Mr. A la parisienne, the carpenter

This post is dedicated to my wonderful, very talented husband {Mr. A la parisienne} who made this very beautiful custom cabinet for our master bathroom.

Five years ago we completed renovations on our 1898 victorian farmhouse.

As I was designing our masterbath, I knew that I wanted real pieces of furniture for storage-no mass-produced cabinets allowed! I had decided that I would search in antique shops and flea markets for a "medicine,towel,toiletry" cabinet.

In the meantime, our bathroom only had two real places for storage-our vanity/sink and a very cheap, diminuitive cabinet I bought at Hobby Lobby (You know, the "furniture" you find in the unfinished wood section???) Yeah, the cheap little cabinet I had in my college apartment!

Let's just say the 1 foot wide by 4 foot tall HobLob cabinet looked quite pitiful standing in our our bathroom with 11'6'' ceiling.

After five years of searching, I still never found what I was looking for....

So, it finally occured to me to ask my husband to make me a cabinet for our bathroom. Within the hour of asking him, he had me draw a rough sketch of what I had in mind, and in a couple of weeks, he was beginning to build.

A little bit about mon mari:

My husband is a contractor, who loves restorating old homes.

My husband loves to build things...anything.

My husband thrives on projects...

After several weekends at his friend's cabinet-making shop, where he (with the help of his friend) were able to use all of the necessary tools for cabinet-making, he brought the cabinet home!

I must say I was so impressed at his work! This cabinet is better than any antique because he made it with his very own hands for our home.

Thank you, babe, for the wonderful job you did, and I must say you did an excellent job...

And did I mention this was his first time to make a piece of furniture?

Vanity for Humanity-Ma Coiffeuse

Claudia Strasser, author of The Paris Apartment and creator of the Paris Apartment decorating style, has taken on a very interesting and commendable project. She is collecting shots of various vanities from women across the globe who follow her blog

The Paris Apartment

Her goal is to "[collect] shots of your vanity for a book [she's] putting together called ‘vanity for humanity’ with all proceeds going to habitat for humanity." She's looking for "candids of how we live, sort of [a] voyeur’s look into an area that’s mysterious, sexy and unique for every woman."

While my vanity is actually in the master bathroom, I decided that I would participate. I mean, this is a candid, real place where a real woman primps and styles!

Five years ago when my husband and I were remodeling our home that was built in 1898, I knew that I wanted my bathroom vanity to be a real piece of furniture. Thanks to my talented, patient, and loving father-in-law, he installed this beautiful sink in the middle of this dresser and salvaged 80% of the drawer space!

I bought this golden statue from my sister-in-law's booth several years ago. I just love everything about it!


Recently, while visiting my Granny, she told me to take a look through her jewelry box and take whatever I liked. When I saw this black and white cameo necklace, it brought back memories of sifting through her jewelry box as a young girl. I gladly selected this necklace as a momento of my Granny's classic taste.


Even my decorations get accesorized

A silver tray full of my favorite perfumes: Coco Chanel Mademoiselle, Pleasures, Armani Mania, and Miranda by Fragonard

My husband found this vintage set of Fragonard perfume bottles on Ebay and gave them to me at Christmas.

A real cameo made from a seashell in Italy-my favorite Italian souvenir-nestled in a larger seashell full of sand dollars and rhinestone pins

A delicate 1928 necklace draped across an Eiffel Tower card

I found this celery colored silk scarf on a recent trip to Fredericksburg, TX. I always seem to have some sort of scarf tied to this mirror. Last winter, I had a long, pink crushed velvet scarf looped around this mirror post.

Scarves, perfumes, cameos, sand dollars, rhinestones...these are some of my favorite things to see as I get ready every morning. Perhaps I could add a feather plume or two somewhere...