home improvement makeover

Recently graduated, living off a nonprofit salary and having had 2 days to pick out an apartment in a new city, my new roommate is awesome but the apartment itself is um, lacking...

Work has kept me from doing some of the bigger plans I have- ranging from painting walls to weatherizing windows- but soon after arrival I started on a project that I had been planning even before finding my room. A year ago I bought some beautiful fabric at Joanne's (when my car was broken down in Minnesota) and have used it for a variety of things since.

I wanted to decorate part of my wall with the fabric, but not just as wallpaper. I started out by cutting the top of the fabric down.

And I also cut out birds individually.

I cleaned my wall with just water and a sponge. I sprayed the fabric all over with fabric starch. The instructions I found online recommended using either regular starch or spray starch. For such a large piece of fabric, I wish I had regular starch as it was difficult to saturate the fabric with spray starch. You can see the results below- there were definite difficulties getting a tight bond against the wall. I left some tacks along the very edge to keep the fabric up.

But the results overall- I love them!
The other great thing- the fabric peels off with basically no residue! Just clean the wall with a little water and you are set to go. Fabric is a great choice for those of us who are renting.

My fabric wall decoration has created a cozy corner with my desk where I can craft, though I'm still in need of the various storage supplies to really set up a neat crafting corner. First house project- completed!