Retro Makeover: Home Edition

Holy geez!  I really didn't expect to spend my vacation this way, but it needed to happen.  I've gotten rid of lots of old pieces of furniture in the past year or so and acquired some new even-older ones, and have a couple of things to revamp (a 50's coffee table in bad shape is one of them), and a borrowed piece on the way.  I've moved some pretty big furniture all by myself (I could still stand to lift weights again, though), and changed a lot of things around.  I've also been purging a lot of unneccessary things, and have sold and sent home with friends bags full of interesting stuff.

I have to admit I have a hard time with color.  I'm not colorblind, black is just easier and matches any accent color.  My place used to be black and white with one accent color per room.  I'm way bigger on texture.  That being said, here's the progress so far:

  The room divider is an Ikea "expedit" shelf.  I went to Home Depot (only because the mom-and-pop shops didn't have reed fencing) and bought a roll of reed.  With thin steel wire from Bering that matched the wire in the fencing perfectly,  I lined it up and secured it to the shelf.  I didn't want the clutter of all my sewing and craft supplies, so that's all hidden from view and still accessible on the other side.

I recently took the plunge and bought the industrial sewing machine I've been needing.  Behind the room divider is my workspace:

I may end up getting more shelving for the upper part of the wall, but my ultimate goal is to have less fabric lying around.  I have vintage reseaming and repairs, as well as custom orders, waiting.  Now I can really get with it, thanks to a machine that's much faster and does flawless stitching.  Fabric is on the way for a custom order I'm particularly excited about.  Details at ten.

It's all a work in progress still, including this poor coffee table:

It'll need a lot of love.  I found it on the side of the road on my way to work one morning, and I just stopped in my tracks and put it in my trunk.  I'm in the process of removing permanent marker gang tags from it.  When I tipped it from sideways back to upright, a razorblade fell out from underneath (no joke- it's in the picture).  This table has had a rough life.

The veneer looks ruined, but between studying art throughout my entire education and being raised by a carpenter, I think I can handle this.