing for all of the moldings in a space – base, casing, crown and now even shoe. Fun fact – we’ve never really been a fan of shoe molding and refrained from installing it in our home or any client spaces unless it was asked…but that has changed after this project. Now we are obsessed as we found our new love affair with show molding. 

We partnered with Novo Building Products for all of our moldings. Their company is super rad as it houses different brands under the umbrella, all of which have amazing products. We chose products from Empire Moulding and Millwork, Ornamental Moulding and Millwork and LJ Smith Stair Systems, all of which work seamlessly together in our space. Once we had the initial call and realized they were Michigan based and only a 2 hour drive from us we scheduled a date to visit the facility…and you guys, it was a dream!

We’ve talked about it before, but being owners of a design-to-build company we’re always looking to strengthen our list of prefered brands, products and vendors. We absolutely landed that here with Novo Building Products and the incredible team they have built. Be prepared to see their products in most of our spaces moving forward!

Baseboards and Shoe

When we purchased our home we went with a modern craftsman 5.5” baseboard throughout to update the space. And we didn’t veer far off with our new baseboards. We chose the Empire Modern Craftsman Baseboards in 5.5”, but there is a significant difference that caught our eye with these. They are actually significantly thinner, which allows them the flexibility to flow with walls, a feature not found in the thicker style of baseboards and moldings. See, even with brand new walls that are perfectly finished there will always be waves in the wall. It is inevitable, no matter the age of the home or remodel. Moldings with a thinner profile will allow for a much tighter seam and less caulk to fill gaps. 

Now we have to talk about this shoe molding. As with traditional shoe moldings, this molding too is ¾” thick but looks like a mini baseboard with it’s profile. But when we saw it in person we knew we wanted to do something different. We had seen it installed with the ¾” laid vertically up and down along the bottom of the baseboard, and we flipped it so the ¾” is laid vertically against the floor. It makes such an incredible statement in our space and really adds that significant detail we feel is lacking in shoe moldings.

Window and Door Casing

Big shocker here…the window and door casing are from the same Craftsman Collection via Empire. It is such a sleek, elegant profile we had to carry it throughout our space. Again, the big selling paint for us with these is the thinner profile. And one major aspect we didn’t hit on above – it is not intrusive! Moliding is great, it is essential and it should uplift any window, door or wall. But it shouldn’t be an eye sore and that is what we felt our former trim was. Especially given the walls in this 1950 bungalow of ours….so uneven which meant so much caulk. We no longer have that problem.

Crown Molding 

Ok, we’ve been dreaming about the crown since we bought the house. We knew we wouldn’t be able to add it into our living room and dining spaces due to coved ceilings, but those were destroyed during the demo so now we are able to feature it. And it completely elevates the space! We immediately fell in love with the crown molding from Empire’s Craftsman Collection. As with all moldings in this collection its elegance and simple profile caught our eye. We were able to get it in 16’ pieces, which meant we would have seams in only 3 of our wall spans, which you can not see! 

Pro Tip – When installing molding on a wall that will need a seam, join them with a 45 degree miter cut. Once they are butted up tight and attached to the wall immediately fill with wood filler or plastic wood. When dry, sand them flush and repeat if you experienced any cracking. The smooth surface will prevent the appearance of any seams once painted, especially if you use a High quality trim paint. We have an entire post dedicated to painting molding, so check that out for some helpful tips!

Aside from the walls we planned to install crown molding to finish our kitchen cabinets. We were supplied with crown molding from the cabinet manufacturer, and the quality was great. But when it met up with the wall crown it clashed too much. So, we will be swapping it out for the crown molding from Empire’s Craftsman Collection and spray it with paint supplied by our cabinet makers, LilyAnn Cabinets. A win win! 

We love all of the molding so much that we have decided to carry it throughout our entire first floor, and plan to update our 2nd floor as well in the near future. But after ORC we just need a little break!

Molding Paint 

Molding paint creates a major impact to the overall feel and vibe of your space. We love experimenting with colors of molding. We’ve got you covered too, with a full step by step guide on how to paint molding!  With this space becoming one open concept the molding paint color helps create individual spaces while still pulling the entire space together. Let’s break that down by the colors and why they work together. 

The overall color we landed on for molding is Accessible Beige by Sherwin Williams. What we love about this color is it lives in the brown family providing warm undertones without pulling out too much pink or yellow into the space. We were hunting for a color that is soothing, calm and welcoming. Accessible beige does just that. We used this color on all baseboards, shoe molding, most of the crown, all the door casing and the window casing in the living space on either side of the fireplace.

We wanted the living room and kitchen/dining room to flow together, yet still read as their own space. To achieve this look we used the color of our window casing, crown molding and baseboards to do this. In the kitchen and dining room we use Sherwin Williams Greenblack. We fell in love with the green undertones this bold dark paint has. While allowing for the window casing to be bold and dramatic, the green hues unite all the greenery we have inside the living space. Inside the breakfast nook, the contract with the Tempaper wallpaper is a perfect harmony, truly pulling out the green undertones!  To complete the breakfast nook we painted the base and shoe molding Greenblack as well. We know that’s a bold move to change base color but we felt this really helped define this space as its own. 

Crown in the kitchen is two parted. We are going to be using the same color as the kitchen cabinets for the color of the crown that will eventually live there and that color crown will continue around the window next to the staircase inside the kitchen. However the crown going around the header looking into the living space will be accessible beige. The reason being is we want to unite the two spaces together and having the crown from the kitchen match the crown in the living area did just that. Keeping the cabinet color with the crown the same in the kitchen space helps define that space! 

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Stairs

When it came time to decide on our stairs we knew we wanted to go lighter to flow with our flooring. Our previous stairs were stained dark, to match the flooring, and was just too stark. We did not vibe with it at all whatsoever. So we went with a simple white oak stair tread from LJ Smith and paired with these incredible decorative risers from Ornamental Moulding and Millwork. Of course, with all things One Room Challenge, we ran into a challenge and had to rebuild our staircase leading into the basement from scratch. We will have a post up soon on how to do that in your home (the right way) but for now just know it was unexpected, and in the end quite reassuring to know that our staircase is now safe.

LJ Smith Stair Systems has been an incredible partner to us, ensuring we had everything we needed to pull the entire look together. While we aren’t quite ready to show it yet we have a custom knee wall, hand rails and some insanely detailed matte black hardware that is going to elevate the design in all the right ways. Stay tuned for more of that on Instagram and next week as we reveal the full space! 

Lighting

Let’s talk about lighting! You guys lighting in a space like this really helps to define each individual space while continuing to develop the overall design aesthetic. We have two statement lighting with four accent lighting to complement the feature lighting. Our breakfast nook lighting is the absolute show stopper. You guys, people are stopping outside our house to look at it…we aren’t kidding either….we see you! I mean how can you not. This Fibonacci 9 Globe Chandelier by Blueprint Lighting makes my jaw drop every time I see it.  The custom details and build of this light is absolutely incredible. We went with a matte black finish to marry our kitchen island features with the lighting. 

Inside the nook we have two Duo Wall Sconces from Blueprint Lighting. The bronze finish on this wall sconces truly captures it’s beauty against our wallpaper. We love how these sconces are unexpected, yet completely necessary for a truly functional breakfast nook. They light the entire inside of the nook making it warm and inviting.

Our island lighting has been a challenge to say the least. We’ve gone three rounds with selection before landing on this linear light. The overall goal here was to have a light that paired perfectly with the Fibonacci without overpowering the space. 

Having two staircases in this open concept space means we’ve got two entry lighting! Again, we wanted the lighting here to pair together while creating its own presents in the space it lives in. In our front entryway we are using a light we’ve own since we moved in. But now the light is seen throughout the house! In the side entryway we are using the Avery Pendant in aged brass and cream by Mitzi.

Mid-Century Modern Built-in Shelves

When we cut the wall open to let natural light in to our living space and funnel into the kitchen space we knew we wanted to create another pleasing element. A knee wall is what you would expect to live here. But we knew this space called for something more. So within a days time Michael built-out the design Danielle had envisioned. Together  we were able to create our new mid-century modern built-in shelves. We didn’t want to leave you hanging on how we created them, so here’s our full blog post on how to build your own. 

Countertops

Welp, we are still waiting for countertop installation. As we shared with you in week 4 we when everything closed down here in Michigan so did countertop fabrication. While this isn’t the end of the world to us this has made a major impact on what we can and cannot do. Turns out a whole lot of things in a kitchen space ride on having counters here! We are fortunate to have built out some killer plywood countertops that we sealed. But cannot wait to show you our new counters that come in today!

So, What’s Next?

We are so so so friggin close to being done! But this next week willo feature all of the finishing touches like countertops, backsplash, pot filler, cabinet crown, island trim, knee wall…oh so many things!

So be sure to hang with us and tune in next week for our final reveal! And check out the other 19 amazing Featured Designers taking part in the Spring 2020 One Room Challenge! 

A Glass of Bovino | Beginning in the Middle | Beth Diana Smith | Clark + Aldine | Coco & Jack

Deeply Southern Home| Design Maze | Dwell by Cheryl | Erika Ward | Home Made by Carmona

House of Hipsters | Hunted Interior | Kandrac & Kole | Kate Pearce | Katrina Blair | Liz Kamarul

Veneer Designs | Rambling Renovators | Renovation Husbands | Studio Plumb | Media BH&G

You can follow us along on our journey over on Danielle’s Instagram page. And stay tuned because tomorrow we are dropping a brand new podcast series inside our Stay True Podcast with all kinds of behind the scenes insight and interviews you aren’t going to want to miss. Subscribe today on Apple or Spotify and you’ll get the notification right to your phone!  

Much Love –