Search results for 'shipping pallet d-i-y'

paola navone’s painted rugs

We love the simple white-on-concrete? stencils designer Paola Navone put in her Greek summer home. They act like rugs, and can be done on wood floors as well. We’ve seen this done before, but not quite so beautifully. read more…

09.27.12 | comments | in copy this!, floors, people, reimagine

kitchen-testing chilewich floor mats

Chilewich is a brand of chic, minimalist woven polypropalene floor mat that is a staple in design magazines. You’d think the material from which they’re made – woven polypropyline – would be available in off-brands, but we haven’t found any in our searches. (We did, however, find a number of seller’s on Ebay who sell seconds or discontinued styles; Chilewich mats aren’t cheap.) We’ve been thinking of possibly using a Chilewich floor mat for the kitchen whose painted plywood floors take a lot of wear and tear. So we ordered some samples from Chilewich’s site.

From having cooked seriously and sometimes wildly-with-a-number-of-cooks-at-once, we know about all the bits of food that can end up ground into the kitchen floor, from scraps of fat from trimmed meat to fruit peels. We worried that all this stuff would mash into the weave and make for more work than we want. So we decided to do a test to see if the Chilewich would really clean easily despite our abuse. read more…

09.25.12 | comments (4) | in elements, floors, inside, kitchen, materials, resources

reader improv: fab shipping pallet staircase / stoop

shipping pallet staircase stoop Lot 45 Copenhagen

photo: jesper ray

We’ve been getting an increasing number of emails from readers their shipping pallet improvisations, as they push they realm of pallet invention. A recent favorite: this swell, stylish staircase by Natasha Figueroa and her husband Dan Husted who live in an up-and-coping gallery district in Copenhagen, Denmark.

We have a private gallery/studio located in Kødbyen, which is the old meatpacking district. Lot45 is the name, and it is an old ‘skin-house’, where they used to hang the hides for curing. Since we did all the work ourselves, we kept the budget quite tight and try to re-use as much as we could. Seeing as the meatpacking district still functions, there are a lot of old pallets laying about. Dan designed and built this so that it can also function as a hang-out during openings & parties.

Their pallet staircase functions as an old fashioned stoop where their friends do indeed hang out… read more…

09.19.12 | comments (6) | in buildings, cheap + great, d-i-y, hard, materials, outside, paths + processes, people, reclaim

diy fab painted house numbers

We’ve browsed endless catalogues that feature chic, expensive house numbers. We’ve always preferred the ones Isabel Rower devised out of washi tape. Then we saw THIS wonderful graphic house number done in ordinary paint. It could be any size and color(s) you want. The trick would be in finding or making a template that makes for beautiful lines, though freehand could be really beautiful.

via Japanese Trash

09.18.12 | comments | in buildings, copy this!, how-to, materials, signs

shipping pallet loungers, for inside and out

When we saw this image from Natural Style Outdoor Spaces on Style Files, we immediately thought: shipping pallets would make a perfect base. You’d hardly have to desconstruct them. Just clean them up (stack if desired) and place slip-covered foam cushions on them (here’s a how-to), for chic lounging pallets that would work inside or out.

It’s curious how inspiring shipping pallets have become…We find ourselves building with them in our heads like some sort of mental Tinkertoy…

What are your ideas?

09.11.12 | comments | in cheap + great, copy this!, d-i-y, furniture, hard, inside, outside, reimagine, resources

reader’s improv: dig this fab d-i-y pallet bed

gorden ammermann

While we were away, we got a very succinct, very cool email from reader Gorden Ammermann, with photos of the wonderful shipping pallet bed he made:

hi,

maybe i´ve something for your site. be free to post it: my new diy-pallet-bed

greetz

gorden

We not only love the white painted bed, but the deliciously rumpled linens in a very simple room as well. You can get the gist of Ammermann’s creation from the other two photos he sent: read more…

08.28.12 | comments | in cheap + great, copy this!, d-i-y, furniture, inside, materials, people, reclaim, resources, sleeping

zigzag paint floors + the zigzag path of the creative

The harsh reality of white-painted floors like the ones in our ‘laboratory’ is that they are prone to scratching and losing their pristine look FAST. Since our plywood floors were painted a beautiful oyster shell white (THAT story to come in a later post), it has been our personal challenge to GET OVER the fact that they will get nicked, scratched, stained and who knows what else…

The solution: to view them as a canvas to paint as we wish, when we wish, WHAT we wish. We’ve started a mental file of possibilities. The zig-zag pattern on this rug would translate easily to being painted on the floor read more…

06.26.12 | comments | in cool spaces, copy this!, floors, laboratory, materials, paths + processes, principles, quotes, rooms

d-i-y minimalist planters made of file cabinets

Now that we have a terrace with a fatso view, we’ve been looking at minimalist planter options and found this image of a cool one at Houzz: a four cabinet file cabinet with drawers removed, turned on its back. It is one of a series of file cabinet planters made by Minimis and has a pricetag of nearly $800. Yikes! So we poked around for other options and found several people had the same idea. Check out this d-i-y before-and-after we found at Pretty Shiny Things: read more…

06.05.12 | comments (2) | in copy this!, d-i-y, garden, how-to, outside, repurpose, resources blogs + sites

‘hip girls home’ giveaway: and the winner is…

hipgirlshome.com

We’ve come to the end of our most popular giveaway ever. Over 190 of you told us what projects you were intending to tackle over the summer in your home or garden in order to win a copy of Kate Payne’s fab The Hip Girl’s Guide to Homemaking, with its trustworthy, no-nonsense information on everything from knot tying to fridge pickles to foraging. Needless to say, we were blown away by your creativity and spirit. If you haven’t yet, check out each of the four posts to see what other readers’s projects are.

But our randomly selected winner made our day with his plan. Timothy Foss wrote:

I have such a long list of hopefuls in this category, but my favorite is this: My grandfather invented a pickle grabber in the 50s that never made it to market. I have one of 3 prototypes. My hope is to launch a local line of garden made pickles from my grandmother’s pickle recipes and manufacture the pickle grabber to go with it. Wish me luck! read more…

05.24.12 | comments | in community, d-i-y, entertaining, inspiration books + zines, recipes, resources, share, strategies

book giveaway last call: ‘hip girl’s guide to homemaking (dig this homecured bacon)

recipe from hip girl's guide to homemaking

photo: kate payne

This is the final call for our free book giveaway! One of the the great things about Kate Payne’s Hip Girl’s Guide to Homemaking is how it makes you realize that processes or projects that seem complicated, are really easy enough to do in your own home. Curing bacon in the perfect example. Kate Breaks it down into five easy steps, and the best part is that you get to control the quality of pork that you use. (Also is there anything more satisfying than the smell of home-cured bacon sizzling in your kitchen?)

So its your last chance! To win a copy the Hip Girl’s Guide, read more…

05.21.12 | comments (21) | in d-i-y, family + friends, food, how-to, learn, projects + play, resources books + zines

colorful d-i-y shipping pallet planters (w safe paints info)

colorful planters made of shipping pallets

photo: stacy k floral

Innovative uses for shipping pallets continue: here a play on shipping pallet gardens, painted bright colors and hung on a wall. In a post we wrote about how-to transform a shipping pallet into a vertical, layered garden, some readers brought up the question of food-safe paints for pallets that will house herbs, greens, nasturtiums and other edible plants. Kate Payne of Hip Girl’s Home (whose book we’re featuring in a giveaway) took the initiative and emailed the Old Fashioned Milk Paint folks, who make a completely non-toxic, zero VOC paint and sealant. Wrote Kate: “…air quality matters here, but so does sustained exposure to moisture and possible leaching, this is a great question!”

Here’s what she found out: read more…

05.02.12 | comments | in copy this!, d-i-y, garden, materials, outside

book giveaway: ‘hip girl’s guide to homemaking’ even teaches useful knots

photo: kate payne

One of the things we love so much about The Hip Girl’s Guide to Homemaking is that Kate Payne always thinks to share the simple–but totally essential–skills that many of us manage somehow not to have picked up. A perfect example is the series of useful knots on her blog. Her tutorial for tying a bowline knot is perfect for setting up the clothesline she was making, but of course has an endless number of knot-securing-uses. Just one more reason why we’re excited to give away a copy of Kate’s book next month. If you haven’t already, leave us a comment telling us what project around the house or in your garden you’re most looking forward to tackling this spring/summer, and we will randomly choose a commenter to receive a free copy of this great book. Deadline is May 19. read more…

04.27.12 | comments (21) | in cheap + great, d-i-y, family + friends, how-to, learn, projects + play, repurpose, resources books + zines, strategies

painted miracle: pink-washed plywood

photo: lisette scheers

We are completely smitten with the pink-washed walls in this photo from the Milan Furniture Fair. It looks like plywood to us (or we imagine it as that) color-washed with an incredible shade of pink…(though it may also be a surface unevenly painted in close shades of flat pink paint)

It made us start thinking about the possibilities for not simply painting plywood uniformly opaque, but washing it with rich ever-so-slightly-diluted paints in unexpected colors so that the grain shines through and the surface is made interesting by imperfection.

Here pink + plywood becomes magic. read more…

04.26.12 | comments | in copy this!, d-i-y, inside, materials, resources, walls + windows

pallet love: 150+ shipping pallet d-i-y’s (in 3:20 secs)

(Video link here.) D-i-y shipping pallet creations are among our most popular posts, largely we imagine because of all recyclable materials, pallets offer a cheap (or free) source of an entirely natural material: wood. We’ve done A LOT of posts about pallets – including how to tell a safe pallet from a possibly toxic one – and we’re always on the lookout for new ideas. We found a trove in this video put together by The Canadian Wood Pallet & Container Association; we lost count at 150 in the short 2:30 second video.

via Unconsumption

led-illuminated shipping pallet bed
the scoop on safe shipping pallets (shipping pallets 101)
ps: some possible dangers of wood shipping pallets
brilliant d-i-y pallet desks, tables, stairs
d-i-y: pallet chair (and stool and lamp)
for stylish d-i-y shipping pallet furniture: paint it black!
d-i-y shipping pallet vertical garden

04.25.12 | comments | in cheap + great, d-i-y, materials, reclaim, resources, resources blogs + sites, video

book giveaway: the hip girl’s guide to homemaking

Now that spring has officially sprung, we find ourselves ready for new projects, around our houses and outside. We keep coming back to our friend Kate Payne’s The Hip Girl’s Guide to Homemaking, an all-purpose guide to doing-it-yourself in your home (and having fun, too) – for ANYONE, whether hip girl or not. (We think it would be a great book for guys setting up their first apartment.)

The books covers a ton of ground, from what you need to stock your home (and how to make your own resources) to the basics of easy, stylish home design. She has trouble-shooting options for virtually any common home mishap. It was Kate’s blog, of the same name, that we turned to last week when we needed instructions for how to hang pegboard in your kitchen.

Some of our favorite springtime gems from Kate’s guide include, her how-to on setting up your own bucket garden; read more…

04.19.12 | comments (145) | in cheap + great, d-i-y, entertaining, family + friends, housewares, how-to, learn, projects + play, recipes, repurpose, resources books + zines, solutions, strategies