Inspiration
For me, this all started with inspiration. My husband and I were in college, living in our first apartment, and had a one year old daughter who I stayed home with. Our home was beige. The walls were beige. The carpet was beige. The air was beige. As a creative, I am highly motivated (or unmotivated) by my environment. Dealing with postpartum depression and my biggest life change yet, I couldn’t help but look around at my beige space and feel the exact same. Who was I again? I surely didn’t feel like an artist. I felt like my old sofa, which was (as you guessed) beige.
The first thing I did was rip off the skirt of that old couch. I noticed it had been attached with staples and thought, “Well, I could do that.” I went on Amazon and used my points to buy a manual stapler. Once it arrived in my lock box across the parking lot, I strapped my tot into her car seat and off to the Hobby Lobby we went. I snagged the most colorful patterned fabric I could find in the clearance remnant section and headed home with the motivation and excitement that had left me many months prior.
I covered my first chair. The seat pad to an antique Renaissance Revival chair I found for $7 at one of the side of the road antique stores I had dragged my husband to in our first couple months of marriage. That was it. I was hooked. Our home was less sad, and I felt less sad.
The early 2010’s are known as being the Pinterest DIY era, and I surely lived up to the stereotype. Shabby chic? Chippy paint? Farmhouse? I’ve Pinterest failed at it all! But every dumb and ugly project made me a little less beige. And every time I gained a new skill, I was a little more “me”.
Now, formally trained and owning my own upholstery business, my why continues to be inspiration. Maybe beige is your thing, it doesn’t have to be sad. I am in this for what makes you feel “you”. Your space isn’t just a reflection of your tastes, it is the environment that houses your motivation. And, darn it, you deserve to look around and feel color, pattern, and movement. So shoot me an email, or better yet, rip the skirt off your sad sofa and be inspired to look at life a bit differently.
-Leah
