Furniture Wrasslin

While in a stylistic slump I bought the above child's bed. I of course had no intention of leaving it like that, but nonetheless, looking at it now it's easy to wonder what I was thinking. I am no stranger to DIY, but there are some things that even I can't D. What you can see in the photo is that it is pine, which is by itself something, indeed, to reckon with. What you can't see is that it is for children, is upholstered in a thin, white, scratchy and semitranslucent fabric, and that the ends can handily, Allen-wrenchly, be let down as your child grows.

Well, I don't have a child, just the neighbor's cat on occasion, and I stopped growing years ago, much to my continuing dismay. Moreover, my decor scheme lies somewhere between Lebanese Maiden Aunt and Balkan Bordello, so the clean lines and light tone of Nordic pine stylings are far from congruent with the rest of my furnishings. My bed is all pillows and curtains and dark Chinese hardwoods and silky sheets; the living room is overrun with textures and brocades and highly sink-into-able things. Not to mention more pillows.

Obviously the pine had to go. That made a great difference, but it was then a darker-colored boxy child's bed in austere Northern style. So I bought a few billion dollars' worth of fabric trim with tassels on it (you don't know how pricey fabric trim is until you buy it by the mile), and some 'Turkish turban' big tassels to stick where the trim ended on the 'ends' of the bed (now the outsides of the 'sides' of the divan.) I upholstered the bed part, which was now taking shape as the seat and inside arms of the divan, and covered the tops of the 'arms' with upholstered foam. Next I took a few dozen pillows out of storage, et voila: a divan on which any self-respecting member of any Divan would have felt more than at ease (in languid recumbence!) enjoying some apple shisha with the languourous (not to mention dusky!) odalisque of his choice.