It’s more important now than ever to have flexible spaces in our homes. That guest bedroom might need to double as an office. Maybe you don’t have a dedicated space for dining but still need a place to eat. Or maybe you host guests occasionally but don’t need a separate bedroom that is unused the…

    Recently we took a trip to one of our favorite places, High Point Market! As the world’s largest furniture market it’s an obvious draw for us, and we’ve loved visiting in the past to see the vast array of vendors, designers and manufacturers. It’s a great place to get inspired, with companies from…

This blog post is sponsored by Home Depot ** GIVEAWAY CLOSED*** Congratulations Gabby Anderson What’s the smartest thing you can do this Holiday season? Join us in turning your home into a smart home! If you’re like us, your home is a place that you want to feel protected, especially once it’s filled with all…

This post is sponsored by Garrett Wade Tools Tis’ the Holiday Season and this one we hope is going to be very special! If you’re like us, shopping for gifts is always a stressful situation. We’re guilty of being last minute shoppers which always adds an extra layer of stress that can easily be avoided….

The weather is changing and we’re coming into the rain and snow season. New York City recently had a record amount of rainfall in one hour during a tropical storm then a week later that record was shattered by a second storm. The amount of water was something our homes and cellars just never had…

Buying a home that needs work can give you the opportunity to design a space that works and looks exactly how you would like. You can choose the layout, pick the finishes, improve the functionality, and make a home that you and your family can enjoy to its fullest. When we set out on our…

How to Get Professional Results Yourself with the 3M Wall Repair Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by 3M. We like to move our art around and change it out for new pieces regularly. So, we often end up with holes in the wall that we need to repair. Time to patch them up!  We found…

Whether you have original windows or tragically cheap replacements like we do, there will come a time when you’ll need to replace them (or possibly restore them). It’s not something that is done very often so if you are going through it, chances are you have never before, and you may never again. So we…

It was important for us to set the right mood in our Speakeasy Werkroom. We needed great vintage items, unique pieces, and even some building materials. And with only a few weeks to complete the project we needed them fast! Sourcing all of the items could have taken a lot of time and money, both…

We’re going to keep this real folks…. Week 7 is absolutely terrifying! Just so we are clear we have 8 weeks total! So we are one week away from the reveal. With less than a week to complete this space, while our list seems to be getting longer and longer, we have been making steady…

One of the most prominent features in our basement renovation is the beautiful wall of custom cabinetry our friend Ethan Abramsom (@TheBuildWithEthan) is building for us. They will be one of the first things you see when you step into the space and they will be painted one of the brightest pops of color in…

It rained the entire Memorial Day weekend here in NY. We had grand plans to take a bike ride through the city and enjoy the first couple days of the official kickoff of summer. Our plans quickly changed given all the rain that we were predicting. And boy, are we glad it did! This forced…

Where we’re at… The Build It’s always exciting starting a demo and kicking off construction on a project. Anticipation builds throughout the design process, and it always feels like a relief to see progress starting on the work. Definitely not the most glamorous phase for many but this is the stuff we live for! A…

Oh hiiiii! The Spring 2021 One Room Challenge has officially kicked off and your boys are so excited to have been selected as one of the featured designers!! The next eight weeks are going to be a mix of emotions while we completely transform a space in our Brooklyn brownstone. So which space is it…

What if an entire floor of your home was dark, damp, and scary. So much so you didn’t want to set foot in it. What a waste of space that you could be using as an office, or a studio, or a gym. That’s what many people are doing with their dark, scary, and damp…

This post is sponsored by ​LightStream​, but the content and opinions expressed here are our own. Over the past year that we have all been spending a considerable amount of more time at home many people are taking a harder look at their homes. Some parts of it might be a little tired or not…

In many old houses walls and floors are not straight, level, or square. It’s something that you learn to live with and occasionally enjoy as a character of a historic home. Watching the dog drop his ball and look in confusion as it slowly rolls to the far wall can be entertaining. Floors often develop…

Montauk Quartz from HanStone fits beautifully in our kitchen and bathroom. Photos by Bridget Badore Choosing stone is one of the most important decisions you’ll make in your kitchen renovation. You can go with something dark and moody or something bright and white. You also have your choice of many types of material like marble,…

Most brownstones or townhouses are narrow and long. Usually 20 feet at the street and 40 feet long. Natural light only enters at the front and back so that leaves a long stretch in the middle with no windows. Squeezing every bit of natural light out of the windows that are there is crucial. Lighting…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFacGPA7lGk Before & After of our DIY Ikea Hemnes Hack This #valentinesday we’re embracing our strongest love/hate relationship ever….. Ikea! We all have that one Ikea piece of furniture that’s been with us a little too long. For us, it’s the Hemnes 3 drawer that’s hiding in our guest bedroom. We decided it was time…

Everyone’s got one. That small and possibly awkward space that just isn’t nearly as functional or beautiful as you would like it to be. Maybe it’s a tiny powder room or a guest bath. Is it your kitchen or office? Or maybe it’s your entire apartment! Any room or home that is short of square…

It’s hard to believe it’s been about a year since we all carved our office spaces out of our living rooms and bedrooms. We spent more time in our kitchens than possibly ever before, cooking, baking, and realizing it’s not the most ideal space. And then with all the extra time at home dreaming up…

2020 is a year we are all anxious to put behind us! Not just because of its difficulties, but also because of many reasons we have to be hopeful for 2021. At the end of any year we always like to reflect on the lessons we’ve learned and the good things that have happened. Like…

We’re taking you inside a Harlem Brownstone we recently visited! Some parts are available for sale before the home is listed and we have first dibs! Take a first look and if interested in a piece let us know which item in comments . We will follow-up shortly with additional information once we have pricing,…

Our stoop makeover has begun and we are already seeing some new life to our old stairs and railing. The paint was peeling off the railing and rust was showing through. Our stairs were chipping and cracks could be seen in the layer below. We needed to not only make everything look a lot better…

We’re about to embark on another project at our house. We’re making over our cellar (aka basement) as a laundry room and storage area. Often the cellar is overlooked as an entire additional floor of living space in a Brooklyn Brownstone. While you might not want to sleep in a subterranean room, it’s a great…

Replacing all of the plumbing is usually on the agenda for many people renovating an old home. If you’re moving around kitchens and bathrooms or if the pipes are deteriorating it’s often best to replace it all. If your pipes are old enough there is also a chance that they could be introducing lead into…

Labor day is coming up and we can’t believe that fall is already approaching! It’s been quite the year already with a global pandemic affecting millions of people. This Labor Day we want to pay it forward with something that means everything to us, community. We’re working with Lowes this Labor Day to,, #BuildThanks and…

Some of the most iconic features of Brownstone design are the front stoop, iron railing, and newel posts. Without that it just wouldn’t be the same. The week we closed on our house, now almost 2 years ago, on one of our first visits we were shocked to discover that one of our 2 front…

One thing is for certain in an un-renovated historic Brooklyn home, it’s leaky. And we’re not talking about the roof. Most modern forms of energy weren’t even invented when they were built so energy efficiency had no bearing on the building process. A common goal of Brooklyn renovators is to improve it but many wonder…

Restoring a historic home is full of surprises! Some are welcomed, like the pocket doors we discovered sealed up in the wall or the 1906 Brooklyn newspaper we found under a bathroom. Some are not welcomed, especially when they unexpectedly cost tens of thousands of dollars! There are some costs that are big surprises for…

Now that the summer heat is setting in we’ve been regularly using our new mini split system to cool our home. We had some questions about how good the system and configuration would work. We only installed one 18,000 BTU unit for the entire parlor floor. Even though it is fairly open, it’s about 800…

We always loved the small touches of character in original homes like built-ins nooks and niches. Some much care was given to creating interesting features and moments in the design. We remember walking through several brownstones in the search for our perfect home and finding interesting ornate niches built into the staircase. Some were staged…

Outdoor space seems more important than ever right now. If you’re fortunate enough to have a backyard, it’s time well spent giving it a makeover. We’ve been working tirelessly in our backyard for the past few months but we’ve been dreaming about it even longer. After going through a major renovation of the house, we…

Our renovation budget required us to get creative to stretch it to the finish line. We tried to combine inexpensive items with some higher-end touches to achieve the overall outcome. Sometimes off-the-shelf items just won’t get you to the gorgeous finished look of that inspiration photo you’re swooning over. We certainly didn’t have the budget…

Now that we have been living in our renovated house for over 6 months, a lot of people ask us what we would have done differently. One of the things we immediately say is the lighting design. We didn’t make any huge mistakes (well except for the guest bedroom light switch ending up behind the…

Tis the season for gardening and planting! The sun is out and birds are chirping and we’ve been working on our backyard makeover the past 2 months. It’s been a really fun 100% DIY project and the perfect distraction from the problems of the world. We have already planned our space, torn out a lot…

** Please note we received Bulbrite Solana bulbs as a sponsorship. The opinions and commentary in blog post are our own. During our renovation we really wanted to put in smart lighting. We wanted it to connect to our devices, set it on a schedule, adjust light levels from our couch, and have it integrated…

** Thanks to the Allswell team for the free mattress. All opinions are our own: A new mattress was almost as important for us as picking out new appliances. Maybe more! We spend a lot of time in bed. Whether it’s sleeping, blogging or just scrolling through Instagram, you want something comfortable when you want…

Do you find yourself knowing what TV show your neighbors are binging or worse yet what their daily fight is about? You’re not alone, especially as we are all home more now to hear it. It’s something we considered as we were renovating. We had not yet lived in the place since we just bought…

Stay home but stay busy! There are several DIY projects that we have had on our list and we’re using this extra time at home to make them happen! Need inspiration for a project of your own? Here’s our top 5 DIY project ideas you can work on while you #stayhome! Some projects might require…

We’re starting the new year off by planning some of our 2020 DIY projects. The majority of our renovation is finished and we can now enjoy our space and dive into our list! When a major renovation is finished it can sometimes be surprising how much work is left to do to create your dream…

2019 was a big one for us. We successfully (mostly) completed a major renovation in less than a year. And we’ve shared the experience through our blog every week! This is our 52nd post of 2019. So we thought we would look back at what’s happened. After cost, timing of a renovation is the most…

Now that all of the major work is done in our place we are having all of our final inspections done. It’s an interesting place to be in the process because in addition to building our place to be our home we have spent a lot of time building to match the approved plans so…

Whenever we talk about “finishing” our renovation project someone reminds us that it will never be completely finished. We’re almost to the 95% complete mark, which I guess is where it will always be. While that may be scary for some, we’re perfectly happy about it because…well, we love a project, and we’ll have plenty…

We didn’t plan on writing an article on paint, especially since our place will be mostly painted white, but given the amount of time we have spent trying to pick white paint and to get the sheen levels right we felt like we needed to! We’re planning on letting the architecture and original features of…

If you were anywhere around New York City in the past 2 weeks you know the enormous amounts of water that fell from the sky. Torrential downpours almost daily. We have had the place for 6 months now and this really gave us the opportunity to understand how the place is handling water. I guess…

It’s pretty scary being woken up in the middle of the night hearing foot steps above your head in what should be an empty apartment under renovation. That’s exactly what happened to us about a month ago. We’re living in the finished garden lower level rental while we renovate the duplex upstairs. It’s a construction…

For every big project, planning only gets you so far. There are some things that pop up and quick decisions need to be made. We just had a meeting with our contractor and went through a long list of items we needed to make a quick call on. We’re excited about because it really marks…

Most people have a lot of stuff. While we are serial purgers and travel light, we still want to comfortably fit all of our stuff but also make our place attractive to future owners. We may have made some choices that are not too “stuff-friendly” so we are trying to take advantage of space as…

It’s hard for us to believe at this point that coming into this project that we didn’t plan on stripping our woodwork. It was so far out from all of the other work that needed to be done that it’s just something we didn’t think much about. As the walls move into place, the plumbing…

We went into our renovation with a strong idea of what we wanted to do…and on a pretty tight budget. So we decided to act as our own designers. We do have some designer friends who are helping out with advice along the way, (and the power of Instagram!) but ultimately for better or worse…

One of the steps in many renovations is testing and removing the dreadful asbestos. Asbestos is a natural mineral that has been mined and used for centuries because of its durability in buildings. Because of its carcinogenic nature it is now banned from use. While contractors and builders no longer use materials containing asbestos it…

A traditional Brooklyn brownstone is about 19’ X 40’ (as is ours) give or take a few feet. There are nice big windows in the front and back, but there are rarely windows on the longer sides if you’re in the middle of a block of townhouses like we are. That means you only get…

Our place currently looks like an episode of Stranger Things. Wires are hanging from the ceiling and weaving through the walls. They bundle together where holes are cut and then disbursed to fixtures or switches from there. With all said, it’s moving pretty quickly and even just getting to the electrical phase feels like a…

We’re about half way through what we hope will be a six month renovation. This week we thought we would catch you up on where we are and the timeline on how we’re hopefully going to stay on track. It feels great to be able to see how everything will come together. Two months ago…

We’re adding a new bathroom where there was not only previously not one, but there is also no plumbing in that area of the building. There are a few interesting challenges to solve to make this possible. Doing it in an over 100 year old building only adds to to the challenge. We have the…

The renovation is moving along nicely! We get excited with every stud and pipe that gets installed! This week we’re taking a break from the construction fun to talk about the community and history of our neighborhood. It’s been amazing to learn the rich history of our building and also experience a warm welcome to…

Our place is over 120 years old, probably more like 130. The DOB started keeping records in 1899 so many brownstones in Brooklyn show that date on record even if they were built before. We were fully expecting to find some surprises once we started opening walls up, although we were holding out hope that…

We are a few days into demo and it’s moving fast! Walls are down and we’re seeing the place really open up. We have had a few surprises so wanted to share. After working for months on plans and approvals it’s really satisfying to see progress! On the parlor level the wall that created the bedroom…

For the past 3 months we have been in the design and planning phase. We spent a lot of time in (and out) of the house figuring out how we wanted to configure things. Our architect was also hard at work translating that into drawings and a plan that the New York City Department of…

We’re proud to have been featured by our friends at Bed-Stuy Local (www.bedstuylocal.com)! Check out their interview with us below and head over to their site for more! DECEMBER 17, 2018 BY BEDSTUYLOCAL ,The Bed-Stuy Small Business Hustle – “The Brownstone Boys” Today, we are posting our first small business profile! We plan on doing…

One of the things we are looking forward to the most is enjoying our backyard. Right now only the garden apartment has access. So we plan on building a deck on the parlor level and popping in a door where one of the windows is currently. We’ll have stairs to give us access to the…

We’re working on one of the more fun parts of our project, designing the kitchen! We probably don’t have to tell you how important it is. Heart of the house, right? We know what we want. We have so many photos pinned on Pinterest. So why don’t these renderings from the cabinet company look like…

While we were hunting for our brownstone to renovate, we also looked at some recently renovated buildings, mostly by developers. The trend is to tear down walls and open up the entire parlor level floor with a huge slider leading to a deck. Sounds nice. Walking in you are greeted with a bright, open, and…