All posts by Beth Dotolo
Seattle Waterfront Renovation & Interior Design
Pulp at Home: Beth’s Custom Performance Dining Chairs
When it came to choosing the dining chairs for my own home, it was a decision I didn’t take lightly. Funny enough, dining chairs can be one of the larger investments for a client’s furnishing package. Depending on the size of your dining room, whatever chair you choose, you have to multiply that times 4, times 8, or sometimes… times 20! Luckily, I have a smaller dining room and can really only fit 6 chairs. Either way, it adds up.
More importantly, is that I wanted my dining chairs to hold up to the every day wear and tear of my two kids and hold up to the use they often get when we’re entertaining friends. Our dining room is also the main table we use for everyday meals… remember, I live in Seattle where space is at a premium! And, I love that we eat all of our meals together here.
So, I found a fabric that I absolutely loved from S. Harris… Godwin in color, Earthwind. You may remember that we have a liscensed collection with S. Harris, but this fabric is from another collection created by their creative director. So, we can’t take credit for it. But, I was instantly smitten… and, strangely enough, a little unsure I wanted it in my home. It is such a funky pattern and a bold one, at that. But, when I thought through that question, I knew I needed that fabric.
First of all, you only live once. Secondly, it’s always the items our clients are unsure of, that when they trust us and say ‘Yes!’… it’s the piece in their home they love the most!
So, I decided to just go for it! There was only one problem… linen, food, and small children (and, drinking adults) don’t mix. Since I knew the process we were going through to create our Pulp Design Studios for S. Harris Hospitality Collection (launching this month!), I took that fabric to the S. Harris creative director and asked if I could have it made into a performance velvet! And, it was absolutely possible. Sometimes you never know what can be accomplished until you push your collaborators. And, not only was it possible at small yardages… it was less expensive! Those are the kinds of hoops we love to jump through to push our projects and get amazing style and quality for our client’s investment.
Now, to find a chair! We had recently installed some Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams chairs in one of our beloved client’s high rise condo. I absolutely loved them! I knew they were comfortable before we even specified them for our client- because we always go high and low to sit test before we suggest anything to a client- and, our client confirmed that after living with them that they would spend hours hosting long dinners, game nights, and book clubs. They are always complimented by guests for their comfort. So, I was sold.
Our new chairs are incredibly comfortable and the lush velvet makes them feel absolutely buttery soft to sit in. And, perhaps, one of my favorite parts of my dining chairs is that I specified that they not pattern match when upholstering the chairs. Since the pattern repeat is so large, no chair is the same. I love how uniquely stylish they are!
WHAT’S NEXT IN THE #FIGTREERAMBLER DINING ROOM?
Before we tackle some of the larger Kitchen and Bath renovations, we’re going to keep playing with getting the spaces we use every day happy and finished out with key furnishings.
Here’s my checklist, for now…
- A new chandelier
- Art over the bench
- Drapery for the windows
Stay tuned for my next post, where I’ll reveal the design plan to finish out my Dining Room!
If you have any comments or questions, follow and direct message us over at our instagram accounts at @pulpdesigns!
Beth’s #PulpAtHome:
Read the posts + @bethdotolo on instagram + #FigTreeRambler on instagram
Carolina’s #PulpAtHome:
Read the posts + @carolinavgentry on instagram + #TheValenciaProject on instagram
Home Tour: Classic with an Edge
Beth & Carolina share how the Pulp Design Studios created an entertainers’ heaven, while still functional enough for a family with small children.
Dallas Texas Interior Design
Lakewood Texas Luxury Interior Design
Pulp at Home: Beth’s Tips for Selecting the Right Paint
Last month, I shared all about how I came to live in our home. But we couldn’t move in without a proper paint job – plus, it’s a perfect time to paint when nothing is in the house! So I wanted to share some before-and-after photos, along with some tips and tricks on selecting paint. As we say at Pulp, it’s all about an individual experience and applications can vary from project to project. Let’s take a look at how I tackled a few of the spaces in our whole-home paint job…
The living room has such great light – it just needed a brighter and more up-to-date palette to make the most of the sun streaming through those windows.
I’m thrilled to finally be taking on my own little design project! Just like with any other project, we pulled everything together on mood boards to make sure the paint colors were perfect – and worked together perfectly!
The tone-on-tone colors in the living room are crisp and clean – so much more modern!
The dining room obviously needed an update – it was firmly stuck in the wrong decade.
Since the living room and dining room are open to each other, we wanted the colors to flow seamlessly from room to room, too.
I’m thrilled with how the rooms are coming together, but we have a lot more to do (like that new chandelier)! Stay tuned…
The tile really dated the kitchen. We weren’t ready for a full demo, so we had to come up with a plan to modernize this kitchen’s look as quickly as possible. Paint was the solution!
Yes, you can cover tile with a primer – and it made all the difference!
It isn’t perfect (yet), but it’s SO much better!
I wasn’t a fan of this color in the master – and the “accent” was on the wrong wall.
A darker color is perfect in a bedroom – it creates a cozy feeling.
Still working on our bedroom… but it’s looking lovely in this light!
While paint can make a huge difference, this basement had a not-so-happy surprise in store for us that caused us to change things up…
The original plan was just to paint the wall with a great scrubbable option.
I feel like painting a home really helps you claim it. It shifts the energy and makes it feel like home. And, now that the paint crew has finished painting, it’s time to get to the fun stuff… the furnishings!
After Carolina shares all about her renovation next week, I’m going to start revealing a bit about our furniture design – which is still in progress!
For now, we’re leaving you with some serious before photos (above) and a little tease at the progress over at #FigTreeRambler, so far….
If you have any comments or questions, follow and direct message us over at our instagram accounts at @pulpdesigns!
Beth’s #PulpAtHome:
Read the posts + @bethdotolo on instagram + #FigTreeRambler on instagram
Carolina’s #PulpAtHome:
Read the posts + @carolinavgentry on instagram + #TheValenciaProject on instagram
Pulp at Home: The Story of Beth’s Seattle Home
Shifting Gears
Hello! Beth Dotolo, here. I am excited to share that we are making a little shift on the Pulp blog… We have always exclusively shared our client’s homes, design trends and tips, and now we are pulling back the curtain and opening the door to our own humble homes.
Don’t worry, we’re still sharing all the latest in projects and trends in an editorial way, especially in our magazine ICON. But, here, we’re rolling up our sleeves a little and giving you a look into our personal design processes and life. As designers, our homes are a constant work in progress, ever-changing, and since we are small business owners who work on luxury residences for our clients, we’re jumping into this with a little vulnerability, too… Carolina and I will both kick off the series sharing how we came to live in the homes we’re in now, starting with me, in our new series: Pulp at Home.
The Story of Beth’s Seattle Home
Now, for my story… I recently purchased a new home in Seattle at the end of last year… as many of you know, we moved to Seattle from Dallas a little over seven years ago (when we opened our Seattle studio). I still can’t believe we’ve been here for over seven years! They say everything is bigger in Texas, and they aren’t lying. We ended up settling in to a Seattle home that was a little over 1,000 square feet for the first 6 years we lived here and, let me tell you, it was cramped. A family of four, with a dog and a cat, and frequent visitors. My husband and I would often times give up our bed to family visiting and sleep in our kids rooms on an air mattress. Now, imagine being a designer and designing luxury homes all day to come home from work and have to sleep on the floor! It was quite the juxtaposition. Of course, we wanted a larger home. But, we were happy.
Then everything changed for us… My mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer in Texas in 2017 and in the summer of last year she asked me to take care of her. I flew to Texas to get her and moved her into our home. My two boys rooms and their playrooms were shoved all into one room and my husband and I made her a room of her own so she felt at home. Shortly after she moved in with us, she was admitted to the hospital and they found that the cancer had spread to her brain. The decision was made to put her into hospice care and she lived with us for a couple months under my care in hospice, before passing away in our home. (As a side note, I am so grateful for our amazing Pulp team because they were able to help me make our clients feel like everything was just fine and we kept those projects rolling last fall.) Those were some dark, stressful, and, at times, beautiful days… not just for me, but our kids, too. After experiencing such gut-wrenching pain and stress in that tiny home with one bathroom, it was time to make a move. I needed to get out, but only so I could separate myself from the oppressive times and look at the loss and life of my mom from a different perspective. In the words of a good friend of mine, this felt like running towards something and not running away from it.
That’s the short version of a long story and I’m still healing, but it’s pivotal to why our home means so much to us now and why it’s a bright spot in some really hard times.
With that, I’d like to introduce you to our home… or the start of it, anyways.
Our home was built in 1948 and is a mid-century rambler style, with great bones and amazing light. It was well cared for by the former homeowners, and the woman who lived here before sold the home shortly after her husband passed away. So in a way, I feel like it was destined. Sent from the heavens or not, our new home is in need of a good healthy kitchen and bath renovation, for my tastes.
I have been having fun dissecting our home and our life to be able to apply the same principals to designing my own home that we apply to our clients… How do you live? How do you entertain? What are your indulgences? I asked myself all of these questions we ask our clients in our Splendid Living process as we went on the hunt for our home.
What we loved about it, firstly, is that there is space….. ahhhhhh. Space! It’s not a huge home, compared to most. But, compared to how we were living before it’s pretty great.
High on my husband’s list was a finished basement. We entertain often (which we haven’t been able to do since moving into the last home) and we have lots of friends with kids. We loved the idea that we could have friends over and have space downstairs for kids to be kids, with civilized entertaining above. There is also a guest room (albeit awkwardly laid out) and a second full kitchen in the basement, which is amazing for guests. We will often have family stay with us for 2-3 weeks, so the thought of having a space for them to get coffee and have some quiet time (along with giving us some personal space) was so enticing. Long term, that basement kitchen will be turned into a proper bar. In case you didn’t know me, I’m a huge cocktail enthusiast and we love a proper cocktail. Our home definitley needs a proper bar!
We also loved the backyard! Seattle is such an outdoorsy city and we love spending time outdoors. My favorite, and possibly what sold me on the home, is that there is a giant fig tree out back. A fig tree!! With real figs! Hence, we named our home… Fig Tree Rambler. Every home needs a name, right?! So, basically, our summer plans will consist of me in a hammock in the backyard drinking fig cocktails. Sounds perfect.
The other thing we loved about this home was that it has a detached garage with an apartment above. We immediately saw income potential there! So far, we’ve only used it as an additional guest room, but we’re excited about the potential of getting it fixed up and renting it out. We call it the Fig Tree Guest House and it will be super cute when we’re done with it. Speaking of the detached garage… Our plans are to turn part of the garage into a home fitness center.
We’ve got big plans and there’s a lot of renovation work and furnishing to be done! We’ve taken plenty of steps in the last several months to get things in a great place and I’m going to share lots of that here in the coming months… but the first thing we did before we even moved in was get rid of the basement carpet and painted the whole home. There’s something about a fresh coat of paint that really helps you claim your home. It gives it such fresh look and shifts the energy… yes, I’m west coast now and I’ve gone full ‘Woo’.
After Carolina introduces you to her beautiful home next week, I’m going to share the painting process we took on, before and afters, and some tips and colors! For now, we’re leaving you with some serious before photos (above) and a little tease at the progress over at #FigTreeRambler, so far….
If you have any comments or questions, follow and direct message us over at our instagram accounts at @pulpdesigns!
Beth’s #PulpAtHome:
Read the posts + @bethdotolo on instagram + #FigTreeRambler on instagram
Carolina’s #PulpAtHome:
Read the posts (coming next week) + @carolinavgentry on instagram + #TheValenciaProject on instagram
Bellevue Washington Interior Design
