By Request: Apartment Tour

A couple of readers have requested a tour of my apartment, so today I thought I would oblige. This post comes at a rather odd time though, because I'll soon be moving; Mark and I have got a place together! We just found out that we got the flat we wanted, and we're both really excited about it. More to come on this new adventure. In the meantime, I suppose it's fitting that I do a little tribute to my soon-to-be-former abode.

I put a lot of thought and energy into the decor of my apartment when I was setting it up 5 years ago, as it was a chance to start with a relatively clean slate and to use the skills I'd learned when I took several interior design classes at a local community college. My apartment is small, about 600 square feet, so I really needed to get the most use out of the available space. And more importantly, I wanted to create a vibrant, modern interior that was also welcoming and comfortable.

Upon entering my apartment this is what you see: the hallway and the bathroom at the end. Yes, my shower curtain has shoes and handbags on it; but of course! On the left is a bookcase with old family photos on top; to the immediate left and right (out of the frame) are walk-in closets, and the doorways at the end of the hall lead to the main room on the left and the dining room and kitchen on the right.

Walking down the hallway and looking back, you'll see the front door (my old spot for outfit photos until I got bored with it), and the doors to the closets (the largest closet, on the right, also has a door that connects with the main room). I've done a closet tour before; here are the links to those posts:

Part I: Closet Philosophy
Part II: Tops and Accessories Closet
Part III: Skirts, Dresses, and Shoes Closet
Part IV: Coat Closet

First I'll show you the main room, which functions as both the bedroom and living area. My goal was to create a cozy seating area and make it look distinctly separate from the bedroom half of the room, even though the two are literally inches apart. When you enter the room and look to the right, you see the seating area, with the TV and Charlie's habitat. That modern-looking perforated round table actually opens up and is Georgie's bed and crate.

Right now the room is far more packed than I would like it to be, in part because of this recent purchase (though there will be plenty of room for it in the new place):

Inside is a gorgeous 1920's sewing machine with gold Egyptian motifs on a black background. I found it for a steal of a price at a local antique store and could not pass it up; it still works and has all the attachments!

Panning left, you can see the rest of the seating area. The sectional sofa helps to define this as the living room, keeping it visually separate from the bedroom half of the room, which you can just see the corner of on the left.

Here's the other half of the room, the bedroom side. I used the hanging shell strands to further define this as a separate room-within-a-room. The shell strands (from West Elm) make a beautiful tinkling sound when you disturb them.

Looking all the way to the left are my bookshelves, another past outfit posing spot which doesn't get used very often because the lighting isn't as good. Those bookshelves (the Sapien bookcase from DWR) are brilliant for small spaces, because they hold a ton of books in a very small footprint. The bamboo wall graphics are by Blik. The round rugs, as well as the area rug in the seating area, are by Flor, which makes eco-friendly modular rug tiles that can be configured in a multitude of ways.

Moving to the other side of the entry hall, there is the by now familiar yellow dining room, which also doubles as my office area. I also stuck the refrigerator in there, because the kitchen was just too small for it.

As you can see I still have my old iMac as well as my new PC; when it came to it I just couldn't bear to get rid of the Mac, and anyway it has Photoshop on it, which I didn't want to have to buy again for the PC. So I hooked them both up, and now I use the PC for all my blogging, email, etc,. and the Mac when I need better graphics capabilities, such as editing the promo photos for the shop.

Finally, there's the kitchen, which you enter just to the left of where I take my daily outfit photos. As you can see I've mounted just about every type of rack, shelf, and hook available in order to keep my limited cabinet space as uncrowded as possible.

For more about that beautiful wall graphic, see this post.

That concludes the tour! It may be small, but it's been great little home for Georgie, Charlie and I for the last 5 years. In many ways I'll miss it, but the new place promises such delights -- including (drum roll)... outdoor photos!!

Allow Me to Introduce... My Lizard

Have you been watching the new Life series on the Discovery Channel? I'm absolutely enthralled with shows like that, and I was particularly excited to see that one of the first episodes was dedicated entirely to reptiles and amphibians. I've hinted at my great love for herpetofauna on the blog before (and perhaps you've guessed it from my snake tattoo), but today I thought I'd go a step further and introduce you to Charlie, my pet lizard.

Charlie is a Chuckwalla lizard, and is native to the American southwest desert regions. I'm not entirely sure of his origins, though my assumption is that he was originally wild caught in Nevada. Having been purchased at a pet store, he belonged to a friend's son when I lived out in Minnesota, and when the son went away to college I adopted Charlie. That was in the winter of 1998, which would make Charlie at least 12 or 13 years old (they can live up to 25 years).

Charlie is a smallish lizard, measuring about 11 or 12 inches from nose to tail. However, he resides in an enclosure of epic proportions, which is roughly 5 feet tall, 4 feet wide and 2 feet deep. He inherited this palatial residence from my beloved iguana Pet, who passed away a few years ago. At first I wanted to get rid of the enclosure because the reminder of Pet was too painful, but in the end I decided that upgrading Charlie's living quarters was a more fitting tribute. So there it sits, taking up an enormous amount of space in my studio apartment. Watching Charlie, a rock-dwelling species, clamber clumsily up and down on the branches is entertainment that more than makes up for the oversized footprint of the enclosure. And more importantly, he really seems to enjoy having all that space.

You might not think it by looking at him, but underneath Charlie's harmless looking exterior lies the heart of a killer...

...of flowers. Yes, this diminutive reptile has an insatiable appetite for anything sweet smelling and brightly-colored. Nasturtiums are one of his favorite treats, and he's ruthless in devouring them. He's so enthusiastic when he gets a treat that you'd think he was a Komodo Dragon going in for the kill. He's especially attracted to the color yellow, and once he even tried to eat my DeWalt drill when Mark and I were making some repair on his enclosure.

The coolest thing about Charlie is his ability to inflate his body with air when he's scared or pissed off. In the wild, Chuckwallas inflate in order to squeeze themselves into rock crevices and prevent predators from extracting them, but after living predator-free for all these years, Charlie is pretty relaxed and rarely does it anymore. The only time he does is when he gets a bath, which then causes him to bob around in the water like a buoy. If I weren't afraid of stressing him out too much, I'd probably bathe him more often just to giggle at the sight of him floating in the tub.

Do you have any exotic or unusual pets?