Buying tat for the house
In all the excitement of renovating a house, one's thoughts often turn to the 'final look'.
Clara and I have spent many hours looking through books and online at traditional french interiors and have happily agreed (This time) on what vibe our house should have.
To achieve said vibe, we have been purchasing various bits and pieces and the main source for this 'tat' has been the wonderful leboncoin.fr website.
With the wonder that is Google Translate and Maps, we've been able to plan our French sourced purchases either on-route to or from the house and the vendors have been very patient in keeping the items until our next trip. We've also discovered the joy of writing cheques the french way.
We've also sourced some nice pieces from home in the UK, eBay and will even up-cycle some of the original materials from the house.
As a keen fan of photography, I bought this coin (via eBay) and thought it would look great in black and white - a friend of mine kindly snapped it with his macro lens:
... I think the french should add the word 'bureaucracy' to the saying though.
I've also purchased some old french banknotes (Similar to the one below) that will look great when framed.
We also discovered the wonder of old iron stoves. We've purchased two for decorative purposes from the leboncoin.fr website:
... They scrub up nicely too (The top one is for the UK) and our latest addition is below.
When we had the windows replaced with authentic white uPVC ones, we were able to save three of the old window shutters.
These will be cleaned and hinged together to make a screen.
I also bought this lovely letter box from a market in Brighton for Clara's birthday:
... It's too nice to have outside, so will no doubt be used as a key locker or similar.
We've also picked up two Bateaux beds similar to this one...
... One of them only cost 10 euros! Although, by the time the house is finished, the boys will be too big to fit in them.
A colleague of mine who's from France had this old radio at her parent's house. I couldn't resist!
It's so ugly, it's beautiful (The radio, not my colleague).
And our awful side door will be replaced by this oak beauty...
... I'll get some Oxalic acid on it to clean it up, then apply three coats of yacht varnish to keep the weather out.
Our pride and joy though is this beast of a bureau. It's a bit of a monster...
... Once cleaned up it will be fab.
So that's it for now, but we're always on the lookout for interesting pieces and we haven't even started on the vide-greniers yet.
Until next time... Happy Hunting!
Clara and I have spent many hours looking through books and online at traditional french interiors and have happily agreed (This time) on what vibe our house should have.
To achieve said vibe, we have been purchasing various bits and pieces and the main source for this 'tat' has been the wonderful leboncoin.fr website.
With the wonder that is Google Translate and Maps, we've been able to plan our French sourced purchases either on-route to or from the house and the vendors have been very patient in keeping the items until our next trip. We've also discovered the joy of writing cheques the french way.
We've also sourced some nice pieces from home in the UK, eBay and will even up-cycle some of the original materials from the house.
As a keen fan of photography, I bought this coin (via eBay) and thought it would look great in black and white - a friend of mine kindly snapped it with his macro lens:
... I think the french should add the word 'bureaucracy' to the saying though.
I've also purchased some old french banknotes (Similar to the one below) that will look great when framed.
We also discovered the wonder of old iron stoves. We've purchased two for decorative purposes from the leboncoin.fr website:
... They scrub up nicely too (The top one is for the UK) and our latest addition is below.
When we had the windows replaced with authentic white uPVC ones, we were able to save three of the old window shutters.
These will be cleaned and hinged together to make a screen.
I also bought this lovely letter box from a market in Brighton for Clara's birthday:
... It's too nice to have outside, so will no doubt be used as a key locker or similar.
We've also picked up two Bateaux beds similar to this one...
... One of them only cost 10 euros! Although, by the time the house is finished, the boys will be too big to fit in them.
A colleague of mine who's from France had this old radio at her parent's house. I couldn't resist!
It's so ugly, it's beautiful (The radio, not my colleague).
And our awful side door will be replaced by this oak beauty...
... I'll get some Oxalic acid on it to clean it up, then apply three coats of yacht varnish to keep the weather out.
Our pride and joy though is this beast of a bureau. It's a bit of a monster...
... Once cleaned up it will be fab.
So that's it for now, but we're always on the lookout for interesting pieces and we haven't even started on the vide-greniers yet.
Until next time... Happy Hunting!
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