Tyler and I have finally gotten settled into our tiny Beverly Hills apartment. I was really excited to start buying our own furniture and decorations when we moved out here, having always lived in badly furnished Provo apartments and random Marriott hotel rooms, however, it is much easier said than done. I still don't feel like our apartment is perfect, but it is good enough and we like it :)
Our main room doubles as a living and dining area. Since we have very little space my new cruiser has inevitably become part of the decor.
My favorite thing about our apartment are all the small details, but they are hard to get good pictures of. In the corner of the main room next to the plant are four gold & silver frames. They each contain a postcard-size print of a WWII era poster from Great Britain. I got them while visiting the war rooms in London, where Winston Churchill had his headquarters during the bombings, and I thought they were interesting.
I feel like our apartment ended up with travel as its theme without really meaning too. Along with the world map, and some British influence, we ended up with a few African animals- this elephant, a very skinny giraffe, and a pair of vintage brass alligator nutcrackers.
I think it is important to note that Tyler definitely had a say in the decor. Two of his larger picks were the red
Panton S Chairs and this
Castiglioni Arco Lamp over the dining room table. I think some of my interior design education is rubbing off on him since they are both very classic, and designer pieces. The
Jacobsen Ant-style dining chairs are some of my favorites and the first thing we bought for our apartment.
I apologize that the lighting in some of these pictures is not that great, but I wanted you to see how every window is shielded by palm fronds outside. It keeps our place pretty cool and it feels a little more private and protected this way.
Our kitchen is very,
very tiny. We knew the second we moved in we would need to find a way to add counter space and storage space, and when Tyler found this bright green, industrial metal table I fell in love with it- so much so, that we later bought an identical red one to use as the desk in our bedroom!
Our bedroom really doesn't have too much going on, but I like it this way. I think the sunburst mirror over the bed was one of our last purchases, but it was something I was searching for ever since we moved in. I finally found a really cheap one that I liked at Target and then I painted it gold to match the other gold accessories in our place.
In case you were wondering why our bed isn't made, it's because I like it that way. Not because I'm lazy, (please, I clean my bathroom like three times a week) but because it seems more comfortable and inviting this way- just a little mussed up :) I think the simple pillowcases and bedcover look a little stark all made up nice.
This painting of a fish pond is on the left wall in our bedroom. I like it because you can see the brush strokes, so it kind of has some texture, and that's my favorite kind of painting.
Like I mentioned before, the small details in our apartment are what I like best. The vintage brass alligator nutcracker above is one that my mom had sitting on our mantel while I was young and we still lived in Colorado. After we moved to Hawaii I never saw it and just assumed she had left it behind. I had always liked it though, so when I randomly found one online for sale I snatched it right up. I told my mom about it only to find out that she still had the one I had wanted from our mantel. She gave it to me when I went to visit last Thanksgiving, so now I have a cute little pair of them.
Some of the other little details I like are all on this cubed bookshelf. The dazzling, blue glass bowl that looks like a splash of water to set our keys in, the cute glass and gold-trimmed sugar & creamer my aunt gave me, and a white temple sunstone from Nauvoo that is one of our favorite pieces. I like having little things that have a story attached to it.
This photo from our wedding day hangs in our room and when most people see it it takes a minute for them to realize it is Tyler and I and not just the photo that came with the frame when we purchased it. I think that's why I like it so much :)
Sometimes I feel like our place is too cluttered and other times I feel like it's really boring, but I definitely feel like it has a little bit of both of us in it, so it works. Besides, if you know Tyler and I very well, then you know it isn't likely we'll be in Beverly Hills too long anyways :)
Last Saturday Tyler and I went for a quick two mile hike/walk up the Soltice Canyon Trail in Malibu to a little waterfall- or two or three. We invited Jordan and James and the babes to come with us and it was a lot of fun. When we got up to the waterfall we discovered that a huge mansion was once built there, but it burned down in one of Malibu's famous wildfires. The remains indicated that the house was HUGE though, and the family had used the waterfalls as a water source both inside their home,and outside with numerous fountains and pools.
There were signs along the trail that said beware of rattle snakes so I was kind of freaked out walking to close to the brush on either side of the trail. Tyler and James kept making it worse too, but I managed to step off the trail enough to get a photo of this random bathtub. I didn't get too close though cause I didn't want to find a snake party inside of it!!
I took a photo of these flowers because they reminded me of the flowers I painted on a card for my mom Mother's Day that I thought I had made up- I guess I'm really just a genius :)
