Black Beauty

Welcome to the first post of 2015! It is so hard to believe another year has flown by. I hope everyone's year is off to a great start. 
I know mine is! 

This post should have been written last year, but I finally got around to hanging the shelves, so again, I didn't get around to showing off this project until now. Maybe this should be a New Years Resolution- just get it done! 

Honestly, this bathroom was pretty low on the priority list, but once it got finished, it was really nice to have two full bathrooms. After some fixing up, it had a working sink and toilet, so for the longest time, it was just our other half bath. When we bought the house, it came with a brand new shower that had never gotten installed, and with all the other renovations we had going on around the house, the shower sat in the box  for a very long time. 

Before- The crack in the foundation had to get fixed before we did anything. Check out how we did it.

During the bathroom renovation.

After fixing things like the crack in the foundation, and tsome plumbing issues, we got the bathroom done. 
Not just half done. Really done. 

Even though it is a small bathroom, I really wanted to experiment with painting it black. To add some juxtaposition to it, I added white wainscoting to create balance. You just can't go wrong with black and white! I even painted the ceiling black, and I love how the room feels. 

After- Walls painted in Benjamin Moore Onyx and trim painted in Benjamin Moore Calm

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Besides painting a small bathroom such a dark colour, the next craziest thing we did was salvage the hideous wall paneling that was in our basement. After a coat of primer and then painting it with Benjamin Moore Trim Paint in Calm, the fake wood panels turned into classic wainscoting. I also re-used the old baseboards to top of the wainscoting. This made for a cheap feature in the bathroom!

Reusing this stuff

Turning wood paneling into classic wainscoting

So, when people tell you that you can't paint a small room in a dark colour, you can go right ahead and tell them, 

"I do what I want". 

I love my black, small bathroom, and because I went so bold with this bathroom, 
it's actually become one of my favourite rooms in the house. 

Playing it safe with design can actually keep you from really expressing your true style, so I challenge you to break any design rule you like. I'd love to see your before and afters, and get your opinion on how it turned out for you.
 Do you love what you did?

Happy Rule Breaking! 

xo Jena