updated upstairs space home tour

Hi guys! I’m excited to share an updated post showing you our upstairs! Last fall, we decided to renovate our upstairs! I’ll re-share some quick info about this renovation that I’ve shared in previous blog posts.

We bought our house in fall 2018 and were quickly captivated by the 100-year-old house’s location and charm. The house had a lot of quirks and needed some love, but no major renovations or construction projects were required. The upstairs was two rooms, both with awkward layouts and poorly constructed closets. The upstairs also had a bit of an attic vibe – there were sloped ceilings on both sides and dormer windows on either end of the space (one of which was covered by a window A/C unit). It was dark up there and we really used the space for storage, as a ‘den’ and office, but mostly just for a guest room when family and friends came to visit. The space functioned fine, but didn’t look super great. And, the big inconvenience was that there was no bathroom upstairs. In the fall of 2019, we met with an architect to construct a plan to renovate our upstairs, with the main update being – A BATHROOM and overall open concept living space. We ended up hiring a different contractor to execute the work (Veler & Co based here in East Nashville) which kicked off at the end of November. The project was scoped to take 10 weeks and be done one week before Winnie was due. We were shocked that 1) everything got done on time and 2) the project cost remained within the original scope, because so many things went wrong! We live in a historic neighborhood, so we had to deal with regular city permitting plus approval from the historical commission on our plans. On top of that, SO many items arrived damaged, incorrect or late including the bathroom sink (cracked), bathtub (cracked), bath drain (wrong), sink faucet (wrong), bath faucet (wrong), bathroom flooring (cracked), and the bathroom mirror (cracked). PLUS we added on to the original plan last minute and decided to insulate the entire space and add three skylights. I’ve shared more about our upstairs here in this blog post about the guest room space, this blog post about the new bathroom, and this blog post about the window nook that Eric built. And, here is an Instagram story highlight showing the progress of the renovation from start to finish!

The original plan was to make this upstairs space a hybrid guest room and den/hang out space. This is what it was for the first three months after the renovation. A few weeks ago, we decided we liked the upstairs so much that we wanted to make it our master bedroom, too! Now that E is working from home indefinitely, it’s nice to have an office space that is connected to our bedroom, vs. in the guest space. Plus, our Peloton is up here, which is also nice to access privately and not ask guests if we can come into their space to exercise. We moved the guest room furniture down to our old master bedroom on the main floor. This room also has its own bathroom, so guests will still have their own private space when they visit. The new upstairs bathroom is a little smaller than our downstairs bath, but much nicer and brighter, which we love! So now our upstairs functions as our master bedroom, Eric’s office, a family room, and an exercise area. Right now, we still have Winnie’s bassinet up here with us until she transitions into Lucy’s room.

Originally, the plan was to furnish the upstairs with items we already owned and for the most part, we haven’t bought anything new up here. A couple items like the couch, one rug, picture frames, and desk chair, were gifted from collaborations, but everything else we had purchased last year and just moved to this space. I do want to hang a piece of art about Winnie’s bassinet, and also style the dresser a little differently, but overall, we love how this space turned out! It’s CRAZY how much this space was transformed from when we first moved in and we are super happy with these serene area of our home!