This Renter Gave a Small 1950s Seattle Apartment a Maximalist, “Dark Academia” Makeover
“As a child, I read ‘The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe,’ and rather than identifying with the feminine protagonists, Lucy and Susan, I idolized Professor Kirk, the owner of the home the children were sent to in the English countryside where they would find the magic wardrobe,” Ren writes. “I was fascinated by C.S. Lewis’s description of the professor’s old manor house with its collection of antiques and strange objects. When I moved into my apartment, I was determined to find every way possible to create a space [that] felt like the professor’s house of my childhood imagination.”
Now that Ren has added her personality to the space, she describes the space as her a “dark academic dream.” She continues describing the space: “It feels a little bit enchanted, a little bit scientific. The aesthetic is a mix of new pieces and antiques that feminize the smokers lounge vibe we associate with masculine spaces in the English stately homes of the early 1900s. It’s cozy and comforting despite the occasional skull or antique microscope.”
“I’m first and foremost an artist and my home is deeply reflective of the types of art I create and am inspired by,” Ren explains. “My friends have described stepping over the threshold as akin to walking into my brain. Even the prominently featured green color of my main living and entertaining areas is one that a close friend has started calling ‘Ren Green’ every time he sees it in the wild because it’s so much a part of what people associate with me. In this home, you’ll find backlit cabinets that reflect the safety and comfort I felt in the natural history museum in the city where I grew up.”
“If you look closely, you’ll find antiques that tell the stories of where I’ve lived and the places that have made an impact on me. You can find allusions to the historic fashion and art movements, which inspire my own art and how I like to dress. You’ll also see art from the myriad of artists who are personal friends and others who I’ve interviewed for Beautiful Bizarre Magazine. This space is a maximalist I-Spy book where every object you lay eyes on has a history and a story to tell.”
When asked for decorating advice, Ren says you should “start with a plan even if you don’t know every step. It’s fine for a plan to evolve over time, but where I’ve seen people trip up the most in designing their spaces is by choosing individual pieces or colors for walls or tiles that they like in the moment but have not considered as a whole. If you love your backsplash tiles but you chose them before you picked furniture and now they clash, the pieces you love will feel like less than the sum of their parts rather than making each other better. Not everything needs to match perfectly, it just needs to have intention behind it.”
Resources
LIVING ROOM
- Faux Leather Chairs — Target
- Rest of the Furniture — Wayfair
- Round Table — Antique purchased locally
- Steamer Trunk — Goodwill
- Frames — Thrifted
- Art Prints — Etsy
- Oil Painting of the Vase of Flowers — Bonnie Kate Wolf
- Broom — Makanda, a woodworker here in the Puget Sound specializing in wooden vases and these handmade brooms.
- Dried Lavender — Pike Place Market
- Door Knob — Local store that sells reclaimed hardware from older homes
- Lamp — Thrift Store
- Jars — Hobby Shop
- Bust — Etsy
DINING ROOM
- Cabinet — Local Antique Store
- Table — Local Antique Store
- Dining Chairs — Goodwill
- Ferret Ink Drawing — Symantha Vega
- Harpy Print — Lindsey Carr
- Textured Oil Painting — Alexander Youngblood
OFFICE
- Cabinets — Thrifted
- Desk — IKEA
- Bookcases — Wayfair
- Objects in Bookcase — Thrifted
- ‘Herne the Hunter’ Oil Painting — Kieran Ingram
- Snake Skeleton — Moth and Myth
- Footstool — Goodwill
- Star Wars Cross Stitch —Gift
- Horn above the Magpie — Local Antique Store
- Rustic Clay Vase — Warren
- Small print of the swans — Relief print Ren created called ‘Likewise’
- Star Wars cross Stitch — Gift from another artist friend
- Middle image below the main print — Another one of Ren’s relief prints, ‘Siren’
- Horn above the magpie — Antique purchased from a local antique store
- ‘Valour and Cowardice’ — Ren’s “minimalist design of a statue by the same name that resides in the Victoria and Albert museum in London”
BEDROOM
- Art — Etsy
- Frames — Thrifted
- Harpy on the Top Left — Ed Binkley
- Small Oil Painting — Alexander Youngblood
- Chair — Thrifted
- Dresser — Antique
- Mirror — Thrifted
Thanks, Ren!
This tour’s responses and photos were edited for length/size and clarity.
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