Renters Create Outdoors-Inspired DIY Style in Ground-Floor Apartment Near Navy Yard
When adding design flair to a rental, it can sometimes be tough to overcome the challenges of a home you don’t own. But for Robbie and Dan, the perks of their ground floor apartment vastly outweighed the constraints of renting. The home’s working marble fireplace, original wide plank floors, moldings, and open backyard proved the…
When adding design flair to a rental, it can sometimes be tough to overcome the challenges of a home you don’t own. But for Robbie and Dan, the perks of their ground floor apartment vastly outweighed the constraints of renting.
The home’s working marble fireplace, original wide plank floors, moldings, and open backyard proved the perfect setting to combine the couple’s rustic and beachy styles.
The pair admit to thinking that their design tastes would clash when they moved in together two years ago, according to a feature on the home in Apartment Therapy.
Dan cites summers spend in a woodsy Michigan cabin as a key influence on his favored home style. Robbie’s tastes lean more toward the bohemian and beachy, with a dash of West Coast modernism.
The rustic and laid back design elements still manage to work together with the architecture of the 19th-century building — a house built by a Navy Yard shipbuilder around 1850. The result is an eclectic but clean interior as character-filled as the duo who live there.
The apartment entrance opens into the eat-in kitchen in the heart of the home — the living room is in the front and the bedroom and bath at the back. Robbie and Dan bought the kitchen table on Etsy — their biggest joint expense when outfitting the apartment.
A blue-painted hallway gallery wall adds visual interest and the opportunity to display new art projects and flea market finds. The bench was handmade by Dan from reclaimed barn wood and pipes.
Notice the wide plank floors, wood-burning fireplace and original built-in shelves. It’s details like these that first drew Dan and Robbie to the apartment.
In the bedroom, a vibrant blue tie-dye bedspread draws the eye. A stump on Dan’s side of the bed serves as a rustic bedside table.
A door in the rear of the apartment opens onto the large backyard. A fire pit and wisteria-covered pergola with a built-in grill are big draws for summer entertaining.
[Source: Apartment Therapy | Photos by Lauren Kolyn]
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Bill Deblasshole and his henchmen will be around any minute now to put out that fire and get rid of that fire pit!
LOL
There goes Randolph again…As I have advised you please stop bringing down the BROWNSTONER space with your NEGATIVITY! This is a lovely space. They have impeccable taste. What I would want you to do is invite you to your home so we can take photos are critique it. CLICHE? You mean standard decorating practices of adding ARTWORK to your space to enrich it. Please stop being MR. NEGATIVE OF BROWNSTONER. You were the first one to post and the only SAD thing you said was that…STOP IT! Apply for a job as Mr. Positive and I hope BROWNSTONER has created a fake account to get people “talking” if so, your randolph CHARACTER is INTOLERABLE.
It’s funny cos it’s true.
Finally! Another person on earth who’s over the whole mid-century thing.
Putting money in a rental makes total sense – to a point. Let’s look at the economics: say hypothetically your are paying $2000 a month. With some improvements you can make it look like an apartment that would rent for $2500 but you are still only paying $2000. After a year you are $6000 ahead.
Having said that I agree, major work like a bathroom should be left to the owners. But a coat of paint, some extra trimmings and good furniture is well worth it.
If you aren’t able to discern between putting your belongings in a box and leaving behind a new kitchen you renovated when it comes time to move, then please come and rent from me. I’ll buy a dump let you renovate it and then politely ask you to leave once you’re done.
coolstorybro
“years ago”
read DECADES