The Airbnb
We have spent most of the last few weeks getting the Airbnb up and running. It took us more time than we thought. Mostly because we had all sorts of other things going on. But it has been fun, when it wasn’t exhausting. I already talked about the flooring, which was definitely the bulk of the work. In addition to the flooring, there is also the shoe molding, which is important, but is a lot of fiddly cuts that takes longer than you think it will. Our mantra is the rules of 3: Fast, Good or Cheap. You can’t have all three. So we are trying to do a quality job while being cheap, meaning we are doing it ourselves, so it is NOT fast. I think it has turned out pretty good if I do say myself.
Nick was in charge of the shoe molding, and my job was furniture. We started with what we already had, which included the sleeper sectional and dining room table. We had a couple of side tables, but really needed to get all of the rest of the furniture. So I went to the Restore A LOT. I can’t say enough what a great resource the Restore has been over the years. But for this space, I actually found most of the pieces at other places. I did get some lamps and the cute dresser for one of the bedrooms, but pulled on other resources for most of the space.
The main space includes a dining room and living room. As I said before, we already had a sleeper sofa and a dining table. I got free chairs off of Facebook market space for the dining room, I got a cute book shelf for free too. I also got the mustard chair off of Facebook Market place for only $15, and they were located just down the street. They were moving, so I also got a sofa table for $10. Quite a score. The last big Facebook Marketplace score was the fireplace. I painted it with leftover trim paint. It works too! It provides a little heat and ambience.
I got the china cabinet at The Salvation Army for only $30. It needed a little work, and I am still on the hunt for replacement knobs. Restore has not been providing, what are the good architectural salvage places in Milwaukee? The tree was from another small thrfit store, only $5.
The green chair is from my cousin. She has given us a lot of great pieces, including my great grandmother’s dressers. I was going to use them in the Airbnb, but am thinking they will go in our room instead. I bought the pillows online, they match my theme.
So the main esthetic is definitely vintage. I wanted to play off of the age of the building, and I just love vintage furniture and antiques. I have had so much fun decorating the space. We spent a night sourcing art from our extensive collection. Nick was then forced to set up his workshop so he could frame some pieces. So this added to the time frame, but was so neccesary. It is amazing how much stuff we have, and what a mess it has been. It feels good to get things in order.
There are two bedrooms, the bird room and the squirrel room. I have been collecting bird and squirrel art for years, but the idea really came from these cast iron hooks I got. I had the bird one in our bedroom at the old house, but just found the squirrel hook at an antique shop.
The bird room is the more girly room. The art is a mix of art I got from my dad, purchased at an estate sale, and had in storage. I used one of the antique desks that came with the school as one of the nightstands, the other table was ours, and the chair was a Restore purchase. The comforter and bed are from IKEA, the throw blanket is vintage and the pillows are from our old room. The headboard was painted when we painted Juniper’s dresser. It is from Juniper’s old room, it used to be yellow, but had been dyed blue because of Juniper’s blue hair at the time:)
The squirrel room is a bit smaller, so I found a small dresser from the Restore. I might paint it, but I don’t mind the dings, it gives it personality. Most of the art we had collected through the years. My friend Elysia made the wall hanging for us years ago. It has been up in many spaces, the colors are great. One of my big conundrums with this room is the window placement. Since it was not centered over the bed, I decided to put up the wall shelf, to add balance.
The kitchen is red. There wasn’t much we could do about that besides paint it, and that is no easy feat with 12 foot ceilings, plus painting over red is a nightmare. So I decided to lean into the red and go with a circus theme. We already had a great circus print, and then my dad donated some clowns and carousels. I then found some more pieces at some antique stores and flea markets. There are lots of fun circus items to find in Wisconsin, so I am sure I will be adding more. Lastly I added the fun wind up toys that we bought for the kids in Venice. I wish I had bought the acrobat, she would have been perfect in this space!
The bathroom was huge, but didn’t really need much. We put in the kicthen storage unit that we got from my cousin to hold linens, and then added a mirror over the enclosed urinals. Yep, you read that right. The built in cabinet is just covering up the old urinals. And that is where they will stay. Someday we hope to add laundry. I know it is not necessary in a short term rental, but I have definitely used them when traveling, and it is a bonus.
We have this really large hallway in the back that we want to do something fun with. So stay tuned for what we dream up next. But until then, come down and stay with us. Booking is open!
