Category: Apartment Living

We’ve got Swag

Alternate title: “How to Hang a Light (non-Hardwired)“

Second alternate title: “Something so Incredibly Easy I Don’t Know Why We Were Intimidated”

This quick and cheap (around $30) project has already made such a H-U-G-E difference in our dining zone, that I don’t care if our apartment complex dings our security deposit for the two holes we put in the ceiling. Anyway, here we go– starting with the “before” photo:

Our table is the perfect size for seating four people. Four feet in diameter, it doesn’t take up a ton of space. Unfortunately, this section of the apartment is pretty “blah.” Personally, I love the mismatched chairs with the zebra rug, but the space needed something dramatic to be a focal point and to spice up the pale tones we had going on here, namely the light wood table, light green chair in back, and white walls.

As I touched on briefly Wednesday, this side of the apartment doesn’t get a ton of light after the sun goes down–these days, that means after 4 or 5 PM. (During the day, however, the sliding glass door lets in a ton of natural light, which I’m really grateful for.) I decided that it would be awesome to hang a light over the table so that at dinnertime we can actually see what we’re eating. Oh yeah, and add a little style.

Supplies:

Enter the light kit we found in the as-is section of IKEA for $2. Yes, you read that right, $2. We nabbed it up and began the hunt for a suitable shade. I was really trying to get away from shopping at IKEA for everything, so we checked Target and Home Depot for shades. Okay, so it wasn’t an exhaustive search… later, we did find ourselves at IKEA and got a lampshade from them. The KILSMO, to be specific. So much for my quest to liven up my shopping destinations. Next we went to Lowe’s (which is conveniently right next door to IKEA) and grabbed two kinds of ceiling hooks: medium-duty and light-duty.

Process:

We measured the room to make sure the unit was centered evenly between the kitchen bar and the glass doors, and marked the spot on the ceiling. Then, Doug volunteered to screw the driller hook in (his height gives him an advantage). With this particular hook, we did not need to drill a pilot hole.  At first it gave him some trouble but quickly it started going in tightly. Note: There were lots of other options, most of which including anchors. This one only holds 8 lbs. If you are hanging something heavier, please use one with anchors.

Then, I strung the light kit through the lampshade. This particular shade has a neat feature–it can be adjusted. The first time I strung the kit through, the light bulb peeked out at the bottom of the shade. So I pivoted the thingy (please forgive my lack of proper terminology) so that the bulb was positioned higher inside the shade. The following pictures will make more sense:

For the second hook, we selected a spot directly above the outlet we were going to plug the light kit into. The smaller hooks did require a pilot hole. After drilling that, Doug twisted the hook in. Since the main purpose of this hook is to swag the cord from draping across the room, it doesn’t bear a heavy load, and something smaller was OK. So, we pulled the light kit through the shade and strung the whole thing through the large hook, then the smaller hook–draping, or swagging, the cord (now the post title makes sense).

A good rule of thumb for hanging a pendant shade above a dining table is to aim for somewhere between 2 and 3 feet from the table to the bottom of the shade. Depending on the scale of the table and lampshade, this is a kind of fluid rule. Go with your gut. Ours is 28 inches from bottom-of-shade to table.

Before I reveal the after photo, I must confess our womp-womp moment. To get the right height, an attractive swag, and have the cord running straight down to the outlet, we, well, ran out of cord. We plan on getting a small extension cord, possibly with an in-line switch on it. For now, you can check out the “after” with our temporary fix: a janky surge protector. We will fix that issue soon but for now I can’t wait to share with you:

It is so nice to have a light in this quadrant of the room! It casts a lovely warm glow, thanks to the fabulous brass inside the shade. I love the way the dramatic black ties the zebra rug in. I feel like having this custom light addition is like jewelry on the room. And it was SO EASY!

Space Planning

Space planning is really, really key when it comes to maximizing your apartment’s square footage, especially when living in a small space (mine is around 840 square feet. I’m not complaining; it really could be smaller). The point of the following ramble is to show you that you don’t need to follow “the rules” when it comes to placing the layout of your space!

  • If you entertain a lot, and don’t even own a TV, you will be devoting much more space to a dining area–possibly to seat 6-8! (Most apartments seem to be designed to seat around 4 comfortably.)
  • If you are clueless in the kitchen and eat out every meal, why bother with a dining room table? A bar stool at your counter for morning cereal and coffee might be all you need.
  • If you live alone and really, really need a dedicated office space, consider using a daybed in the living room and turning the bedroom into a mega-productive office.

Those are just a few examples I could come up with off the top of my head. Don’t let yourself be limited by where items “should” be!

A while ago, I shared the floor plan that my complex’s pamphlet assumed I would go with but just for refresher, here it is, including my notes for where I planned on placing furniture. Note: My unit is the reverse of this, but you get the picture.

As you can see, “they” assumed that the dining area would go right outside the kitchen. Unfortunately, for me, plunking down a table and chairs in the intended dining area would cause a major obstruction to the flow of traffic. Instead I’ve got my dresser sideboard, desk, and china cabinet blocked in around the perimeter, and the major floor space open to lead nicely into the living/dining space.

Above is a quick little floor plan I threw together on floorplanner.com to show you how things are really goin’ down around here. As you can see, the living and dining spaces are side-by-side at the back of the unit, with the “extra” area serving triple purpose of entryway, office, and storage.

Here’s a tip: Online floor planners are fabulous tools, but on many of them, if you don’t have a paid account (I don’t), you can only do one space at a time. Also, their selection for furnishings is very limited (as you can see) but overall I love these tools for doing virtual re-arrangements (so I don’t go and move around all my heavy furniture only to discover that I hate it). 

Here’s my fancy “flow of traffic” arrow. Isn’t it nice that there’s no real need to go around anything to get to the back of the unit–where most of the socializing and hanging out would occur anyway? this arrangement is totally my jam.

Here’s a tip to be filed in the “do as I say, not as I do” category. In order to NOT waste your time, measure stuff. See the plan above? Totally eyeballed. Since I do live in my space, I know approximately how big things are, how far away from the wall stuff is, etc. If you want to get the most benefit from your space planning, please measure your space, then measure your furniture items. Floorplanner.com (and most other online floor planners) will have an option for you to change the size of everything, down to the inch. 

Remember my three imagined scenarios from the beginning? Well, using much of the same furniture, I came up with alternate-reality versions of my apartment.

The entertainer who has no TV: the focus here is really on the dining area, which seats 8. 

The TV fanatic who doesn’t cook: movie nights will be epic with the addition of another couch, and added shelving provides storage for a huge movie collection. Note the folding table for one.

Turn the bedroom into an office: Slip the bed behind a couple of folding screens and create a “bedroom” where there was previously open space.

2-Second Tip: An Inviting Doorstep

In an apartment complex with 100+ units, bringing a little personality to your doorstep will set a good first impression.

Seeing our natural-fiber doormat (on clearance at Target) and our seasonal pumpkin brings a smile to my face and sets us apart from so many other anonymous doors in our complex. And it didn’t take much time or effort, either :)