We live in an old house; it was built in 1906. I absolutely love most things about living in an historic home -- except the lack of storage. We were particularly challenged in the bathroom because we had a lot to store -- bath linens, toiletries, good hygiene essentials, first aid & medicines, and a small assortment of odd, but necessary, things -- and no where to put it. We ended up purchasing a small cabinet from Crate and Barrel (it looks like the picture shown above except a little taller and with sliding doors). I envisioned the cabinet looking like a Pottery Barn display, with linens folded neatly, lots of decorative pewter and glass holders for everything from cotton balls to Q-tips, and nice natural fiber storage baskets to hold anything else that was private or without a proper place. And, honestly, this was
exactly how it looked for the first year. After that, the only thing on display, to my embarrassment, was the dust and grime and disorganization from everyday living. I started looking for an antique cabinet/hutch on Craig's list that could be repurposed for bathroom function. Ultimately, I didn't find what I was looking for but it ended up being okay because I really did like our old cabinet, which was still in perfectly good shape both aesthetically and structurally. But I still needed to find a way to make my stuff less exposed. In the photo below you can see how I addressed the problem. First, I bought two kinds of paper that I liked from
ArtMart - an old map print and a faux bois print - decided between the two and took the doors off. Then, with outdoor grade Mod Podge, because of the humidity of a bathroom, I glued the paper on the glass. Voila! I love the results and am so glad that I decided to improve the cabinet like this. In case you're wondering about cost and time, I spent about an hour and a half in ArtMart (this was both in the selecting of the paper and shopping in general), spent about $45 for 9 sheets of paper and the Mod Podge, and invested maybe an hour applying/drying/reapplying three coats of Mod Podge. Not too shabby, eh?
Zoo snow posing. 
Interesting feather find. 
Camel loves this weather!
Where are all the people? At home! 
Maybe she'll become a zoo vet! 
We live in an old house; it was built in 1906. I absolutely love most things about living in an historic home -- except the lack of storage. We were particularly challenged in the bathroom because we had a lot to store -- bath linens, toiletries, good hygiene essentials, first aid & medicines, and a small assortment of odd, but necessary, things -- and no where to put it. We ended up purchasing a small cabinet from Crate and Barrel (it looks like the picture shown above except a little taller and with sliding doors). I envisioned the cabinet looking like a Pottery Barn display, with linens folded neatly, lots of decorative pewter and glass holders for everything from cotton balls to Q-tips, and nice natural fiber storage baskets to hold anything else that was private or without a proper place. And, honestly, this was exactly how it looked for the first year. After that, the only thing on display, to my embarrassment, was the dust and grime and disorganization from everyday living. I started looking for an antique cabinet/hutch on Craig's list that could be repurposed for bathroom function. Ultimately, I didn't find what I was looking for but it ended up being okay because I really did like our old cabinet, which was still in perfectly good shape both aesthetically and structurally. But I still needed to find a way to make my stuff less exposed. In the photo below you can see how I addressed the problem. First, I bought two kinds of paper that I liked from ArtMart - an old map print and a faux bois print - decided between the two and took the doors off. Then, with outdoor grade Mod Podge, because of the humidity of a bathroom, I glued the paper on the glass. Voila! I love the results and am so glad that I decided to improve the cabinet like this. In case you're wondering about cost and time, I spent about an hour and a half in ArtMart (this was both in the selecting of the paper and shopping in general), spent about $45 for 9 sheets of paper and the Mod Podge, and invested maybe an hour applying/drying/reapplying three coats of Mod Podge. Not too shabby, eh? 
