Black Stairs and a New (Old) Rug

Things are starting to shake out in our foyer! Some of you hyper-observant readers noticed the new black stairs peeking out in one of the photos in this post (or maybe you just saw my teaser on instagram). And, best of all, my favorite new rug from eSaleRugs arrived over the weekend. Happy Thanksgiving to me!! Isn’t it gorgeous??

So, about the stairs. I liked the gray paint color okay, but I kept wishing the color was darker, especially as I was picking wall colors and was leaning toward the Brushed Aluminum color, which is a little darker than I was originally planning. You can see my test color here on the wall under the railing by the vent. The gray on gray was a no-go. So I pulled out my gallon of Onyx that I’ve been using on doors and the fireplace and tried a little bit on the stairs. It was obviously the right choice. I asked the painters to add the stairs to the bid and they didn’t charge me much more than the cost of paint (nice!). It made sense to get the stairs finished while the painters were here when this part of the house was sort of out of commission anyway. Also, I don’t really regret all the work I did before with the gray paint color because in the end it actually helped me lean more toward the darker gray on the walls. And most of all, all that filling and sanding needed to happen regardless. So you know, whatever. All’s well that ends well.

And I really do love how the stairs turned out. The contrast is so pretty against the lighter walls and floors. And the railings are far and away less 80s to me in black.

The only downside is the dusty footprints have been killing me, so I moved up finding a runner on my to do list. You might have seen that I found this rug at Homegoods a week or two ago. I liked the colors and the small repeat on the pattern will make installation SO much easier, and will help to hide dirt, but I wasn’t totally sure it was the right choice.

Until I found a new old rug for the entry.

It’s a 100 year-old Shiraz Persian rug from my favorite rug source, eSaleRugs. I’ve purchased half a dozen rugs from them in the past few years and every time I’ve been thrilled with the rugs in person. I got Abbey’s bedroom rug from eSaleRugs, the runner I had in the kitchen in our loft and the long rug I kept in the garden level entry at the brownstone. They’re like priceless little treasures to me. So unique and so beautiful (and all of them were so affordable – less than the cost of a new rug at West Elm). This rug is 4.5×9.5′ and it cost about $350 with free shipping.

I love how the dye colors are sort of all over the place. The reds and pinks and oranges in the medallions are so pretty! And that inky blue stripe in the black background? Be still my beating heart.

The two rugs are perfect together, don’t you think? I feel like an older patterned rug brings soul to a space and that’s exactly what was missing here with the new runner.

Anyway, I’m super happy with how things are starting to come together! We’re going back up to my parents’ on Wednesday for Thanksgiving, but we’ll be back earlier in the weekend and I want to spend some of our down-time hanging art in here and in the living room. I think we’ll have ourselves a comfy home just in time for Christmas. :)