Behind the Scenes– #FabulousBS

As you may have noticed over the past few weeks, the blog has been transitioning from being my personal online journal to being our official business blog.  That being said, we didn’t want to eliminate the personal journal type of posts.  So we decided it would be fun to start a ‘behind the scenes’ series, which we have cleverly dubbed ‘Fabulous BS’.   

For the first instalment, I thought we’d give you a glimpse into what our day to day ‘businessing’ looks like.  I think there are some people {husbands} that are still unsure about what we really do when we’re ‘at work’. 

At first, we spent a disproportionate amount of time planning and setting up all of our branding materials.  But it was super fun, and we’re really glad we had it all sorted out before we got too busy to do it!  I should actually devote a whole post to the long story behind our business name… maybe next week.

On an average day, we often meet at our ‘office’ -the Starbucks close to M’s house.  Which I have to say was awesome… until I stopped drinking coffee!!!  Seriously.  Who does that.  Stops drinking coffee.  Not drinking coffee really sucks.  Ordering tea at Starbucks is just not the same.  But enough about that.    

We have a favourite table tucked in a corner by the window where we can spread out our computers, sketch pads etc.  

 

Now that we have a full list of clients we do a lot of sourcing / shopping.  We’re getting to know the local suppliers for lighting, flooring, countertops, furniture, etc… but that deserves a whole post on its own.  Lots of stories about that.  We make sure we know what kinds of treasures are at stores like Homesense too:

So far, my favourite part of the job is the client meetings where we present ‘the plan’.  A ton of client interaction happens before this point to work out likes/dislikes/wants/needs for each project.  It’s really fun to lay out all of the pieces and see how it works together!

   

Once plans areapproved and work starts happening, we enjoy popping in to see the fabulousness in progress!  This bathroom turned out amazing!  Before/afters coming soon!

That pretty much sums up our ‘work days’.   We have a lot of fun… it really doesn’t seem like work!  Oh yeah… we also spend way more time than we should trying to get the right angle on our instagram selfies to avoid double chins.

Check out #fabulousBS on instagram to keep up on our day to day adventures!

#saskmomfabkitchen: Week 3

When we first started ‘businessing’ we were advised to be careful about designing for friends. What if they hated it? Would they tell you?  Could this jeopardize your friendship?  So I was a bit nervous when we took on this project for one of my bestest of friends. Especially considering I knew some of the inspiration behind the project, and it was an emotional spot for both of us.

Last week Laura shared her connection with the colour purple and its significance to her life. I too, often find myself drawn to the colour purple and thinking of Laura’s little angel.  We were bump buddies, we had all the same doctors and my baby was born only 10 short weeks after Ava Faith.  Laura was there for me even then.  While I was in the delivery room, she was keeping my first born company in the waiting room.  I too needed to honor this baby girl.

Back to the project…  Thanks to Pantone making purple a designer’s favourite this year, it's a lot more popular.  However, Carissa and I weren't too sure about how we would incorporate purple into the kitchen.  It’s just not a very traditional colour for that purpose!  With help of CAD rendering we were able to visualize it, and we must admit that without the rendering, we were shooting in the dark a bit!  Check out the video to see how the rendering convinced us:

 

Here’s the mood board that we presented to Laura:

Along with the mood board, we brought samples of everything over to Laura’s house to look at in person, and ‘try on’ in the space.  The most interesting turn of events was the backsplash selection.  Each one of us had our own fave (I was leaning towards the 1” square mosaic and Carissa was rooting for her signature subway tile), but Laura surprised us by gravitating towards the pencil stripe!  Laura was so sure; she just grabbed it and said that’s it!!!  So cool when that happens!

The Capiz chandys were a no brainer. We held the other option up for peace of mind, but bleah, not even a contender. Capiz it was! Everyone agreed! No questions asked.

We had a little debate about the island chalkboard. Paint would be cheap and easy, but Laura, as considerate as she is, thought that it might have been too permanent of a feature. What if she got tired of it?  What if they moved and the new owners didn’t like it?  (Seriously, who thinks like that?)  My generous friend does… #lifelessons.  No problem! These wall decals are completely removable! Score!

The new faucet was also approved by all! So nice to find good deals like that!

So all of the selections are finalized, and Laura has her source list and design plan.  I have to say that this project turned out even better than I thought it would. I love the feeling of handing over a “Fabulous Design File” to a client and seeing the smile of empowerment that we helped create (#bestjobever). But I have to say that seeing that on my friend, it just made my day. Not only she was griming from ear to ear during our visit, but I also kept getting the cutest texts saying how much she loved it, how much her hubby loved, and all their plans for implementation!

This post concludes the #saskmomfabkitchen project from our end. Stay tuned for the DIY extravaganza on Saskmom.com and our shared hashtag on Instagram #saskmomfabkitchen. We will still show the final result, of course… as per Laura’s schedule, it should be concluded sometime this Spring! My hope is that by the time Lilacs are fragrantly blooming outside, we’ll come style this beautiful kitchen and have a toast in honour of an angel whose tiny footprints still find a way to touch our hearts.

>>> Posted by Marilena <<<

#saskmomfabkitchen–Week 2

A lot happened this week on the project #saskmomfabkitchen so this one will be a doozy!  Grab a coffee and read on.

The first step in our design process was to take the ideas from the initial meeting with Laura, and sort out the design priorities with the wish list and budget in mind.  We had to be very thoughtful about which kitchen finishes we could tackle that would make a huge impact with a modest price tag.  Here’s what we came up with:
- backsplash (Colourful, modern, fun)
- paint (She has a preference for purple... Can we make it work?)
- new pendants (Something with some sparkle… Maybe a chandy effect?!?)
- new faucet (Technically not on the wish list… but we thought that they needed a more stylish one!)
- dress up the island with some chalkboard (Fun for the whole family)

With started out by scouring Pintrest for inspiration:

* See the full Pinterest board here.

With our inspiration shots in mind, we headed out on a little sourcing excursion. 

<<< Trade secret alert!  >>> If you are working with a tight budget or timeline, shop your big box home improvement stores.  The selection of stylish items at great prices might really surprise you.  We have found that the big box stores have really kicked it up a notch over the last couple of years.  Plus, you can take items home, try them out, and easily return them if they don’t work out.  Here are some of the items we scoped out for Laura:

Backsplash:
We found several options, and since it's a relatively small area, we can splurge with some fun mosaics! But we also grabbed simple subway tiles, thinking we could maybe work in our favourite herringbone pattern?  And we couldn’t resist the penny rounds.

On to Lighting.  We felt like we could tackle it two ways:
- Simply swap out the frosted glass shades on the current pendants to something more modern as such stainless steel.  This is the ‘cheap + cheerful’ solution.
Or
- Bling it up with some fab (but inexpensive!) capiz shell chandeliers.  I bet you can guess what our preferred choice is!

Faucet:
To the sales adds we went… and found this brushed nickel one, it goes with their kitchen hardware and has the look we were after for 100 bucks. Score!

Island chalkboard:
The simplest and cheapest solution would be chalkboard paint. However we found these decals that might just fit the bill!

Stay tuned for next update, when plans are unveiled to our lovely client!

>>> Posted by Marilena <<<

Project #saskmomfabkitchen

We are super excited to introduce one of our newest projects.  We are collaborating with Laura of saskmom.com, and this will be post 1 in a series that goes into all of the behind the scenes details of her kitchen makeover.  First, I need to tell you a bit of background on how this project came about.
Laura is a dear dear friend, my very first friend I made when I moved to Canada (even though she’s from Oklahoma). We met on cyberspace through her awesome blog saskmom.com.  I stalked followed her even before I moved here!  If you live in Saskatoon and have kids you probably have heard about saskmom.com… if not you must check it out! It’s fabulous!
Laura and her family live in a cute infill in a very hip neighbourhood.  As nice as their house is, it still lacks those personal touches, which has always bothered my very cool, bright eyed, colourful friend.  She intended to imprint more of her personality onto this builder grade home, however life kept getting in her way (doesn’t it always).
Part of the challenge is that her lovely husband, probably just like most husbands, is perfectly fine with things the way they are, because seriously, it looks just fine. He cannot justify spending loads of money replacing something that is good to begin with.  So… he has given us a budget of $500, and is willing to tackle any reno work himself.  Awesome!  We like challenges! That made us even more excited for this project! Here’s our blank canvas…


Here is Laura’s wish list for her space:
- Add colour (maybe purples or greens?)
- New lighting above the island (her very tall hubby keeps bonking his head!)
- Backsplash

And just for kicks, the cute little helpers:


P.S. Laura will be blogging about her project too, so you can look for updates on her blog as well.
P.P.S. Follow along on instagram for more behind the scenes fun… #saskmomfabkitchen
Posted by Marilena