we’ve been wanting to get a bird feeder to hang outside our living room window for some time now. (hopefully it won’t drive our cats nuts!) this little feeder was inexpensive and easy to make, and we were able to customize it with paint to look like a little snack stand at an amusement park! click here for the full post and instructions or just click “read more” below.
in honor of diy wednesday (stay tuned for derek and lauren’s post at 1pm today), i thought i’d kick things off with this fun project from eco friend architect michelle kaufmann. michelle has a great series of green diy projects on youtube, but you can also view her work over at green site, ecologue. just click play to watch the videos above and below. [thanks, anne!]
holy moly!! this post marks our 1 year anniversary of doing diy projects here at design*sponge! boy how time flies!! we just want to say it’s been such a huge privilege and pleasure sharing our weekly projects with you.
continuing with last week’s idea of re-purposing an every day object by giving it a little flip, we took one of our favorite households items (a metal bookend) drilled 2 holes in it, and mounted it on the wall. it works great as a sconce for a flower vase, a spot for a small stack of books, or simply another fun way to show off a couple of your favorite knick knacks. click here for the full post or just click “read more” below.
there’s nothing better than emptying your pockets as soon as you get home after a long day, but we find that we leave little piles of change, keys, and bills all over the house unless we have a designated place to put them. this ubiquitous wooden magazine holder from ikea turned out to be the perfect catch-all shelf for our stuff, and all we had to do was put a coat of stain on it, turn it on its side and mount it in the corner of our entryway. problem solved! CLICK HERE for the full project and instructions or just click “read more” below.
we’ve spent the last few days in chicago visiting friends and seeing the sights. (we also caught the renegade craft fair on sunday- you can check out some pictures on our flickr page right here. we wanted to make sure to leave our generous hosts a nice thank you gift, but without our usual arsenal of craft supplies on hand, we had to make do with some simple ingredients rounded up from the neighborhood. we came up with this decorative coffee tin, made from an empty one-quart paint can from the hardware store, some delightful paper and ribbon from a local shop called anjenu and some fancy and delicious coffee beans from chicago’s famous roaster intelligentsia. once our hosts have used up all the beans, they can reuse the can as a pencil caddy or flower pot. click here for the full post and instructions or just click “read more” below.
we’ve been out of school for a while now, but this is still one of our favorite times of year. we love roaming the aisles of our local office supply store checking out all the fun, colorful back to school supplies. the other day we came across these red folders for 25 cents each, and thought they’d be perfect additions to our super geeky organization routine. we made one for each day of the week (saturday and sunday share a folder) to help us keep track of what’s happening in our business and personal lives. click here for the full post and instructions or just click “read more” below.
we know this week’s diy post is a little off-topic, but (continuing on last week’s sweet theme) we thought it would be fun to share one of our many, many obsessions with you—beekeeping! for the past few months, we’ve been tending to our little hive in the hopes that some day we could harvest some delicious, homegrown honey. well, this labor day we enjoyed a very sticky, very sweet bonanza, and we caught the whole thing on tape!
whenever we’re thinking about making a project, we always look around the house to see what materials we’ve got on hand. normally that means using a random piece of cork, or a surplus scrap of fabric. this week was a little different. we’ve had a lovely bottle of fleur de sel that derek’s parents gave us earlier this year, and inspired by a random conversation we were having with grace about salt, we decided to make these ridiculously decadent fleur de sel caramels. coupled with a simple origami nesting box made out of a leftover piece of wrapping paper, we’ve got ourselves the perfect gift for a friend’s birthday party this weekend. click here for the full project and instructions or just click “read more” below.
ever since we bought our first piece of “grown-up” furniture (a teak dining room table) we’ve done our best to protect its surface. these cork and felt coasters are a cinch to make, and do a fantastic job protecting the wood from those inevitable water rings made by our drinking glasses and coffee mugs. click here for the full project instructions or just click “read more” below.
