Guest Bedroom Transformation

The last week and a half have been a whirlwind. I had off from Christmas Eve until today, allowing plenty of time to work on the house. And there is plenty of work to report. In the past week all of Leigh's family to help at one point or another, my mother and father drove in from Detroit to help out for a full week, my coworker helped lay wood floors, and I had contractors at the house for some of the time helping out too. So much work was completed that I can't cover it in one post. This post will document the transformation of the guest bedroom.

To start, you have to understand how horrible the room was when I moved in. The previous owner painted a beautiful mural in the room. My parents came to visit soon after I purchased the house and stayed in this second room. You can tell by the look on my father's face how much he enjoyed the mural.



By the time they left, a single coat of primer applied to hide the evil Medusa mural. It didn't hide it much, but at least Medusa was a bit subdued.





The room stayed this way until the Queen moved in. At that time, we needed a place to store her stuff while we renovated so the guest bedroom was turned into a storage shed.



Notice the cat in the middle of the room. She enjoyed the space just fine as a storage space.



As renovation progressed we've been able to slowly clear out this room. A few months ago I noticed one of the windows was broken. I knew this was a bad sign, as the window is on a 5' unsupported overhang of the house, so I figured this area was settling. When we ripped out the back wall a few weeks ago we discovered we had a bigger problem than I had previously thought. Termites.







In a matter of a few weeks we've come a long way.





Here is a rundown of the work done in the room.

The framing was ripped back to the stud, and the joists and walls sistered to strengthen against the termite damage.

We reframed the closet and around the brick bumpout (which we discovered hiding under some old plaster). I could have drywalled over all the brick, but we liked the bit of exposed brick in the space.

New outlets were installed, and the ceiling fan and ugly light in bedroom were also trashed.

The floor in bumpout was leveled with the rest of the floor. This took time, but it was needed to make sure the hardwood floors would go in properly.

3/8" plywood subfloor was laid upstairs over the existing heart pine floors. The floors were in horrible condition, so refinishing wasn't an option.

The back wall and floor had no insulation, so we insulated the spaces and then drywalled the back wall and closet.

The base trim was removed, and drywall issues were then repaired in the room. This sounds like a minor task, but it was a major issue as the drywall mud/tape job throughout the house was atrocious.

Another three coats of primer were applied to cover the mural, and then two coats of a pale yellow paint was slathered on. The color is Pina Colada by Behr.

Hardwood floors were laid. The floors are a 3/4" Brazilian teak and they look fabulous.

We then hung the west elm pendant light over the bed.

A lot more work was done in the past week, and there is a lot more detailed explanation of the work done, but I'll save that for later. There is still some more work to be done in the room, like completing the trim and finishing the closet, but we are very pleased with the progress.

Thank you so much for everybody's help - words can't express our gratitude.