For All You Crummy-Apartment Dwellers
This post probably won’t appeal to a lot of people because most people probably don’t live in crummy apartments with medicine cabinets full of mold, peeling paint, and God-knows-what-else. But, for the few of you out there who do, this is something I recently did that has made getting ready in the mornings a little less scary. There are no before pictures because, honestly, I’m ashamed at how bad this cabinet was looking. Like everything else in my lovely, too-small rental bathroom, the inside of the medicine cabinet was covered in paint which I assume to have one day been white. In places it was peeling to expose some awful green, and in others the original wood below (if only they’d left the wood in this apartment alone!). To make matters worse, we have a real humidity problem in the bathroom. There is no ventilation system, so the door really must almost always be left open or it’s mold city in there. This is true for the medicine cabinet times a million. Everything in there, including our toothbrushes, always stayed slightly moist. Certain bottles (ones we don’t use often, like peroxide) actually had mold growing on them. I’m really ashamed that we’ve lived this way for a year and half, although I don’t think it’s always been this bad. I’m not sure what happened to upset the balance in our medicine cabinet, but I finally got tired of looking at three colors of paint and fifteen species of mold every morning and decided to do something. I initially thought about wallpaper, but nice-looking inexpensive wallpaper is tough to come by around here. I have been really, weirdly into wood grain lately, so I decided to use wood grain contact paper instead.
After removing all of the products and shelves (which also required a thorough wipe-down), I used a natural cleaner to scrub down the inside of the cabinet, trying not to chip off any more paint (I’m not sure if there’s lead somewhere under there, but it wouldn’t surprise me). I then measured the dimensions of the cabinet and used one long piece to go from top to bottom, and big pieces to fill in the gaps between where the shelves are perched. Surprisingly, wood grain is a very forgiving pattern and I was able to cover the entire inside except for the shelf supports.
The camera highlights all my mistakes--I promise it's stunning in person!
This was also a good reason to throw things away. I love throwing away things I no longer use or shouldn’t use because they’re expired. I was also able to take stock of what I have (too much damned soap; there are seven bars in the medicine cabinet and two in the shower), which will hopefully prevent me from buying any more (I just love nice soap too much!). A project like this isn’t really a big deal and doesn’t take up much time, but I really like the effect. Not having to see at peeling paint and mold every day certainly cheers me up!
Note to all: If you were thinking of getting me soap for Christmas, think again.
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Comments
One Comment on For All You Crummy-Apartment Dwellers
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Dawn on
Sat, 5th Dec 2009 8:55 pm
I have seen it, and yes it is stunning in person!
Good job.
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