Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful boy

My client base is pretty diverse, running the gamut from singletons to young families to a set of grandparents. But last week I finished a project that turned out to be a Retrograde first: a nursery for a baby boy.

The deadline got moved up because, well, we wanted to finish before the baby was born. (In fact, he's due any day now!) My client and her husband had just renovated their basement into a kicka** master suite and wanted to turn their old bedroom into the nursery for their son. (Yes, they knew ahead of time that they were getting a boy ;-)

What made these clients interesting was how in tune they were with my own style. The mom-to-be frequents the same thrift stores and antique shops around the Mission as religiously as I do. They shared my attitude about reusing and upcycling materials, turning them into great custom pieces. Needless to say, this made my work really easy, since the mom-to-be had done so much work already. I felt like I came to this project as a consultant or sounding board, giving her another opinion or verifying the great decisions she had already made.

Taking the fabrics and pieces she had already acquired, I worked up a treatment for the nursery, including some different floor plans:

In the end, some of the placement of furniture changed for the better (or the more practical.) She also decided against using her vintage Saarinen tulip side table in the nursery (wise decision--this will turn into a rambunctious toddler's room soon enough!) She also enlisted the help of her incredibly skilled mother to make custom pillows, a daybed cover, and to paint the vintage dresser into a great changing table.

I wish all my clients had mothers like that!

I brought over a few finishing pieces (including the homemade Keith Haring "Night Owl" nightlight, which I gave them as a gift) and took some photos.

Here are the before-and-afters showing the transformation from master bedroom to nursery:

  (Before - with fabrics and crib tucked in a corner)

  (After - a daybed for lounging or nursing)

Yes, there's a lot of blue in there, but I was really glad to see my client wasn't afraid of getting other colors in there too, like orange and green. With the daybed and vintage dresser in place, it could easily be turned into a guest room or a sitting room if the baby ends up in another part of the house.

I'm just glad I got to take a few pictures before the little guy's arrival! Here's a little video dedicated to him and his awesome family: