I’ve run into a bit of a hiccup with the painted studio floor. If everything had gone well, the floor would have been finished by the end of the weekend. Everything didn’t go well.
I did get the checkerboard floor in the main part of the room finished, and it looks great! But what gave me trouble was the back entry. If you’ll remember, I had planned to stop the big checkerboard at the cased opening between the main room and the back entry, and then paint a rug-type design on the back entry floor like I had before with the black and white chevron painted floor.
I had something like this in mind.
But seeing the design in real life as opposed to a small mock-up made things very different. First, having the large main checkerboard design just dead end at the cased opening looked really strange and unfinished, probably because the actual gray that I used is much lighter than the gray shown on them mock-up.
And then I got to the design on the back entry floor, and I just couldn’t see more checkerboard looking good in that area. So I racked my brain (and also spent quite a bit of time on Pinterest) trying to come up with a design that might coordinate with the checkerboard floor. I also needed to find a way to end the large checkerboard design in the cased opening instead of just stopping the design, which seemed kind of random.
For the back entry floor, I considered just about every two-color painted floor design I could think of and find on Pinterest. Of course, I considered stripes, but I also considered so many others.
I finally landed on a square two-color sunray design. It seemed easy, and since I was using the same two colors that I used on the checkerboard floor, I figured it would coordinate. And to create a stopping point where the main checkerboard design ended, I decided to do three simple stripes going the whole width of the opening in white, gray, and white.
Well, the stripes in the cased opening looked awful (I forgot to take a picture), so I painted the center gray strip white, which just left me with one 6-inch-wide stripe. I wasn’t thrilled with that, either. And then I painted one section on the sunray design, and that didn’t look great. So it all seemed like a fail to me. Here’s what it looked like when I decided to stop.
That stripe in the cased opening still needs a second coat of white over what was the center gray stripe. But I may end up sanding it down and doing something different altogether.
And then I decided to use my photo editor and fill in the rest of the sunray design to get a better idea of what it would look like. My mock-up isn’t perfect, but we can at least get an idea of what the finished design would look like. I’m definitely not excited about it.
So that really took some of the wind out of my sails. I was so excited about finishing the floor this last weekend, and then just as I got the last little area, nothing seemed to go right.
I really can’t envision any separate floor design looking good in the back entry. The only option I see is continuing the large checkerboard design straight through from the main room to the back French doors. The only issue is that I definitely do NOT want the checkerboard design in the studio bathroom or the storage closet opposite the bathroom. So I’m still going to have to find a way to officially end the design. Otherwise, I’ll just run into the same problem that I had with the floor in the cased opening.
I wonder if doing a very thin black like to “finish” the checkerboard flooring might work. That would tie in with all of the other black accents in all areas of the studio. So the new revised design would look like this…
But for now, I guess I need to get busy with some sanding. I’m glad this is a small area, and it won’t need much sanding. I just need to get rid of all of the paint ridges that always form as a result of taping off a design and painting over the tape. It’s frustrating that I’m having to take a step backwards, but at least it’s not difficult, and it shouldn’t add too much time to this project. This painted floor has been a pretty big project overall, and I’m glad to be down to the last little bit so I can move on to other things!
Addicted 2 Decorating is where I share my DIY and decorating journey as I remodel and decorate the 1948 fixer upper that my husband, Matt, and I bought in 2013. Matt has M.S. and is unable to do physical work, so I do the majority of the work on the house by myself. You can learn more about me here.
