Pretty Stairs

I'm sure anyone that reads this blog is well aware of my ability to come up with big huge projects for the house that will inevitably consume a lot of hours and a lot of cash. But hey, a girl can dream, right?! Lately, my mind has been running full force trying to figure out something to do with our staircase/hallway, since we've thrown around the idea of tackling that this winter when we're inside hiding from the bitter cold.

From what we've been told, whoever owned our little house before us was apparently trying to flip it. While that explains the all neutral walls and everything else covered in white paint color scheme we walked in to, it's also important to note that in a lot of ways... said flippers did a really crappy job. I suppose it's not exactly fair to assume that the previous owners even had anything to do with the oddity of the hallway, but I can't help but wonder (woo, Sex & the City shoutout!) why it is the way it is.

See my lovely little picture, which I've so beautifully labeled in photoshop with what I refer to as the "line of ruin" -


If you look closely, you can see that said "line of ruin" is a big squared chunk of the wall that juts out about a half of an inch from the rest of it. WHY?!?

Now you may be wondering why I really care about that little line of extra wall, and to that I show you this -


Beautiful, isn't it? This jaw-dropping staircase belongs to none other than Centsational Girl, who's blog full of DIY projects and at home makeovers has me drooling on an almost daily basis.

While I'm not sure I could EVER convince Dan to go for the wallpapered panels below the chair rail that Kate the Centsational Girl did, I was able to get almost a full nod of approval on the idea of a chair rail with blank panels underneath with complimentary paint colors for an overall gorgeous two-toned look. Then I noticed that darned line of ruin. And the fact that our staircase is nowhere near as breezy and open as Kate's. Long story short - we can't have a chair rail. And if we decided to try anyways, it would look really really ridiculous. FINE.

The line of ruin also knocks out any chance of serene strips a la Young House Love's extra bathroom (although I would go vertical over horizontal to play up the height) -


Back to the drawing board and still convinced I can do something besides paint one solid color, I turned to a google image search for "staircase makeovers" and now have two new ideas to run past Dan one of these days when I think he's feeling extra open minded :).

#1. DIY Stenciling. Easier (and cheaper) than wallpaper, tons of room for creativity, and somehow doesn't feel quite so permanent, which is always nice for someone as indecisive as myself.




#2. Funky stairs. With a "normal" neutral colored wall hosting a slew of framed black & white pictures. Again, not insanely permanent, and easy to switch up if I tire of it.



I'm fairly certain this could be done with regular old paper and some mono-adhesive spray, or wallpaper if I find something I love!