Monday, August 30, 2010

I Only Panic When There's Nothing To Do

Yes, it took nearly the entire month of August to accomplish, but the renovation of our downstairs record room is FINALLY (almost) complete. Rest assured, lots of painting, carpet-pulling, tile-laying, name-calling and tear-shedding ensued. The above photo is the blank canvas, as it was presented two years ago when the house was first purchased.

Here's your first peek from the staircase.

A wider shot. Please note the absence of the room's original carpet and the newly introduced Vinyl Composite Tile. It took five (grueling) days to get the 400 square feet fully covered—adhesive invariably finding its way into any/all available crevice(s). An entire day was also spent applying coats of sealer and finisher to the VCT, until it shone like spun gold! Many thanks to our friend Kevin who was kind enough to help us with getting started, and our numerous subsequent consultations.

The replacement tiles for the drop ceiling are another dramatic improvement. Fortunately, we hadn't brought any of the furniture back in before we attempted to swap out the originals
—a cloud of dirt, dust, fiberglass debris and other misc. nastiness exploding and blanketing the floor upon removal. Good times!


Two more shots of the lounge.

One of the driving forces behind this renovation was our recent procurement of modular Umbo shelving from the early 70s. Our pal Justin, knowing that we were aggressively seeking out any examples, casually mentioned to us that he'd finally seen some in person ...and in the least likely antique store in Atlanta! Somehow, amid all of the candelabras and suits of armor, the store's proprietor had chosen to erect an 8' x 8' monster shelf. He also informed us that he had extra pieces laying in a dank breezeway in the back. After two days and three filled-to-capacity sedan rides later, we had 90+ individual pieces securely placed under lock and key. Needless to say, we are thoroughly convinced that Justin is the absolute best!

The shelves, which were originally used for display in some long-since-forgotten department store, were grimy after years of disuse, so we spent 20+ minutes on each individual piece (36 of 'em pictured), scrubbing the thick ABS plastic in an attempt to resuscitate 'em. We'll eventually get 'em professionally repainted at an auto-body shop, returning 'em to their original albino glory.

Also, plenty of stools're placed nearby to aid Valery in reaching that top tier.

This also represents the merging of our record collections. We're left sitting on nearly 500 duplicate LPs and 45s (not pictured). Plans are currently underway to sell these off next year in anticipation of our honeymoon. A link to the sale(s) will be posted.

Another modular shelving unit—designed by Olaf von Bohr and produced by Kartell—got the deep clean and now houses our furry friends.


Here are the majority of our 45s. We were really pleased when we realized the boxes we settled on fit our built-in shelving so perfectly. One of the few things that worked out without any hassles.

Two Bertoias, a Herman Miller table and a space age umbrella stand manufactured by Artemide flesh out this side of the room. Dig the Drumbos!


Saving the most agonizing part for last (literally), the spiral staircase represents one of the most infuriating aspects of this entire process. It was originally painted a delightful mauve (as seen here), as was the room's trim, and required a thick coating of spray-paint and many (many) touch-up jobs. Did we mention that we forgot to address the staircase until after we'd already painted the walls? Torture. All paint-related kudos are explicitly due to Valery's nimbleness and unerring precision with a brush.

Despite the fact that the room is technically unfinished
we're still working on the staircase (thanks in advance, Kevin!)we successfully welcomed our new addition with local friends (Tim and Christine), a wayfaring Mississippian (Collin) and a couple of errant Canadians (Fen and Jeff). We were very happy to be able to celebrate this massive undertaking with friends and we're truly grateful for all of the help!

22 comments:

MoonDoggie said...

Wow! What an amazing transformation. I'm stunned by the amount of vinyl you possess!
The bold colour choice is very effictive. It looks like an incredibly fun room.

MoonDoggie said...

eek! *effective*
How'd I let that one through?

Devil Dick said...

fancy. i'd be arfraid th even fart in that room...

SUZY8-TRACK said...

Holy Moly! That is some impressive vinyl collection!

Petro B Pettson said...

My brain just melted out through my eye sockets!

erin said...

DIED. AND. GONE. TO. HEAVEN.

Gonked, Glooked and Slurped! said...

Thanks, guys!

Apologies for causing the melted orbitals and sudden death!

Amber Von Felts said...

H'oh boy! I thought my place was like a Stuff Museum...this room takes the cake. Its beautiful, from stem to stern. I especially like the fuzzy fuzz ball guys you have. Can we see more of them? Great job on the transformation!

Gonked, Glooked and Slurped! said...

Thanks for the kind words, Amber!

Those fuzzy wuzzies will be getting an entry in the fairly immediate future. Be on the lookout!

Anonymous said...

It's truly beautiful - would love to peruse the record collection sometime..

PS - If you guys possessed 500 (+!) of the same reocords, it's a good thing you met up...

WHITE JESUS said...

Record room looks great! Congratulations!!!

Devil Dick said...

Travis would approve of your kind hospitality... i still wouldnt fart in there tho'...

Gonked, Glooked and Slurped! said...

Thanks, Corey!! Sorry we got caught up with other things this weekend and didn't have a chance to drop you and Susan a line. We will rectify this situation immediately!

DD, we appreciate your holding it in.

Gonked, Glooked and Slurped! said...

We couldn't agree more, anonymous. It was meant to be!

About flipping thru the records: you can come over and visit, but you'd better bring that Cramps bizniz card if you wanna flip through the good stuff.

Susie O said...

If you two resided in my area, I would either want to be your best friend or vow to be your worst enemy (because you'd get all the good stuff I want).

I am so jealous of all of your little furry friends. I have the one pink disc-go case guy, but I've never had the good fortune to find others. This room is by far the coolest redecorating accomplishment I've seen on any blog (at least that I can remember right now). I am truly jealous. Well done.

By the way, what method did you use to coat the floors? It looks so slick! I used the same tile in my kitchen.

Gonked, Glooked and Slurped! said...

Susie, we're the quiet sort, so we're hopeful that we could coexist peacefully if we lived in close proximity! We're really glad to see other folks who enjoy similar things--especially in the southeast!

Thanks for the kind words about the renovation. We love your house and enjoy seeing the changes you guys have made--keep it up! The lounge really looks fantastic!!

We used four coats of Zep floor sealer (spaced half an hour apart) and four coats of Zep floor finisher (another half hour between coats)to get that slick effect. If possible, look for the "wet look" version of the floor finisher--we couldn't find it, but we're told it's even better.

We're planning on laying VCT in our kitchen, too. We're probably going to end up using white and I'm 99.9% sure that we're going to get it professionally done this time. Way too many nooks and crannies that we do not have the patience for.

Genzilla said...

lookin' good.

moviemag46 said...

Speechless....in the good way :-)

Liina said...

This is the coolest thing I have *ever* seen.

Tre said...

you could use the vintage chemistry set to get those plastic shelves back to white.
http://retr0bright.wikispaces.com/

I have used this process on several vintage plastic pieces.

Anonymous said...

Nice progress and amazing results ! Where did u get the cubes for the vinyl from ? Looks great

Gonked, Glooked and Slurped! said...

Hey Anonymous, it's a modular shelving system produced in the US in the early 70s. It's called Umbo and it's become increasingly rare and expensive over the past few years.