I took my Greenleaf kit out of its "primed and stuffed in a corner" purgatory and started its transformation into a little mid-century home. Like most of my projects, there is minimal planning, lots of swearing and regrets and praying that Instagram and Pinterest have an actual image of the house I have in mind.
It turns out, they kinda did have a similar picture (which I can't find anymore) but I used it to inspire the exterior of the house.
The Canvas
The plywood house was a bit warped after I primed it. Pressing it under heavy books helped a lot.The vision I have is a mid-century home with an added on sun room, not era correct, kinda like most homes! Added for function, not its architecture. Truthfully, the sun room is a secondary add on kit for the house that is a greenhouse. I decided to flip it and put it on a base to make the extra room. That space will be the living room and also the bedroom (couch/bed). The privacy for that space (and to hide its not quite era appropriateness) will be the breeze wall sent to me from the wonderful Anna-Maria (The Shopping Sherpa). I had been drooling over the wall, and its was like she read my mind!! Now it will have a home!
The inside and part of the outside will be clad in 1/2" square cinder blocks. To define the front door I trimmed part of the front in black wood and used corrugated wood siding stained using Danish oil to prevent warping.
To the right, there will another section, the bathroom, built on. the roof will form a "butterfly" roof with the main section. Lemme tell you, trying to envision the roof angles, the shower stall (that will also be angled to the roof line), and just constructing that thing is the reason you see no room!! I'll get there, but I just need a burst of motivation. I did buy the clear plexiglass sheet and knife at Lowe's, to nudge me along.
The Door
The door also came from Greenleaf. I used a sheet of vellum paper from Michael's as frosted glass. I will be honest, I really dislike having to hang doors. If I could have purchased a pre-framed door like this I would have paid a premium, but I didn't find anything I liked. There are slight framing gaps which anger the perfectionist in me, but I will just not have lights on inside the build when I take pictures, and the gap will never be visible to the world!
The Sun Room
Let's not even discuss how I measured many times and somehow managed to not only make BUT GLUE TOGETHER the base before realizing it was too large for the entire glass frame to sit on. But, I added the black ledge and its fine now. In the below picture, its not glued on yet, so due to some warping, it looks like it doesn't fit, but I assure you it now does.
I applied stucco to the interior and exterior of the base then painted it. I went with wax as a finish because I didn't want any sheen on the stucco.
For the sofa bed, I made two toppers, one is the beige linen and one is a very fine deep beige corduroy. I know I want to make the build vintage at times and then modern, so making two makes sense.
The Kitchen
The kitchen space in the build is tiny. Nothing more then a galley kitchen! That said, I wanted something that stood out against the blonde floors, so a dark wood was most appealing.
I have been hording a large box of veneer for 2 years. First, I was clueless on how to use veneer and second, it looked tricky. Throwing caution to the wind, I made my sink unit and veneered each board, then glued it together. The only "trick" is to clamp each piece of wood and let to thoroughly dry and to use a (many) sharp blades when trimming the veneer. One day I will make a tutorial for everyone, because it is a lot easier then it might seem.
For the island, I veneered a Houseworks kitchen island. It was the right size and it had a butcher block top.
The stainless steel counters weren't terrible to make. I used a sheet of hobby aluminum from a model train store. To achieve a bend in the metal, use a sharp blade and score the line 2-3 times (but don't cut through!), then bend against a metal ruler. I had to use the Dremel to cut out the sink hole, but scoring and bending was too tough.
The kitchen faucet is from Paper Doll Miniatures Shapeways Store. The sink is from Marion Russek's Shapeways Store. I made the sink and stove from kits by ELF Miniatures.
What I haven't photographed is the actual wall behind my galley kitchen (below is just staged in another space). The kitchen has a stainless steel wall with floating shelves (which have under shelf lighting). That took forever to make! All the batteries and wires for the kitchen will be hidden inside the sink unit.
And that is that! Before I can attach my kitchen wall, I need to plan the bathroom (which shares the back of the kitchen wall and door). Much more mumbling and grumbling and procrastination will occur!
