Friday, January 15, 2010

Creative solutions to eliminating Pepto Bismal Pink

I have mentioned before that often the creative mind is "tripped" (as in circuit breaker) more of necessity than anything. One of the things that spurs my creativity is being in the midst of creativity. I must have some space that is bright and lively around me.

When we first moved into our home the walls were painted beige!! I hate beige. I hate it on everything. If there was never a need for a color then beige would be that color (Don't know if that statement made sense but you get the idea.) Anyway, the night before moving in I conned my girlfriend and her son (who thinks I am a little eccentric) into help painting my living room. I just wanted one room that was bright! My colors were McDonald's Yellow and Red. Yellow was for two walls, and the red was to cover a dark brown wall panelling that was on one wall. The fourth wall was a rock wall that covered the entire wall. Mary put two brush strokes on the wall before turning to me and asking "Are you sure Rene?" This is the result of the wall.

Anyway, to go even further.. Our bathroom was a "pepto Bismal" pink and the wall that was just across from the toilet had had a fake tile panel put halfway up the wall and then had had plaster put on the top half of the wall. The plaster was draped over the edge of the tile panel and so the wall was kind of an uneven at times bulging mess in the center. And "IT WAS PEPTO BISMAL PINK" It is an incredibly small bathroom but for a counter it had a black and white polka dot formica sink cabinet. In short it was really really awful.

One day after making some mosaics on a lamp I was working on, I realized that I had a HUGE amount of small marble beads (the type used in vases to hold flowers in place) and that I could probably cover most of the wall with these beads and it would just cost me the price of grout. I spent days looking at mosaics on the internet and searching for ways to apply the beads and mosaic them. I had about 5 pounds of these beads and they fit in a shoe box. One day i happened upon a website that advertised a mosaic that was 3' by 3' for $600. I almost gagged. That was approximately 1/5 of the size I needed to make my mosaic! So I set off to do my own using the beads I had in the shoe box! If I did it right I might even have some beads left over.

I figured out a plan to make the bathroom look like it was underwater. A really fun concept that I still enjoy today. (The wall was done about 3 years ago and the floor just after that but I still have some grouting to do around the base of the wall and floor.

After consulting with some artists and then just plain experimentation I began work... My shoe box of beads covered just over 1 square foot of wall and I found myself going to craft store after craft store to by bag after bag of these beads. $650 later and about one week of putting the beads on the wall and grouting them this is the wall I have. I cannot tell you how beautiful it is when the sun shines through the window on it but most people who have never seen my house or my bathroom end up coming out of the bathroom and taking other people who are visiting my house into the bathroom to show them the wall.

Just for info... the wall has 32 fish of all sizes on it and the bathroom has over 100 fish hidden or in plain site in it. But the wall is the fun one to try and find all the fish on.

so I am back to work, but I will post again tomorrow and have more stories or pics to share.

Our creative home on Whidbey Island.

1 comment:

nursemyra said...

wow - great job on the wall

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