Man Cave

Like most men my husband would love a space he could call his own and that's why I decided to turn our study into a man cave. For Christmas we put a shed up in the backyard, in order to free up some space in the garage. Now my husband isn't a shed type of guy so we needed an area in which he could hide away and do what ever men do in their caves. So with only one room left, the study will become his office when he works from home and thus it'll also be known as his man cave.

Like many couples if you present a space to them and asked them how they'd decorate it their responses would probably be quiet different. That's what it's like in our house. Mr Opoes likes a modern, minimalistic look with clean lines and I like wooden things, vintage items while also liking some modern pieces. I know you're thinking that we really don't have much to work with because we like different things but when we moved into our house we decided that we would like to decorate the house in a classic, vintage style with items that aren't cheaply made so that they will last us longer or so they'll last the children's treatment of them.

When we were building our house we designed the study to have two functions, one was to be a study and the other was to act as a guest room. After living here for nearly two years we've never had a guest sleep in the study. So when I was planning how I wanted the room to function I've made room for a blow up mattress to fit, still allowing the room to serve two purposes. This foresight meant we were able to add a built in wardrobe, thus allowing us to divide up the space between my husband's study and a guest room.

Last year I purchased a beautiful barn style door that I wanted to use as a table top for a desk and after explaining my concept to my husband he seemed pleased with the idea. Using the door will allow me to create a unique feature within the study as the door is  fifty years old so it'll be a vintage item with somewhat of a classic style. I'm looking forward to seeing what the door has to offer once it's stripped back and I'm hoping that we'll have a unique desk top for the room. The additional benefit is Mr Opoes will have a place to rest his laptop on while he works instead of sitting in the middle of the house, in the kids area.

Other decorating ideas include creating a gallery wall that you see when you come through the door. Directly opposite I'm creating a storage space so my husband doesn't have to leave the room to find a file while he's working. After talking to some of my blog friends on Facebook I also decided to hang three pictures above the storage space as they're sentiment to my husband and I, but I'll share those with you when the room is all finished. When I did the gallery wall in our front entrance my husband helped me hung all 33 picture frames and it was during this time that I learnt he liked the concept behind a gallery wall.

With this in mind I wanted to create something slightly different so that it would have more of a masculine feel about it. When I talked to my friend Mel over at Mellywood's Mansion she gave me the idea of creating a monochromatic gallery wall as she thought this would be something my husband would enjoy. This idea was perfect as I'd wanted to cover a corkboard within fabric, plus I had a few embroidery hoops that would be ideal for showcasing pieces of fabric to create the monochromatic look I was after. Not long after this Christian (another blogging friend) posted a picture on Facebook showing what Jamie from Raising up Rubies did with an embroidery hoop and I was hocked.

Now if I'd shown this picture to my husband he would have laughed but I had just the right shirt to go in my embroidery hoop and it would work perfectly with the monochromatic theme. The shirt I had in mind defines my husband so it was a no brainier that it would be perfect for my gallery wall. The other good thing was I could use the wooden hoops frames and this would save me having to paint them. After spending time ironing the shirt, sewing it down in places and hiding all the extra material in the back I was left with this.

I was really happy with the way it turned out and because of the size of the hoop I found it was easier to use cotton to hide the extra fabric instead of using glue to hide it away. I was really happy with they look that the various hoops created especially when I paired it with a few square canvas's, the rectangular corkboard and photo frame. When I presented the finished wall to Mr Opoes on his birthday he really liked it and ultimately that's all I was trying to achieve.

I am really happy with the look of this wall and I think that even though its monochromatic and masculine I really like it and I can't wait to get the entire room finished so that I can continue blogging in there when Mr Opoes isn't working from home. I'm hoping to find a way to use the kid's pet rocks in the room so maybe I'll find a space for them in the future. So what do you think I'd love to hear your thoughts on my little wall. Should I use the rocks on the wall? Tell me what you would do.

Megan