Less is more, more or less...

Ever since I first walked in to our little apartment with 3 suitcases and a small box of books... 

My first thoughts were: 

We really should paint these walls...

And then, gosh we really need some furniture!

And so I chucked white at all the walls, (as you do in Sweden) but I felt as though it really needed something to add a bit of depth and interest. To take some of the attention away from all the white...

Upon seeing that gorgeous ocean blue paint sample, I knew straight away that was the answer!

 

I know that traditionally dark colours can appear to impose which would generally not be a good idea in such a small space. 

But for some reason this particular colour in this space has the opposite effect for me. 

I think it could be because the wall is slightly recessed from the rest of the room, and perhaps it's the particular shade of blue. 

From the corner of your eye it's very unobtrusive and almost falls away...

Needless to say I think it makes a very nice contrast to the bright white! 

As much as I could go on about my blue wall all day. 

It still needed something to break it up, just a bit.

Enter the super snazzy shelving/sideboard unit for... wait for it... only 75kr!!

(plus delivery though, unfortunately we didn't realize in the store that it comes apart in to two pieces which would have made it almost possible to take on the tram, sort of kind of)

 

Oh well, it's even got a little pull out desk thing, unfortunately the key to lock the cupboard got lost somewhere between 5 mins down the road and our place...

It has very conveniently already been painted white, all be it rather roughly, but it's a very good base for when I decide what to do with it sometime in the future.

I've posted this before, but I think it's worth posting again Vamp do amazing things, very inspirational! 

As soon as it was home, (and I had lots of study that I really should have been doing) I spent a good few hours putting things on, and taking things off the shelves!!

My first reaction to this unit was, great now we have somewhere to put the STUFF and THINGS on!

But I soon realized that it was much more pleasing to the eye to take one thing away for every new thing I put on it... like I say less is more, more or less.

Click on the "Read More" to check out my (finally finished) home made lamp shade...
And this time it's not a rice paper ball creation!

See I told you it wasn't a rice paper ball thing ;)

Some of you may remember the feather-boa paper lantern monstrosity I made last time...

Anyway, this time I was inspired by the leafy pattern on the Orla Kiely duvet, with the right kind of plastic stuff, and one template (cut out and repeated 28 times) this was the result!

I made slightly longer pieces for the middle ring and shorter ones for the outside. Et voila!

It's not as huge as it looks in the photo of course... it's quite difficult to photograph just right.

I'll leave you today with a little picture of the little hallway shelf that could.
The bright red makes me happy every time I come home, and the George Jensen leaf bowl makes a wonderful sound when I chuck my keys in to it...

P.S. as a special treat to those of you who've made it all the way through this post:
Here's Zebe with a purple paper crane on her head!