Style Space Makeover: Home Office

I have always felt that an important part of have great style is having the "style spaces" in your home to support it. Style space: A place in your home that serves as a haven for expressing your personal style. For example, a vanity table or boudoir, closet, or our focus du jour, the home office. I spent the last week with my mom, who was visiting from Minnesota, doing an extreme makeover on our guest room/office, and it's now my favorite room in the place.When we moved into our 2 bedroom apartment last year, we ended up using the 2nd bedroom as a sort of "spillover" room for things that didn't have another place to go. Our guest bed, 2-desk setup from our NYC apartment, and I took over the closets for my clothes. It was never a room to hang out in. The bed was on the wrong wall Feng Shui wise (beds should always be coming out from a wall that's opposite the door), and my little 24" desk was hardly the space to run a home based business from.  Check out what it looked like before...

The first step was to rearrange the furniture. It took a little trial and error, but we managed to move the guest bed to the other wall and still keep the original pieces from the shelves/desk setup. We only removed one of the desks, and now we had an entire new wall on which to create my home office! I knew I wanted all white, sleek, and modern, with touches of vintage. With the help of West Elm furniture, Russell and Hazel and CB2 desk accessories, and a few touches from my new obsession French General (more on that later), we were able to create my dream office! Drum roll...

Chair, desk, pillow from West Elm; Lamp from Ikea; Memo board by Catherine and Peggy

Vintage spool of yarn from French General, Set of 3 rolls of tape from Design Within Reach.

Rolodex from Russel and Hazel; Acrylic box with lid from CB2; memo board pins from Michael's

Tip: For a home office, keep the look simple, clean, and even a little matchy matchy. Clutter always seems to be an issue with desks, so any way you can keep things easy on the eye will be best.  In my case, I kept all the main pieces white, and office accessories clear.

The bed is now so much more inviting in its new position too, which also eliminated the need for bedside tables. Even Ian's computer desk has its own cozy nook in the corner now, without being too visually cumbersome in the room.

We replaced the old dark brown lamp shades with these fluffy white ones from Shabby Chic. So much airier, and now the lamps really give off a lot of light for our overnight guests to read by.

I had been wanting a memo board for the office forever, but have only ever seen tiny ones measuring about 16"x24" for sale - hardly enough space to hold all the day-to-day inspirations. So, on the last day of our makeover process, Mom and I spent the day crafting our own memo board out of vintage hemp fabric we picked up at French General, buttons from my collection, and tools from Michael's (white grosgrain ribbon, stretched canvas, quilt batting, and staple gun). It wasn't quite the 10-minute project that the YouTube videos made it out to be, but the Metal in both of us wanted to be really thorough and we couldn't be happier with the outcome!

Mom and me, working into the late hours to get all the buttons sewn on.

As you could expect, Mom was much faster than me with the sewing.

Our work really paid off in the end. Kenzie now spends all her time in this room, and it set the bar for the rest of the rooms in our apartment. Home decorating is always a work in progress. I'd still like to replace Ian's desk chair (which is currently one of our teal kitchen chairs) with a clear one like this one from CB2...

Once you start working on your home, it's hard to stop. But all the fun ideas and wish lists serve as great things to post on your memo board! A stylish home always serves as a strong inspiration for a stylish you.