Yikes, this one has been a long time coming! It’s almost time for house tour of our current place but I’m only now getting to our Vancouver house tour. It’s actually been so long that I thought I might not post them at all but I thought what the heck. Not only do I want the photos for memories (because this apartment was my favourite to date) but it might also bring you some spring decor inspiration!
I use my blog as my little online diary so I wanted to make sure I had documented our first place we lived in as a married couple. We only lived in this place for about a year and half after we moved home to Vancouver from the United Kingdom but for me, it really felt like a home. Partly because it was the biggest place we ever lived it (about 1100sq feet, so it felt more like a house versus an apartment) but also because we planned our whole wedding here in this living room, Ken got ready for our wedding day here, my wedding dress hung in our bedroom – as well as many other happy memories in our year and a half here.
When we moved from London to Vancouver, we moved back into my moms place thinking it might take us a month or so to find an apartment we liked. We ended up finding this place within a few days of landing and had moved in shortly after. Since I was starting back at my Nursing job about a month later, I wanted to get us settled and living comfortably before I started again. I had a feeling Ken wouldn’t have us in one spot for very long (boy was I right because we are in France now!) so I knew nothing was going to be permanent furniture. There wasn’t going to be any investing in pieces for this home decor makeover! Since we weren’t sure how long we were going to be living in Canada, I wanted to keep our decor budget to a minimum. I wanted it to feel cozy, warm, stylish – but on a shoe sting budget. The place turned out even better than I could have imaged considering what I spent and how quickly we did it. I’ve always loved using craigslist and vintage shops to fill our home with unique pieces – plus I’m a sucker for a good deal. So after a few weeks of non-stop craigslist e-mails and countless visits to value village – we were all set up and I was back to work.
The best part is, when we did end up moving to France in December – I put it all back up on craigslist and actually MADE money on many things I sold. For example, our gold bed frame I got for free on craigslist and I ended up selling it for $150 – a ton of people wanted it! I think I could be a good thrift flipper one day! Haha
Let’s take a walk through our home! Starting in the living room…
This apartment had the BEST light. It made photography and recording videos such a dream. I did end up adding the inexpensive Ikea curtains just because I love the layered and textured feel they add to the room. I also really love the black rod against the white walls – it helps draw the eye up and showcases how high the ceilings were.
We added tons of cozy seating to the living room and loved hosting company around our coffee table. We had several groups over for wine and cheese and filled the table with all sorts of snacks and nibbles. The couch and chaise were from Ikea and the Green chair in the corner was a thrift find.
Adding this gallery wall of our engagement shoot (by Christine Peinaar) was something I had been excited to do since we got our pictures back from Christine. We hadn’t been able to do it until we landed in this apartment because we had been hopping around way too much. I kept them all black and white so they would stay in tune with the neutral look of the room – it keep it looking much more stream lined. I put two of them in the gold frames to add a little variety to the wall. I was clearing going through a gold phase when we were in this apartment – you’ll see it in almost every room 🙂
Real life over here – remotes out on the coffee table. I bought the marble/wood box to house those kinds of things but honestly, they never really made it into the box. I ended up as a catch all and the remotes lived on the coffee table top 🙂
Ah, I love this shot. I absolutely loved coming home to this cozy room. After work I would wander in, drop my shoes at the door, make my way around the corner to the right into the kitchen, unpack my lunch and then make my way to the big comfy couch. Ken often fell asleep on the lounger and I got the couch. It was as big a single bed so it wasn’t hard to fall asleep on 🙂
Can you tell I let Ken add a few of his own favourites to the decor here? He’s a big baseball nut so that was his input. He also added a box of scotch to the top of the bookcase at some point. Not my choice for decor, but the rest of the place was all done by me so I figured I’d give him some free run.
I LOVED our bed frame. I still can’t believe I got it for free!!! I wish I could have kept it but we just have no idea when or if we will make it back to Vancouver anytime soon. I know one day when we have a home, I’ll love shopping for home decor all over again so I was fine parting with it. Especially because it made me a little pocket money in the end when I sold it 🙂
Ken’s bedside table often ended up as a catch all for things that came out of his pockets at the end of the day. Luckily, our bedside tables (also a thrift find) had drawers in them so I would simply open up the drawer and scoop everything in the drawer. The drawer was a mess but at least I couldn’t see it 🙂
He kept his corsage from our wedding on his table too 🙂 Now it lives at my moms house in our memory box.
I another favourite spot. This little cubby in the hallway. We kept our keys and coins in the little door and opted to keep the vintage letter front and centre. The letter was addressed to a previous tenant and was from about 1950! It was found stuck in the back of a drawer when she moved out but the landlord chose to keep and frame it. I loved it 🙂 I hope the current tenants still have it in that spot.
The most expensive hand soap I’ve ever bought but I loved it! Ken does too. Plus it just looks so cool – haha! I feel like it adds SO much style to a bathroom.
The persian carpet was also thrifted – I paid $10 for it. I wasn’t originally going to put it in the bathroom but I loved the way it looked in an all white bathroom with the marble tiles. Plus it keeps your toes warm as you brush your teeth!
The dinning rooms was one of the last places I started to work on. It was never totally finished because Ken started to apply to schools in France, so I had a feeling we would be on our way before we knew it. I kind of lost interest and stopped playing with it. I really loved our dinning room table and the teak chairs (which we ended up keeping) but the gallery wall was never right. It kind of drove me nuts, actually! Haha. The bar cart was another favourite – I always had people commenting on it – it was from Walmart! What a steal!
If you are familiar with heritage homes, you would know that generally the kitchens are TINY! It was tucked away in the back of the apartment and could barely hold two people in it 🙂 We often made dinner in here together and frequently bumped into one another. We aren’t big people so that tells you just how tiny it really was. It also had an apartment size fridge that didn’t fully open because the door hit the oven! It was small, but it did the trick 🙂
I did end up buying this gold handles and replacing the simple plastic white ones they had in there just to elevate and personalize the space a little bit 🙂 It was a very inexpensive way to add a little (non permanent!) style to a kitchen.
That’s it! It’s kind of difficult to give a full tour of a space in pictures so I did a whole video on our apartment as well.
You can watch it HERE or click the video below – and make sure to subscribe HERE! I have a new video going up every weekend! Usually on a Saturday – SUBSCRIBE to make sure you don’t miss them 🙂
I would love to know what you think about the post! Love or hate it!? I promise I won’t be offended!
Leave me a comment down below 🙂
Xo, Andrea