Reader Lynne emailed a while back asking for ideas about how to handle the room divider inside her 1959 Florida home. With her problem solved — and thanks to lots of suggestions from Retro Renovation readers — she’s back with pictures to share.
Lynne wrote:
It’s been a long time coming but I wanted to send you some photos of the room divider that I had written to you about several months ago. There were so many excellent and thoughtful tips from your readers, and I really appreciated all the insight. Many people suggested that I live with the room divider (and any other features I may want to change) for a year or so, which turns out to be great advice – it’s so true that once you are in the house and living there day to day what might seem like an issue is not at all. I ended up painting the room divider a sky/turquoise blue, which is an accent color in my green and blue color scheme, and had a piece of MDF cut to fit over the planter portion. I painted the MDF shelf white to match the bricks below, and now I’m able to place a few decorative items on this and it’s very functional. I originally wanted to get white marble but frugality won out! As this is a vacation home, I did not want to put any plants in there at this time, but I can always do that at a later date. When I am in the living room or kitchen the room divider is not as much of a separator between the two rooms as I had originally thought. I have attached several photos of the house, before and after, and overall it’s coming along well and I’m pleased with the progress. Most of the work we did was outside, painting and landscaping, but we did have the carpets removed and the terrazzo floors refinished, and I have purchased a lot of furniture and household goods second hand from many sources – which has been huge fun staying with a 50’s -60’s vibe.
Thanks,Lynne. It looks fantastic — and it’s so great to see you and Larry enjoying your vacation home…. respecting its original bones, yet still making it your own. 🙂