New Flooring, Cabinetry and Faux Roman Clay!

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Initially, I laid the flooring starting at the back of the room before we bought cabinets, then I realized you have to add the cabinets prior to installing floating floors because the floors have to be able to expand and contract over time. So I got to work removing the flooring that I had already done, which sucked because I already installed it in half the room!

I took measurements and made a Home Depot run to buy some pre-made cabinets. I decided on 3 so that this cabinetry could also be used as a desk, the cabinets wouldn’t run the entire way across and there would be space under part of it for your legs. I’ve bought cabinets from Lowe’s and Home Depot, I prefer the Home Depot unfinished cabinets because they are smoother and paint ready. The Lowe’s unfinished cabinets are more rough and you’d need to sand them down a bit to give them a smooth feel before paint.

I got them home and arranged them how we wanted. I had to cut a hole in the back of a few with my jigsaw because we have electrical outlets in the back and you can’t cover those up. That came in handy though because now we have the printer inside one of the cabinets plugged in.

Before we attached the cabinets to the wall, I put a dark grey tented primer over the walls and ceilings. Not sure this step was really necessary, but at this point I thought I was going to be using actual Roman Clay instead of the faux roman clay I ended up using.

Once everything was primed we installed the cabinets by screwing the backs into the studs. Then I painted them my favorite black color! Tricorn Black by SW. I always remove the doors before painting, it’s helpful to remove the drawers as well.

After that was all painted, it was time to install the flooring. Of course we had to leave a note on the cement slab before installing!

Looking back, I did make a mistake installing these floors. I thought since the floors already had padding on the back you could just lay them without needing any additional layers. What I should have done was at least put down a moisture barrier under the cabinets and the flooring, which is just a sheet of plastic. Moisture can come up from the cement slab and ruin your cabinets and flooring over time. I won’t make that mistake again! You learn something new with every project.

This wasn’t too hard to install, just lots of bending over! The hardest part was the angled cuts because this room has an angled corner. You also want to leave about 1/4 an inch around the parameter to allow for the floors to expand and contract, or else they could buckle over time.

They are super dusty here, but I got the floors installed for a second time and I’m super happy with my work!

We added a transition piece between the floors I installed and the tile in our entryway. This came in the same color as our flooring.

Tyler picked out a fandelier that a friend of ours had in his office. It’s a chandelier that has hidden fan blades above it and it puts out an amazing amount of air flow shockingly! These come in all different styles! We have a vintage one in our guest room. I even created a round up of really cool fandeliers I found on Amazon for you.

This is it when it’s not in action.

It’s hard to capture in a photo, but the blades are right above it and pop out as they spin.

I was going to use Portola Paints Roman Clay, but their company is very hard to get a hold of and you cannot order more than a sample online. I tried calling them multiple times to try and order it but I think they are just so busy for their little store they can’t keep up. A friend sent me a video of a DIYER on Instagram doing a faux roman clay and I decided to try it! I just used Joint Compound and leftover Tricorn Black paint! I mixed the 2 and started smearing it on the walls with my putty knife. Just remember, this lightens a lot as it dries.

But when it dried there was no color variation like roman clay has, so I reached out to that DIYER and asked her how she achieved the look I was after and she said she had mixed several batches and the color was off slightly with each batch, but that’s what ended up giving it the color variation and movement I was wanting. So I kept going! The angled ceiling was the hardest to do. I covered all the walls and the ceiling! Basically skim coating all over again.

Once that first coat was on, I added some more paint to the mix and randomly smeared it on the right wall.

But when it dried, I hated it! I had put WAY too much black paint in the mixture.

Luckily, it’s just paint and it can be fixed! So I added more joint compound to the mixture until it was closer to the original color and then I started smearing that on top of the too dark color and it was looking much better once it dried!

The technique I came up with was not to mess with the color anymore once I got it almost back to the original color. Then I smeared it on randomly with the putty knife and then rolled over that with a foam roller to take away the harsh edges of the new color and feather the color out a bit.

I then went around the entire room with this new technique and the ceilings as well! This project took a lot longer than I imagined it would, but that’s how my projects always go!

And look how great it turned out! I know this dark color isn’t everyones cup of tea, but I think it works so well for a masculine rustic industrial kind of look we are going for in the man cave!