I've recently moved from London to LA with my husband and our cat, plus a handful of boxes and zero furniture. We're slowly kitting-out our new place in Santa Monica from scratch and trying to minimize the trips to IKEA and maximise the interesting stuff we have in our home. We didn't bring any of our furniture with us quite simply because we didn't really love any of it enough to pay for the privilege!
Whilst starting over is fun to a certain extent, its still very hard work, time consuming and expensive! My natural instinct is to furnish the place as quickly as possible but I don't want to compromise on quality or style 'just to get it done' because we're going to have to live with it every day. I have the luxury of not working right now too so I'm trying to slow down and take the time to make good choices rather than disposable ones and try to reuse, recycle and re-purpose where I can too. I guess I was also thinking that if we're going to be going home in a few years, I don't want to have to start all over again, AGAIN! I want to have start having stuff we love and stuff that won't disintegrate as soon as it's moved - Stuff we will want to ship back because we love it and want to have with us wherever we live in the future.
I also want to live somewhere that welcomes me home every day (who doesn't??) and at the age of 31 its about time that I started to try and make that happen.
So, the basic rule of thumb for getting stuff for our new home is that if it's free or very cheap and can be transformed into something I can live with for a few years then its good. If it's quite cheap and can be transformed into something I can love for a long time then it's awesome. If it's a bit more expensive but well made and/or can be updated, cleaned up and loved then that's pretty awesome too. Recycled is better than brand new - charity is a good place to start and Craig's list is my new best friend. We can't do anything too drastic to the decor as it's a rental so the carpets, walls and ceiling have to stay as they are so anything interesting is also has to be removable.
So, whilst my husband is working hard, I'm trying to use my short span of job-free time to be creative and thrifty all at the same time and this blog is all about my attempts - successful or otherwise! I hope you enjoy x
