Switching the Bedroom and the Home Office
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photo: Eric Diesel |
One such was the utilization of the rooms themselves. City apartments follow "lines," meaning that the layout of each apartment on each floor echoes that of the apartment above and below it for the height of the building, with allowances for some floors such as entry, basement and penthouse. Your apartment line affects everything from the prestige of placement for those who care about that to, as everyone cares about, cost. The layout of our line is an ell with the kitchen/dining area inhabiting the lower foot of the ell. Rooms open along the riser of the ell. Flow is very important in a dwelling. The floor plan should invite both occupant and guest to navigate instinctively. For example, in our apartment the living room is the first room one sees when entering the apartment. Framed as it is by a double-wide doorway, it welcomes one to step into it -- to settle onto the mid-century modern sofa in paprika upholstery, to pop a DVD from the shelves of them into the player, to filch a piece of candy from a golden dish.
When we first moved in, the placement of many rooms occurred naturally, but we struggled with placing the home office and the bedroom. A logical choice for the bedroom would have been at the very front of the apartment, which is both next to the bathroom and the farthest room away from the common areas. However, that room fronts the street and we were concerned about both street noise and light pollution from a nearby landmark bridge. There was a room at the back of the apartment whose placement beside the kitchen puts it at the bend of the ell but along the back wall of the building itself. This makes this room the darkest and quietest in the apartment. Though it meant guests would pass our bedroom en route from living room to kitchen and dining -- thus, I feared, disrupting flow -- we placed our bedroom there and put the home office at the front of the apartment.
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photo: Eric Diesel |
Meanwhile, the room we were using as an office was only slightly better suited for that role. Everything had to be designed around a room that is essentially a square, but in an office, the fundamental shape from desk to bookshelf to computer screen to books to file folders to the papers they store is a rectangle. Neither noise nor light pollution were a problem for a room devoted to working and learning, but we did learn during open-window seasons that the street is, in fact, a moderately noisy one. I learned to appreciate as a form of city music the steady hum of traffic feeding onto the city bridge less than a block away. I wrote countless columns looking out that "writer's window" -- you have often read my references to the hollyhock bush that grows just outside, to the intoxicating smoke of barbeque grills during warm weather, to the sight of skiers navigating snow banks during blizzards.
As I've written about, last summer I went and got myself some cancer (as of this writing I remain cured), and even despite the energy lost not just during that time but that nags to this day, this year I woke up one mid-summer morning and thought, "why not go ahead and switch these rooms?" Though we had done intermediary work in the bedroom, I had never been satisfied with its design. Further, the bedroom furniture was 20 years old -- among the first household purchases for a young and barely solvent couple -- and was definitely showing its age. Anyone who has been with me on my "rounds" knows that, as many design professionals do, I am in the habit of visiting home stores to see what they're showing -- and also knows that for years I've been lingering over the displays of new bedroom furniture. After confirming that our savings could withstand the assault, we decided to buy new bedroom furniture, and to switch the bedroom and the office.
Thus, a summer that began innocuously as one of picnics in the park, visits with friends and walks through the city became one of the paradox of relaxing by doing work. It turned out that switching two rooms was the largest task we've undertaken in our urban home since the move into it. For, as anyone who's just dropped their kids off at college will confirm, that's what hauling the contents of one room into another one is: a move. This project proceeded as a move does: over weekends, evenings and other days off from work, with plenty of hot baths, take-out dinners, frustrations and rewards. I documented the journey via my twitter account, dispatching routine updates I hashtagged "renovation weekend No. X" and tweeting photos of the project as it progressed. As a result of my sharing the project via this media, I got a design gig I was able to accomplish quickly and invest the proceeds from into my own decorating project, and some on-air attention from a deejay whose program kept us company for many of those working hours.
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photo: Eric Diesel |
But beyond gendering a set of furniture, the pieces anchor the room by scale and tone. Though there are obvious utilitarian functions, from a design point of view, that is what a bedroom suite should do: anchor the room, so that all of the design elements (which, by the way, include function) proceed from how those pieces inhabit that space. Remembering this when shopping for bedroom furniture will help prevent that unfortunately well-known sinking feeling of a set that looked great on the showroom floor but looks off when it's assembled and placed in the room. The sales staff should be asking you questions that indicate that they understand this -- asking for your measurements of wall, door and window, if there will be electronics to take into consideration, even about your window and linen treatments. We walked into the showroom knowing we were furnishing a square room at the front of a city apartment building. That meant we wanted pieces that had presence but an economy of it -- strong enough, if you will, to take on the sights and sounds streetside without being macho about it.
While we were in the showroom, John surprised me by suggesting we look at club furniture. It turned out that he'd always wanted a home office with a sofa in it, and he turned out to be right. Though the office already had a club chair in chocolate leather, we found a matching club sofa whose dimensions agreed with the new office. We already knew we were going to line three walls of the office with shelves, reserving the fourth for the desk, computer setup and file cabinet. Placing furniture in the middle of a room is a somewhat gutsy move; home decorators are often intimidated by it. But we lose so much when we design a room only along the walls. The club furniture looks just exactly right placed in an ell in the center of the room, lit by a mission style floor lamp that is itself an ell. The lines and curves of the furniture and lamp reflect and reinforce each other. Appropriately, they are attended by a table of photography, design and architecture books just right for dipping into by lamplight. And this is the vista, framed by the doorway that once framed the running board of a bed, that greets the eye as one passes through the apartment.
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photo: Eric Diesel |
The new nightstands proved to be narrower than we had calculated for, but the narrower top space provided an opportunity to obtain new bedside lamps. I was sure someone could use the lamps currently in service if we added them to the pile of furniture and accessories to be donated. I took my time with the decision regarding the new lamps -- again, every sales person from Crate and Barrel and West Elm to Mxyplzyk and Delphinium knows me by sight as someone who talks to them, often sends recommendations their way and does his share of spending while he's at it. I found gear-adjusted metal lamps at Pottery Barn, which have a steampunk quality that agrees with the vibe of the room. They look perfect topped with drum shades in a color I can best describe as red curry. This color agrees with the coffeehouse colors of espresso and cream -- enlivened by autumnal shots of pumpkin and persimmon -- that comprise the room's color scheme and is echoed in the new linens that a new bed deserves.
As for the noise, that is, in fact, an issue, but it is one we can manage. The simple purchase of a noise maker ameliorates much of the street noise, and an investment in handsome wooden blinds helps block out both street noise and street light. Due to its placement in the line, these walls are strong enough to support a tv, so once it arrives a modest set will be anchored to the wall. That will add to the quiet livability of this room, elevating it from a room just for sleeping to one that, along with its partner at the other end of the apartment, contributes to that flow of daily living that is the fundamental reason homekeeping exists: transforming structure into home. It took a lot of work, but the results were worth the effort. Though there was a period of chaos, harmony -- even serenity -- was the reward.
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