Before + After – Painted Blanket Chest

In the bedroom of today’s woman, it’s absolutely, 100%, no bull crap essential to have a place where you can slump your clothes, sit and zip up your moto boots or rest a stack of clean laundry for a week before you finally get around to putting it away. Double bonus points if said place can also store extra blankets or bulky sweaters that don’t fit in your closet.

Ever since we moved into the smaller bedroom I’ve been searching for the right piece to go at the end of our bed. This toy chest from my childhood bedroom fit perfectly, but it needed a little love to go from 80’s nursery life to grown-ass lady bedroom.

Sometimes, all you need to pull off a good Before + After is a couple coats of paint, for real. All designers will tell you that paint is their best pal – the quickest (and cheapest) route to big time change.

For this project I used two coats of Benjamin Moore’s Midnight – a deep navy with slate gray undertones. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

In natural light, it looks more blue but by lamplight it looks almost black. It’s moody and lovely, just like me.

I’m especially happy with the way it makes the colorful art we hung above it pop.

The top work is a 1980 Mary Engelbreit original of three girls that reads “Koki, Muffie, and Bitsy shop for circle pins.” I love this drawing dearly because “Muffie” is my Mom, “Koki” is Mary – my faerie/art godmother – and “Bitsy” is Nicki Dwyer – my actual Godmother. I love these ladies and I love the cherry red frame Mary chose all those years back. This illustration hung right where I had my timeouts growing up. I wonder if Mom did that on purpose so we had to sit and reflect on how cute she was while we were being punished.

The bottom piece is an original masterpiece by my little sister, Mo, from when she was probably four or five years old – elevated to legit abstract art in an IKEA matte and frame. I adore the colors she chose – she had an eye for style even back then.

Here’s a view from the door of our bedroom:

And here’s a closeup of the dreamy breakfast in bed that I’ve never enjoyed in real life but totally makes the picture feel cozy:

And that, my friends, is all there is to it. Paint saves the day. Now you’ll have to excuse me while I eat that piece of apple cake in two bites.

Loveyoubye! Maggie