Mirror Mirror

I would have LOVED this mirror for our parlor.  Alas my budget doesn't allow for the splurge, even at 50% of the original $500 price tag on this Mirror Image mirror sold on One King's Lane.  As usual its a great source of placed to look for fun decor, if one's budget allows!

Baby Steampunk!

I had a lovely baby shower yesterday with ladies of Fenn's and my family. We had tea at a formal tea house with a wee bit of steampunk mixed in. Our party hostess made this fantastic centerpiece for the event which we are going to add to the decor to the nursery! Its hard to see in the photo but the balloon even has "air vents" and the "weights" are key. (That's our sitting room, not the tea house in the background.)

Ceiling Fan

We were thrilled to find this awesome ceiling fan which is recreated from the nosecone of a WWI Warbird. The fan is made by Craftmade, they make a few other fun airplane inspired fans. We love the propeller blade as the fan! It is so cool that Fenn is almost jealous enough to snag it for his office, except the color scheme won't quite go. I know that this delves a little bit outside of some views of steampunk but we think it will be a fun touch for the room. The nursery is a bit small so having a light and fan combo is a great space saver!

Baby Clothes

As we are shopping for various baby items we are finding it very hard to find baby clothes, toys etc that support the steampunk style we are looking for. We find it almost as hard to find items made in the USA. We like to support local and handmade items when possible. We are also finding we don't fit into the generic baby interest of either sports or baby animals as a key component to baby clothes and decor. One shop from Texas I found that makes luxury baby clothes and bibs is Infintissma. It does seem to offer styles that suit us better, which is really what baby styles are for i think. :) I got a set 50% off from One King's Lane. It kills me to pay so much for items that will be used so hard but other choices the fabrics aren't what i would want against my skin so i don't want it against by baby'es.

Tea Lights

We received a wonderful of tea light holders as a housewarming gift. They are available from Crate and Barrel. (Unfortunately their webpage won't let me link to the photo.) They seem to be made from bike sprockets. They look great in the steampunk theme bonus room we're trying to finish up before the baby come!

Steampunk baby curtains

I also got a swatch of the steampunk aviation fabric generously loaned to me by the fabric creator (see photo on this from May blog). The fabric is $30 a yard and takes 3 weeks to get so if you do buy fabric from Spoonflower makes sure its exactly what you want. The swatch shows the fabric to be even prettier than I expected, the color is more sky blue than teal which is how my screen displays it. Since i will be using the fabric as a shear rather than a heavy curtain I am now just debating on the weight to select for it.

Artwork

I found this fabulous print on etsy by a talented local artist. You can view more of Mike Dutton's art on Etsy. I love the steampunk and fantasy combination. I get a sense of adventure and whimsy from looking at the print. I have this on order and we will need to find the right frame for it. I think it will be a great addition to the room. Now we are debating about whether or not to paint the nursery or leave it tan like most of the rest of the house.

Baby Room items

After an embarrassing long break I am picking back up this blog. We are pushing toward our housewarming party and starting to seriously decorate the nursery so I hope the decorating block i've been suffering from will soon lift! I just ordered these whimsical balloon hooks for the baby's room. I think they will go great with the fabric I want to buy. I've got a swatch of the fabric on the way and then we can move onto paint etc.

Steampunk Baby Room

I saw this fabric on Steampunk Home, a great blog I follow that is like Better Homes and Gardens for Steampunk decor. I loved it but had no reason to purchase it. Well amid our recent move and decorating plans we have been blessed with one more surprise, a baby on the way. This moves up the time table to decorate the spare room into a nursery a lot sooner than expected but I am already taking measurements of the existing curtains to replace them with this adorable fabric!

Dreaming of Versailles

Playing a favorite game of keyword search for whatever is on my mind turned up this incredible series of stencils on Etsy. I am constanly impressed with the range of the skill of artists in Etsy! I wish I the house for am 18th century salon! As it i am scheming to see how I can fit this into my more humble decor! You can find this in the CuttingEdgeStensils shop on Etsy.

Dome backed chair

I am lusting again after Restoration Hardware furniture. If money where no object I would buy a pair of these chairs in a heartbeat! I think this is fantastic example of modern steampunk style sneaking again into the mainstream culture. I have seen photos of this style of chair before and I think it is delightful. I have to say I am surprised to see it mainstream furniture design however given the unusual style of the piece. It reminds me of hot air balloon. In my mind's eye I can see this looking perfect in our Explorer's Club room. Alas for this style of furniture I have as yet to find a reasonable priced alternative. I shall have to just visit the store and admire from afar and I tend to do with their pieces. I will add this to my "someday I will be able to afford" list of furnature.

The Enchantress of Numbers

In honor of Ada Lovelace Day, a day to celebrate women in science, I searched for "Ada" on Etsy. To my delight I found a great buy that I am very exciting about, an Ada Lovelace print by the talented artist who goes by Minouette! (Search for her lovely work on Etsy.) Ada Lovelace has become one of my latest favorite historical lady. I have also noticed that she seems to be an unofficial Steampunk icon. She is the mother of the computer program and daughter of mad, bad, Lord Byron. For those unfamiliar she wrote how to calculate Bernouilli numbers using Mr Babbage's conceptual the analytical engine, which was in concept the worlds first computer. A great summary of her is available on the podcast "Things you Missed in History Class"She is also the subject of my favorite online comic, Lovelace and Babbage. I do love clever humor like that! I'm not sure if this is going to in the house or in my office and work but it was such perfect Steampunk inspired decor that I just couldn't resist.

Through my interest in Ada I have also stumbled across other blogs dedicated to historical women in science. I am very excited to see them emerging in the steampunk movement well beyond a nod to Madame Curie. At last the ladies are starting to come into the light and out of the footnotes for their contributions. Some ladies I want read more about are posted here, the official list of people who blogged for Ada Lovelace day. http://findingada.com/list/ I didn't know about the event until the following day otherwise I would have blogged for Ada as well, it is definitely on my "to do" list for next year! For my personal interest in astronomy I am putting Miss Leavitt toward the top of my reading list.

Timeworks

Just found the PERFECT clock for the bonus room. This is modeled after a turn of the century railroad station clock. Another great buy from One King's Lane. The clock is made by Timeworks who specializes in vintage style clocks. I was also delighted to discover this wonderful line of clocks is actually made locally in Berkeley! I have been a minor personal quest to decorate my house with as many local products as possible so this find was doubly successful to me! (This is not because of political commentary, because I would my hypocritical otherwise as I love French imports, but stems more of a curiosity to determine what kinds of products and quality level of items my country still actually produces vs what we import.)

Tea Dreams

As a tea junkie I have always admired the lovely tea boxes in restaurants. One of my favorite moments after a fine meal is to order tea and get to make a selection out of beautiful box. Sadly of course most of us have no place for such an item in our daily lives. If I got to select such a box for my kitchen this one might well be it, hand made by ScorchedMirth shop on Etsy its just beautiful and really catches the style of fine tea.

Getting there slowly

We have gotten the living room more or less arranged to feel like a home. The furniture looks great with the wall colors. We went with Dutch Boy, Chateau Stone and the ceiling is Wavy Beach. Its a relief to see all of the colors really do go together as we planned. The next big step in here will be the crown molding (but AFTER i get a more functional kitchen). This will really tie the room together. Nothing in this room had to be purchased, its all inherited and definitely gets us toward the steampunk style we want.

Wall Decor

I've seen many articles on the Steampunk House blog that I follow suggesting that one use vintage or reproductions of botanical prints to create a naturalist theme of decor. This is something that we are toying with for our Explorer's club theme room but haven't been able to find prints like that. One Kings Lane has come up with a wonderful collection. We aren't quite at this decorating detail stage but at least now I know where to look!

Breathing free

I am finally back on-line after fighting with my new connection at my new house for weeks and I have missed my blog and my online decorating fix to no end! As part of the home owning experience our new house had a mild smoke smell from the previous owner who smoked only in the finished attached patio, initially we though this would be easily resolved but we soon realized the smell permiated through the ENTIRE house. We have learned that the only way to get rid of smoke is to paint every wall and replace ALL of the carpet, cleaning doesn't cut it. We also learned that smoke residue goes THROUGH primer even when the walls are well washed and it takes several coats of paint and washing to cover it all up. So home buyer beware and if you buy a home of a previous smoker budget to spend the money to make it smoke free!

On the upside the enforced painting and cleaning required us to painstakingly paint the bonus room and we ended up settling on a lovely antique white to seal in the scent. After looking at various design pictures we were inspired us to go for a wonderful burgundy colored carpet. (Which we got at a GREAT deal since no one apparently wants this color.) Once we added our cherry bookshelves we are well on our way to our Steampunk Explorer's club themed living room in our now smoke-free environment. Now onto the decorating!

Lighting

We just bought lighting for the bonus room that we want to make into a steampunk Explorer's club style rec room for our TV and dance floor and whatever else strikes our fancy. We bought the single lamp, the 3 lamp straight section and a 6 lamp adjustable section. This lighting has brass accents with springs and screams steampunk on a budget that we can all afford. We are still painting and carpeting this room but our reward will be hanging this wonderful lighting which will MAKE this room!

More lamps

Here is a fun Etsy find from RizBerry, Etsy is my current shopping obsession. I LOVE these insulators as pendant lamps. Makes me wish I had asked to buy one from former owners of my house, who collected these to make my own. Great idea that is both steampunk and smart recycling.

Steampunk fans and lighting

To my recent delight both shopping and reading other people's blogs is the discover that wether the average person notices or not modern culture is slowly becoming infused with steampunk style. From high end designers to Restoration Hardware and even in Lowes and Target its easy to find steampunk style that with a few personal touches can be made really wonderful looking. This is fan is my current favorite item off the shelf item I've seen during our recent shopping outings. The design reminds me a propeller blade. Add a few accents from the craft store and it could look really amazing at a daily price range. Lowes is full of other great lighting and fan options at very afforadle prices!

The Bonus room

This is probably the biggest challenge in the house. This is an enclosed and finished patio that the previous owners had set up as a living room. They also had a lot of collectables and the glass shelves were lovingly hand built by the original home owner to display a set of 1960s fancy liqueur bottles, the LARGE ones in all kinds of strange shapes. Unfortunately while well designed the shelves are not good for much other display purpose. We want to use it as a living room and rec room with a Steampunk style explorer's club theme to it. Fenn is a geologist so we have literally shelves of rocks and other specimens to display and are inspired by many of the naturalists posts on MySteampunkHouse blog. However we are also avid dancers and have a ballroom dance floor to squeeze in this room as well. So we are looking to liven up the old wall heater, take down the mirrors, sand and paint the walls and see where that gets us.

The living room

The front room is the living room and dining room area. This room is 1950s peppermint meltaway green with white door boards and floor boards. We love the accents but with the green exterior this is a bit much. The plan here is to remove the popcorn ceiling, warm the room up with tan paint, add crown molding and wainscotting to bring the room back a few decades. The previous owners left us brass lamps and light switch covers that are in the plan to bring in the steam touches. Our living room furniture is all victorian antiques so it should all tie together, we hope.

The Starting Point

Our ideal house to steampunk out would have been a true craftsman but in the San Franciso bay area those are hard to find in a location a) we could afford, b) wasn't a terrible commute or c) wasn't run down beyond our price range ability to fix up. Although we searched for months with the challenges of modern home loans we did not find this dreamed of starting point. What we did find was a 1951 house with some updates from loving owners and nice expansion in a great location with wonderful views from every window. We fell in love with this house the moment we toured it, it just felt like home. So we jumped on this opportunity to buy it. Our decorating desires now is to bring this house into steampunk style.

Inspiration comes in strange places

Where did our quest begin? Oddly enough it began in Disneyland in the new house of tomorrow now called the "Innovention House". This is to me the steampunk dream house. This ideal home is a fantastic mixture of arts and crafts style decor and wood accents with huge flat screen displays as changing artwork in each room. This home has beautiful technology in every room including automatic computer controlled window coverings, fireplace, stereo, model train (naturally, it IS Disneyland) and even an ASIMO home helper robot. It would take a Disney budget to make this home a reality for us working folks but the concepts are fantastic and got us started dreaming. Here is the link of you want to see the official webpage but be warned this is a big and rather slow flash site. http://dreamhome.disney.go.com/media/ap/dreamhome/index.html

Dreaming of a Steampunk Home

Where to begin? My husband Fenn, and I, Evie, are two intrepid explorers seeking to create a steampunk home. Our vision of steampunk is form, function and beauty where technology works for us in elegant and wonderful ways. The steampunk ideal teased and flirted with us at a friend's wedding and our vision for the house of tomorrow is borrowed from the house of yesterday with the technology of today. We have been home shopping for months and finally we found a suitable starting point. This was no mean feat in the CA Bay Area even in a recession so here we are with a 1951 CA house, our canvas for our steampunk dreams.