Living Room Reno: Progress & latest flea finds

Back with an update! Our handyman started work on the ceiling Monday and it has been a slow and steady process ever since. If you follow me on instagram you know this already…

To recap—we decided to plank the ceiling and install beams to match the kitchen in the adjacent room:

But since this ceiling is vaulted and 16' high at the top, we could not do it ourselves, so we hired our handyman (the same one who built our stair railing).

Step 1 was to buy our tongue and groove boards. I still had a stack leftover from the first purchase, so I bought 420 square feet to cover the ceiling (and it ended up being just enough, whew). It came to $570 after a 10% off Labor Day coupon.

Because the living room is a little under 24' long and these are 8' boards, we had to cut a few inches off each one. That was fun (not).

We covered the entire garage by standing them up to make them easier to prime.

We did not have to prime the entire boards, just the knots. Let me tell you, these knots are a nightmare. We did not use any primer for the kitchen and living room and within a few months the tannins started bleeding through.

We later added both primer and paint on top of them with no luck… it comes back within a couple weeks every time. So when I did our foyer makeover, I made sure to cover the knots completely with Zinsser's BIN shellac based primer (which is supposed to be the best out there)…

Sadly, a couple months later and I can say it made no difference at all. It even bleeds through on the dark painted planks:

This was taken from my studio which was not primed, but I am sure it would have bled through anyway. You could argue that it just adds to the rustic-ness, but I am not sold so we have been periodically touch up paint which only lasts for a couple weeks. It is such a pain!

With this new ceiling going in, there is no way we can get up there to touch it up so The aim was to make sure they did not bleed through. I called Zinsser and explained my problem, and they suggested trying to use their water based (1-2-3 in the blue can) first this time with the BIN oil based on top of it. I do not trust water based primers to block tannins but I did not know what else to do so I gave it a shot.

We applied four coats of the first primer on every knot…

And covered that with a coat of the BIN…

Whew, that was plenty of painting. And no, I do not feel confident that it will work. I have since talked to more painters and after some online research, have discovered new primers that are supposed to be fail proof. We have not hired a painter yet so I may pick up a can of specialized primer and have them hit the knots one more time before painting.

Back to the living room. This was taken during Day 1. We are adding six lights and surround speakers so we had them run the wiring and cut the holes while they were up there.

Currently, it is a bit chaotic in here…

But the planking is done!

This is a shot looking towards the kitchen (the smaller holes are for the lights and the larger ones are speakers). The extra three lights along the soffit was Brad's idea…

Here is the perspective from the fireplace looking back toward the stairs and my studio:

We picked up the wood for the beams yesterday so we will be building those soon and they'll run along the two seams where the rows meet.

That is all the progress I have at the moment. The guys are in the living room as I type working on framing out the firep
lace so that will be next! Unfortunately we are having some issues with our mantel (the wood is not completely straight and we discovered it is not deep enough) so I am a little nervous about that. We will see how it all plays out.

In the meantime, I have been having some success at the flea market. I found this large vintage chest for $60 which will make the well suited side table next to the couch: