My little brother Peter and his new wife Lindsay have been living with my Mom since their wedding last Fall, saving up and figuring out the next stage of their lives. Selfishly, I've loved having them around - we have Sunday night dinners, go to the cottage together, have movie nights - Oscar loves his Uncle Pete and they have had tons of "boys" days together. It's such a special bond, and I'm ridiculously grateful for that. I also feel like Lindsay has been in our family forever, I adore her like as if she was born my sister.
A few months ago, Lindsay got accepted into nursing school (yay!) and in a week they are packing up and moving into their own place. In another city. (booooo!) Although I'm heartbroken to not have them right here - I'm so excited for their new adventure as a married couple.
I noticed that Linds and Pete were on such a small budget for the move, and as such, they had little funds left over for decorating. I wanted to help them a nice place that would start them off feeling like "adults" so started thinking - where could I shop that was economical, but also had stylish furniture. Typically economical and stylish aren't words that you see together a lot when it comes to furniture. And I wanted to find a place that didn't scream "dorm" room like some other big box stores do. Right off the bat - Leon's came to mind.
My thought process was this - I knew that Leon's pricing was very reasonable and in terms of style, their items appeal to a large market of people - you have formal, casual,country - a look for everyone. I knew if you took a few key pieces and added personal touches - what you may think may not be very stylish could really be when paired with the right accents. Having browsed their website, after some looking there were some really great classic pieces. I felt like it was such a great collaboration, so I reached out to Leon's and told them about Peter and Lindsay moving, my ideas of what I could do with their collections and.... they loved the idea of collaborating! I love when companies are game to have some fun, and think outside the box.
Leon's invited Peter and Lindsay to pick some major key pieces for their new place - with my role to step in at the end to style and reveal. HOW FUN is that? Peter and Linds get awesome furniture, I get to play decorator for two of my favourite people.
And so the decorating adventure begins. This isn't about decorating 100% with a store. Leon's knows you won't buy all your decorating accessories from them - but what I will show you is exactly what I had envisioned when I reached out to Leon's. How you can pick single key pieces from their store, and work magic with mixing and matching pieces. Because that's how I decorate, and likely many of you do to.
To get an idea of our shop, and, the series - check out this video I made. I had a ridiculously fun time filming it and putting it together for this. Plus you get to see Linds and Peter. :) (I'm also wondering if you can spot the couch they pick??)
So the first step in this whole adventure was to actually pick some furniture that that the lovebirds liked. I had done a preliminary browse on their website which has all of the pieces listed, along with measurements. The initial browse on the website was a good introduction and, gave us an idea of what we wanted to focus on. But I'm close to the Leon's at The Roundhouse, so that's the destination we picked as our "go to" location.
The three of us headed to the Roundhouse location in downtown Toronto. (It's GORGEOUS) I tagged along to be a voice of reason (and to snap photos) but tried to stay in the background as much as possible, as it was their first foray into furniture buying. And from experience I knew that an excursion like this could be stressful. (Especially when you have your sister tagging along). A shopping trip like this, you are trying to figure out your own style, tastes and at the same time - dealing with your partner on what they want. I remember Aubrey and I having a meltdown over china patterns for our gift registry. Deciding on what your style is as a couple is ridiculously hard. So as I told them, the first visit wasn't to buy anything or, make decisions. It was like dating. You needed to go meet the pieces, test them out. And so, that's what we did.
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I thought that they were for sure going to pick the bed above, but after a second visit, selected a different one. The bed shopping was pretty easy for them, and they picked a mattress that they adored. The bed wasn't really the "BIG" decision - it turned out to be the couch. Oh, the couch.
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Lindsay will likely kill me for this photo but I think she looks gorgeous even when sliding into a two person monster recliner. They actually stayed in this couch for awhile. It was being very much considered as a couch. Rec room - yes. Main living room? Not so much. (But they loved it so) Watch the video to see Peter's reaction when he sits in this couch. It's pretty cute.
As I anticipated, couch shopping proved to be overwhelming. Both Lindsay and Peter had different ideas of what they liked. When you first walk in, everything is a possibility. That blue couch? Yup. It could work. That tufted leather one? Ohhh. Gorgeous. Every couch you walk by could be "the" couch. When you let your eyes adjust to the large selection of what you can pick from, you start to see pieces that really are gorgeous, and, could be in an issue of Domino magazine, if it were paired with the right fiddle leaf fig tree and rifle paper co. wallpaper. There are gems in the store. If you haven't been to the Leon's Roundhouse downtown Toronto I highly recommend you visit. While you're down there, go visit the Train Museum like we did. It's a vibrant, historic area of the city. The Leon's area is brightly lit, wide open, and styled beautifully into little vignettes that makes it easy to imagine a piece (or two) in your own home. I get overwhelmed in tightly packed spaces and this was anything but.
I'll reveal what they picked later on this week, but the couch above was being considered as a major contender. (Peter loved it!) They didn't pick it - but I was digging it. If you're trying to picture why I love this one so much, see some inspirational photos I've pinned here to show you. The above couch is from the Shea collection and retails for $1,999 - Which is one of the higher end couches at Leon's. But a similar couch would run you at least double that.
Anyhow, I know this post is long, thanks for sticking through to the end. If you've watched the video, see if you can guess which couch they picked!!
xo Lindsay
This blog series has been sponsored by Leon's. I have not been compensated for this series, however Lindsay and Peter have been gifted a few key pieces of their choice from Leon's to furnish their place. All other items in the reveal are my own - so stay tuned to see what I've been picking up at antique shops and auctions. Follow my decorating fun for my little brother's first place by following the Hashtag #MyLeons and #DecoratingMyLittleBrothersPlace (Yup, that's a pretty long hashtag that I came up with)
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