Back in the fall, I was approached by La Sierra Apartments here in NB to spruce up a corporate apartment.  One unit, in a weeks time? Well okay, no problem. The challenge: use furniture in inventory and spend next to nothing.   SAY WHAT??  Every design idea I had instantly imploded.

How was I supposed to do art, drapery, lighting, and fun accessories on a couple hundred bucks?  (I know it’s possible, but I’m used to accessories budgets in the thousands.)  Sure, it’s easy to come up with endless ideas when you have a nice budget to work with, but this was going to be a little harder.  A rug alone could break the bank.

I had to get creative.  But really, I needed to relax and go with my instincts.  I was made for this.  I don’t like paying full price for, well, anything.  I’m always looking for a deal, and now it was time to put my bargain hunting to the test.  And I had like 4 days to do it.

I started with a vacant apartment.   There were a lot of warm, brown tones in the apartment (wall color, fixtures, flooring, etc) and in the existing furniture I was going to use.  The armless chair I picked was in this fabric:

So I decided to pull out the grays tones and run with that.  The goal was to combine warm and cool to create an inviting & simple, yet contemporary space.

I bought a 36×36 gallery wrapped canvas at Michael’s with a 40% off coupon.  I then took a couple of hours one morning, busted out my (literally) 8-year-old paints and created a neutral abstract painting.  This was going to be the piece that tied the browns and grays together.

Here’s what the final result ended up like:

The lamp shades, pillows, and drapes were from Target.  The drapery was on clearance – jackpot!  The drapery hardware (not pictured) is from IKEA, as well as the rug ($19.99), and floor lamp ($14.99).

These IKEA frames were under 10 bucks a pop.  I took some pics of local landmarks (Gruene Hall, the Comal River, and the Faust Bridge) and printed off 8x10s of them at Target.

I apologize for the very few crappy iPhone pics, but it turned out pretty good!   The only thing I would have liked to do differently is include some vintage bargain finds if I had more time to search for them.  Where are your go to places for great accessories on a budget??