One Room Challenge (Fall 2017/Week 2)

WRITTEN BY ART GIER

We are in the second week of the One Room Challenge and we’ve made some major progress without actually making any progress. Not sure, what I mean? Well, let me explain. As an architecture enthusiast, I appreciate all interior finishings in every single one of their forms. This is great when my wife and I peruse old buildings or museums and find ourselves together in awe of the intricate trim details and the craftsmanship of great structures, but with both of us appreciating these fine details, it creates a little bit of happy chaos when we are deciding what finishings we want to include in our spaces. After all, we want to design and do it all!
However, after a decade of working together on projects, we have figured out our roles. My wife Bethany  typically designs our spaces and I typically bring her back to earth and let her know what is actually doable. After that we revise and compromise and finally decide on a design that encourages a team effort. This starts at the very beginning when we are in the conceptual stages of a project. Typically there is a lot of creative ideas swarming and also a few arguments as we navigate this whole Designer/Contractor business. Such was the case with our son’s room, the bedroom we are taking on for the One Room Challenge.

It was a no brainer though, knowing we wanted to work with METRIE again for this project. The only issue for a pair of DIY creatives was narrowing down our favorite trim design for this space, when their are so many incredible choices and options on the METRIE website.  In the end we decided to go with a classic board and batten detail around the whole room.

If you have a small space and want to visually expand your space, this type of traditional board and batten will help you do just that. By taking trim right up to the ceiling and carrying it around every wall in the room, one can effortlessly visually enlarge any interior. Board and batten draws the eye up and around any space.  Speaking of “up”, we also narrowed down our search for the perfect ceiling and decided to choose METRIE’S tounge and groove boards in a natural rough pine finish to add some warmth to the room.

It’s hard to choose favorites, (at least thats what we tell our kids ;)) so for us, the hardest part of the project is out of the way. While I placed our order with the staff at METRIE, Bethany has been packing up our son’s room so we can demo the spaces dated dropped ceiling ASAP. If you’ve ever met a creative 5 year old boy, then you know clearing out their play things is a feat in itself!

So, now you know what I mean by the fact that we are making progress, without actually making anything that makes the space look different. 😉 Next week we will no doubt have some messy progress photos to show you, but for now, here is a round up of our top five favorite spaces that boast board and batten!

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(Click on the photos to be taken to the original source.)

So, what do you guys think? Do you like board and batten just as much as we do? Whats your favourite interior finishing? Not sure? Check out my happy place METRIE for one of my favourite ways to gather ideas. Hello architectural details!