River House Diary

It was a long wait for the window treatment for the hall bath as the material was a real splurge. It's hand printed from Galbraith & Paul -- the Lotus pattern in an Aqua colorway. We had them made to open top down as the neighbor's house is quite close. Hall bath window treatment; personal collection

We purchased this signed and numbered print from a gallery in the historic district of New Bern while we were still living in New York. We finally got it framed and I love how it turned out. The frame with the weathered white and silver gilt splotches reminds me of oyster shells. How perfect! It now hangs in our powder room, or half bath. Aww Shucks! in the half bath; personal collection

Not everything goes according to plan at River House. Yesterday the Kenneth James Juan Chan grasscloth wallpaper began falling off the walls in the half bath. Thankfully, the installer is coming this afternoon to repair it. But we are very curious as to why several piece decided to let go at the same time. Falling wallpaper; personal collection

We have seven windows in our bedroom, two in our bathroom and one in our closet. The window treatments in the bedroom will eventually be layered woven wood shades and drapes. However, we didn't get the drapery at this time -- just the shades. They are from Horizons Window Fashions; the pattern is Tranquility and the color is Peca n. We got these as full black-out shades. Master bedroom shades; personal collection In the bathroom, we had full blackout shades made that can open from the top of the window or the bottom. This allows us to get maximum light into the room and still have privacy. They were made from Norbar Fabrics Bellamy Cotton 1 . Zuniga Interiors specified off-white shades. I was tempted to have them match the bedroom drapery fabric, but since we are not getting those drapes anytime soon, I chose to play it safe and go with a solid fabric for the bathroom Master bathroom window treatments; personal collection The window in the closet is high on the wal...

I thought it would be a long time before we hung any art in the house. Pete hates hanging groupings more than he hates Ohio State University. (He’s a University of Michigan alumni.) But we’ve been in our attic for two days unpacking and cleaning all our artwork, which we haven’t seen for three years as we moved none of it to New York. We first had to decide if the art would work in our new house or if it needed to go. Several hard decisions later, we began thinking about where to hang individual pieces. An easy decision was the female nude by Raphael Soyer. It’s an unusual work for him as the painter and printmaker was known as one of the most important American scene painters. His detailed works of people and places in New York City are very well known. Our Soyer piece is much more intimate than his usual work. And because it is so intimate and we are living in the Bible Belt, we chose to hang it in our bathroom. Soyer lithograph in the toilet closet; personal collection T...

Today I ironed and hung shower curtains in Bath 2, or our guest bath, and the bathroom upstairs. I continued to work on Bath 2, lining the drawers and shelves in the vanity and filling the etagere with bath accessories and supplies that may be needed by guests. Bath 2 vanity; personal collection Michael Aram Ocean Reef shower curtain in Seafoam; personal collection Etagere of bath accessories and supplies; personal collection This bathroom has a pocket door between the tub/shower and toilet and the vanity, which offers some additional privacy but makes the room feel somewhat smaller than it is.

We walked-through the the house earlier today with Andy and Jane and created a punch list of small items that need to be finished or corrected. Overall, we are extremely pleased with how the house turned out. Master bath; personal collection

We ordered two ceiling lights for Bath 2 from Home Depot. They were from the Home Decorators Collection, a company that makes designer knock-off home goods. The quality of their products was always hit or miss but I assumed that would improve after Home Depot bought the company. I was wrong. Bath 2 ceiling lights; courtesy of Home Depot When the electricians unboxed the 13" 4-Light Semi-Flush Mount with Crystal Ball Shade  lights, they discovered about half of the crystal ball mounting hooks had fallen off the balls. As they were assembling the fixture, several more hooks fell off and some were missing. Crystal ball with broken mounting hooks; personal collection Of course, since we'd purchased the lights in April of last year, returning them was no longer possible -- one of the dangers of purchasing items one's self instead of through the contractor.

I'm not sure how a manufacturer ships a mirror without all the necessary hardware, but that's what Pottery Barn did when they shipped the smaller Vintage Pivot Mirror for the Bonus Bath. I ordered it in mid-December to correct the first bathroom mirror mistak e I made. Mirror issue; courtesy of Austin Bayliss Pottery Barn has a 30-day return policy so we own the larger mirror we can’t use. We’ve cannibalized it by taking the hardware and hoping it works on the smaller mirror. Hopefully it will work and I don’t have to by a third mirror!

Yesterday I had a plan to use the capiz shell mirrors we already owned in the Master Bath because they were more narrow than the too-wide mirrors that had to be hung off-center from the faucets in order to fit. When the mirrors were propped up in the shower, they looked like the colors matched the tile. On the wall ... not so much. I thought they looked too yellow in relationship with the bronze translucent tile in the glass tile mosaic backsplash. And the mirror on the left still looked jammed into the corner. So on to Plan C. Capiz shell mirrors in the Master Bath; personal collection

Apparently the answer depends on how many bathrooms there are in her house ... or my house. To date, I'm batting 750% -- three mistakes out of four bathrooms. And that's only because we haven't gotten to the last bathroom yet. My two previous mistakes were: Oops! The Mirror Is Too Big Bath 2 (Guest Bath) Screw Up My third mistake was in the Master Bath. Again, like Bath 2, the mirrors were too wide. 30"x40" Hamilton Hills mirrors in the master bath; personal collection If I would have taken this photograph from a straight-on position, one would note the left mirror isn't centered on the faucet because there wasn't room. It's about a half-inch off center. The mirrors that were too wide for Bath 2 are more narrow -- 28" wide by 40" high. Would they work in the Master Bath? Capiz shell mirror option; personal collection Yes, we decided they would work in our bathroom just fine. They will still be too wide in my opi...

Bath 2 has double sinks and we designed the vanity wall to include three single-light sconces and two mirrors. We already owned the mirrors, which had capiz shell frames -- perfect for a coastal look. Capiz frame mirrors hanging behind the bar of our Oakton house; personal collection When the electricians were at River House last week to install the sconces in Bath 2, we discovered a big problem and one I had made before in the Bonus Bath upstairs  -- the mirrors at 28" wide by 40" high were too big for the space. Here's the issue: The vanity from wall to wall is 70-3/4" wide. There is 5-1/2" of counter before the outside edge of the sink and each sink is 17" wide. That means the center of the sink is 8-1/2" from the outside edge. 5-1/2" + 8-1/2" = 14". Oops! The edge of a 28" mirror would be jammed in the corner; never mind there being no room for two sconces (one on the outside of each mirror). Again, like the Bonus B...

The painters finished up Monday and all the protective plastic is gone so we had a chance to see how the master bathroom was coming together. We love how all the tile works together to evoke sand and shells of the coast in a calm, tranquil spa retreat. Master bath shower; personal collection Master bath vanity; personal collection

Pete and I have both been uncomfortable with the thought of ordering our window treatments online as we would be responsible for measuring and installing. We asked our builder's interior designer if she had recommendations for a workroom we could use, and she directed us to McQueen's Interiors in Morehead City. We are working with Beth Cantrell. She must have loved us. We walk in off the street extremely windblown, carrying a 3-ring binder and two plastic bags filled with carpet and tile samples and fabric. But after selecting treatments for 21 windows, crafting a cushion for our closet bench and reupholstering a bench and a chair, I think she really loves us now! The woven shades Zuniga selected for the kitchen were now longer available, but this looks like a great replacement -- just perfect. Window treatments selected for four kitchen windows; personal collection A bonus for us -- the sideboard Zuniga Interiors specified for the eat-in area of the kitchen is on sale...

The countertop for the upstairs bathroom was installed the day before yesterday. It's plain white cultured marble with an integrated sink so pretty hard to screw up. You can tell this was the most inexpensive bath to outfit -- no special backsplash, no separate undermount sink and a 4-inch spread faucet. Cultured marble countertop with integrated sink; personal collection

The countertop in the guest bath was installed yesterday. After the laundry room countertop fiasco, this was the one I was so worried about, we visited the manufacturer to double check . Cultured marble countertop from CreeKraft; personal collection

The master shower was designed as a wainscot with large field tile installed from the floor to 6 feet up the wall and glass tile mosaic sheets installed above to the ceiling. The glass tile was a bit of a splurge and had very specific installation instructions. A bright white thinset was required so the translucent nature of some of the tiles was not distorted. Based on some of the dark spots that are showing through the tile before it is grouted, we question whether the installation instructions were followed. Glass tile mosaic sheets before grouting; personal collection Glass tile mosaic before grouting; personal collection How this issue gets fixed, I have no idea.

The original design for the master shower included a 3/4” x 12” liner tile between the field tile and the glass mosaic. When it was time to order the tile, the liner tile was no longer available and we never found a replacement selection we liked. Plain cream tile isn’t so easy to find! Zuniga Interiors suggested using Schulter’s 1/2” tile edge trim in polished chrome as a replacement for the liner tile and to finish the exposed edges of all the tile instead of bullnose tile. This resulted in a polished chrome stripe around the shower niches and on the shower wall. Remembering the MTV show entitled “Pimp My Car” where they always seemed to add a bunch of chrome to a celebrity’s vehicle, we joke that we’ve “pimped our shower.” Master shower niches with polished chrome edging; personal collection

The trim carpenters, who do an excellent job (and know all the best off-shore fishing spots), got a little carried away when they were installing the crown molding in the master bath. We want the shower wall tile to go to the ceiling so this crown molding will need to be removed. Crown molding in the shower needs to be removed; personal collection

When designing the Bonus Bath both Zuniga Interiors and I missed a critical bit of information provided by the house plans. The slope ceiling non-surprise surprise; personal collection Those dashed lines circled in red indicate the ceiling is sloped where the bathroom vanity is located. What the plans didn't indicate was how high up on the wall did the slope start. Today, we found out. Ceiling slope in Bonus Bath; personal collection The wall is 83-1/4 inches high -- less than an inch short of 7 feet. The height of all the things that have to go under that slope are: 33.25" -- Bathroom vanity without countertop   6.00" -- Countertop and backsplash 35.00" -- Mirror   9.00" -- Light bar ------- 83.25" That means there would be no space between the backsplash, mirror and light bar. Not good. The lights have already been ordered and changing them would require a restocking fee. Also, there's not really enough room for sconces on e...