Chinoiserie Chic: Gray Owl

Benjamin Moore Coventry Gray

With my painter arriving next Monday to paint the garage and the intervening 4th of July holiday, yesterday I decided I needed to focus on my to do list for the garage.

The garage has great bones, believe it or not. The ceiling is wood and stained a dark walnut. There is a French door leading to the terrace. Some of the walls are antique brick. There are four windows. The space is large - two cars plus, so there is room for storage as well as the two cars.

First up is deciding on a wall color. I went to Benjamin Moore yesterday for paint chips. I have decided I want gray. The last two rooms I painted in my house were Stonington Gray in the powder room and Gray Owl in the man cave.

I am leaning toward Coventry Gray. It is a medium gray and I think it would look great with the dark wood ceiling, antique brick, and our gray and black cars. The french door and windows will be painted a crisp white.

Benjamin Moore Coventry Gray

I also need to decide on new lighting and shelving. Today I'm off to Lowe's and Home Depot to see if I see any lighting that will work. I would love to add a Chinoiserie element or two as well. I have a couple of ideas, but I'll see what I think once the room is painted.

Have any of you redone your garage? If you have any great ideas for me, I would love to hear from you.

Benjamin Moore Gray Owl

Welcome back. This is Week Number Two of the One Room Challenge. If you missed last week, you can find it here. To review, I have decided to turn our former family room into a Chinoiserie Man Cave for my husband.

My goal for this week was to 1. decide on my color palette and most importantly 2. choose the paint color and 3. get the room painted.

More often than not, my plan for a room starts with a pattern - either fabric or wallpaper. I knew that in this room, being a man's space, I would not use much pattern, but a little never hurt anyone, right?

In my stash of fabrics I had a yard or so of this gorgeous Chinoiserie toile by Bob Collins & Sons called Fete Chinois in the gray, ebony, and ivory colorway - this is a masculine Chinoiserie fabric if there ever was one. Let me rephrase that - this is as masculine as I go.

I decided it would set the tone for my room, with a palette of gray, white, and black and that this fabric would end up as a pair of fabulous pillows to go on the leather couch. The room already has a great distressed leather couch that is staying. BTW, to me distressed leather is absolutely perfect for a man cave. Distressed leather is so forgiving - the sofa is ten years old and looks like new or better than new.

I absolutely love the color gray as a neutral wall paint color with Chinoiserie. Everything looks good with gray. I used Benjamin Moore Stonington Gray in my One Room Challenge powder room combined with this wonderful Ralph Lauren Chinoiserie toile.

Benjamin Moore Stonington Gray

Ralph Lauren Chinoiserie Toile St. Honore

So for the Man Cave my search began for a new gray. I kept coming back to Benjamin Moore Gray Owl. It is classic and elegant, without going too beige, too blue, or too green. The prefect gray. My painter painted it this week and it looks wonderful. I am totally smitten.

Here are some rooms painted in Gray Owl -

Meredith Heron

Emily Henderson

Now the fun can begin.

This week my goals are to 1. get rid of the big old box CRT TV and 2. replace it with a sleek entertainment unit and 3. a flat screen TV. This will make Mr. Chinoiserie Chic very happy.

I love Ikea's Besta Burs TV unit - it is beautiful and cheap and it comes in three colors that would be great - high gloss white, black, and gray. Not sure yet which I will choose. I am off to Ikea today.

Once the TV and cabinet are in place, I plan to make the TV less of a focal point on that wall by creating a gallery wall around it like these, all via Apartment Therapy -

A Cup of Jo

Lonny

Kate Hayes Design

Turquoise

Did you notice that in the first two gallery walls the TV is in front of some of the art? I know artists would consider this sacrilege, but I'm kind of digging it. Part of me thinks it's very cool and part of me thinks it would look like I already had a gallery wall and added a television later in front of it. Still debating.

I have a small gallery wall in my kitchen and another small version in my living room, but this will be my first large scale one with a dozen or more pieces. I love a good gallery wall and am excited to start looking for art for it.

Please go see what progress everyone else made this week.

Chez V

Chinoiserie Chic - that's me