My introduction to Valerie Lecoeur came through the brilliant kids' glassware she imports from her native France. Made of superstrong tempered glass, it's really hard to break (check out this video to see for yourselves) and is thus perfect for a lot of little people I know. A visit to her website, zoe b organics, reveals all sorts of baby products that are as easy on the eye as they are on the earth.

I fell in love instantly and was even more smitten when she sent me photographs of the beautiful North Carolina home she shares with her husband, John Brockenbrough, and their three children, Zoe (7), Lucas (5), and Sophie (22 months). True fans of the modern aesthetic, they opened up the back of the 1924 colonial-style home to create an airy and spacious great room, where the family does most of its living. However, the original flavor has not been completely irradicated--tradition lives on happily beside the more contemporary touches.

So you really did a major renovation to the back of the house. Would you say that you have a specific design philosophy or credo that you follow?

Well, we are definitely more modern in our taste than most of the people around here, but we really love the juxtaposition of a traditional-feeling structure with more modern furnishings. When we did the renovation, we thought of it more as creating a blank slate rather than making a contemporary addition. The trees and the light are so beautiful, so we wanted to take advantage of that. Now we have wonderful light in here all day long.

That huge wooden table is fabulous ... and are those the famed dishes?

Ha! Yes, those are the Duralex kidishes. We really do use them every day! I love the table as well--it is wonderful to have the space to put it in. I first fell in love with one very similar to it in a store window in New York, but it was much too expensive. Crate & Barrel did this great knockoff, and voila! We have the perfect dining table. It also looks great with the high chair that my mother brought us back from France. You can't find anything like that here ... I don't know why. I much prefer wooden furniture and toys to the plastic things you see everywhere.

  Speaking of cool wooden furniture, tell me about this step stool you have in the kitchen!

Oh, that is called the learning tower, and it is really great stuff! We've had it for 6 years now, and all of my kids have used it. It has a wide base so they cannot fall, and the bottom is adjustable so that they can be counter height and see what you are doing. I can't say enough good things about it!

So you've managed to find a practical and attractive kitchen stool for the kids, and here it looks like you've come up with a great solution for displaying their art.

Yeah, you know, we have so much artwork by the kids, and we are always trying to figure out how to display it. I thought it would be nice to put it in a frame, so I searched around for one that I liked, put cork board in it, and now we use it for drawings and photos--it suddenly puts them into a nice context and makes the work feel more special.

 Usually you see a bench in the mud room/entry area, but you've got these great wooden seats....

They are from an old movie theater. We found them in an antique shop and fell in love with them the instant we saw them. Do you know how sometimes you buy a piece and when you get it home it's like it was always meant to be in that space? These chairs are like that. We'll probably leave them here when we move.

And now to the more formal part of the house.... We've just spent all of this time in the bright white of the great room and then suddenly you have a rich chocolate brown living room and a dining room that is vibrant orange.

I've always felt that color is better when an old house has nice architectural details, moldings, etc. Otherwise, all of those features get washed out. We even wanted to use more color in the great room, but there were so many angles and planes that it didn't make sense. We did paint one wall (behind the TV) but we chose to leave the rest white and use color in the accents. The coffee table is really unusual. Everybody that comes into the house comments on that! It's actually an old workbench that my husband found in Vermont and used to have in his studio. We took the legs off and put it on two blocks of wood. It helps the room feel less formal.

  Now we head upstairs past a series of black-and-white portraits of ... sock monkeys?

I think sock monkeys are amazing--I have always loved them. These photographs come from a coffee-table book that I bought at Calypso in New York. The book is wonderful. We just picked out a few of the images and framed them. My youngest daughter, Sophie, loves to look at them as she climbs up the stairs.

 Speaking of Sophie, let's head into her room next. I love the bright pink dresser.

That is from IKEA. We bought it and then painted it that color. Poor Sophie has gotten the short end of the decorating. She was a bit of a surprise and was born right as my business was taking off, so her room definitely needs work. She's still a baby, though, so she hasn't started complaining yet!

 Hey I recognize that slide--I think I used to have it when I was a kid!

Isn't it great? This is definitely something that I want to keep for my grandchildren--it's a classic. It's so simple and yet it has so much more style than what is out there today. In this house, we are lucky enough to have a playroom--a place dedicated to our kids and their mess! This way they can keep their things in their own area, and we can keep our things in our area. We used those flower Flor tiles, which I think work perfectly.

Now on to Lucas's room. That might be the largest portrait of an Uglydoll ever produced!

One thing I feel very strongly about is not filling the kids' rooms up with cutesy made-for-kids stuff. The space can still be kidlike without being silly. My husband was doing a project at work where they made huge prints of interesting objects and this was one of them. It was actually Lucas's doll, so we took it home when they were done with it. I worried that it might give him nightmares, but he's fine with it.

 The bookshelf adds a fun splash of color. And tell me about the koala bear--is that a chalk board?

The bookcase is from Design Within Reach and is great because you can change the configuration so it can grow and change as we do. I just started importing the Koala sticker from France. It is chalkboard, but it's made from potato starch so it is completely biodegradable. When you are done with it, you can just throw it in the compost and it will completely decompose.

And lastly onto Zoe's room, which looks enormous!

All of the bedrooms are quite large, which actually makes them more difficult to decorate. I like to be somewhat minimal, but in a room this size, minimal just looks empty. So you have to find a happy medium. That's why we all have such big beds. It kind of fills up the room a bit and makes everything seem less lost. We might have gone a little overboard with the pink for Zoe. I would love to get away from it at some point.

 I like her little animal collection. Tell me about the panels that hang above her posse.

Oh, those are fabric bulletin boards, actually. She uses them to pin up pictures, art, whatever. And they look good empty or full, which is a bonus!

Well, it may be predominately pink, but it does feel like a great place to hang out, as does your entire home. Thanks for giving us permission to throw the old and the new into the same pot and delight in the juxtaposition.

Find out more about those tempered glass dishes and lots of other cool products on Valerie's website, and check out all of our house tours.

And see more from Nesting contributor Brooke Williams at her blog, this is authentic. 

How charming and decorative are these paper lanterns by Djeco? They are for indoor use only and measure approximately 16 inches. We love them for a playroom or nursery.

Stefanie, a government psychologist, and Ryan, a Biotech manager, from Rockville, Maryland, sent us photos of their 4-year-old daughter Hayley's bedroom makeover. We love how their small tweaks made huge differences. Check out these before and after shots.

What was the color palette you were working with?
Her favorite colors are blue and pink, and I also love contrast, so I tried to introduce brown and white to tie in her bedframe and all of the white accessories. The floral curtain fabric really helped. It's a Michael Miller fabric called Flower Crystals from the Corduroy line.

Were you going for an Asian vibe—the bed, the tree decal, the lamp—or any theme in general?
Yes, I try to have some Asian-inspired pieces throughout the house, because my husband is from India. Also, my best girlfriend is from China, and I'm definitely drawn to that kind of decor. We bought the West Elm bed because of its Asian vibe. But I actually bought the cherry-blossom decal from ShaNickers on Etsy, because we live in the D.C. area, and I love the cherry blossoms we have here, so it was a nod to that. And I got the lamp because I thought it went well with the Michael Miller fabric. But, in general, I did want it to have a sort of Asian feel, because Hayley is half Indian, and that's a part of who she is.

What tricks did you use to save space?
I put her dresser in her closet to have more floor space. I hung a shoe organizer behind her door to organize all of her small items, like stuffed animals and costume jewelry that seem to clutter the floor. There are storage bins under her bed, where she puts her special stuff, like her drawings, animals, and doll blankets, which I do not touch when cleaning or purging the room. I put 3M hooks on the back of her closet doors to hang dress-up clothes, and on the side of the bookcase closest to the door to hang play necklaces. There are two pillows on her bed that I added pockets to (only one is complete in the photo). I thought since I was adding pillows for decorative purposes, I wanted them to be useful as well. Hayley loves to use them as stuffed-animal beds or doll beds, or to carry toys throughout the house. So now they have more of a play purpose too. I'm still working on a big pocket pillow for the bed.

Are there any furniture pieces that were difficult to tie in?
There are some things she made me keep in the room: the rose-petal play cottage and the Sleeping Beauty vanity. I tried to tie all of her interests together and somehow make the cottage and Disney stuff work too.

Are there any items in the room that are a product of a DIY?
I painted the bookcase white before I really knew how to paint furniture, but I like it because it fits the canvas totes I got from Lowe's.


How did you settle on these prints from Etsy?
They remind me of my daughter, who has dark brown hair and likes animals, butterflies, princesses, fairies, and dancing.

Every image in the room is hung on the wall except the one on the shelf. What is that one of?
The framed photo is of her pet goldfish that died just before I redid the room. We are on to Goldy #2 now.

Do you have any tips for saving money while decorating a room?
I love to buy prints, but I hate spending a lot of money on frames, especially odd-size frames. So I buy framed artwork at Goodwill, and I recycle the print and paint the frame. Half the frames on the art wall were frames from Goodwill that I painted white, the rest I had on hand. Also, I found that a lot of craft stores have cheap unfinished frames that can be painted or stained. I did not have anything custom matted. If I could not buy a cheap ready-made mat, then I used scrapbook paper or fabric as the background. Last, I have a lot of stuff that I never use, and I've just committed myself to finding a use for it.

Give me a rundown of your Etsy finds.

Over the bed
"Love" poster = Made by girl
drawings of little girls = Belle and Boo

Top row
"Ashland tree of peace" = Creative Thursday
"Dancing Fairies" = original painting from JMC designs
butterfly = daughter's drawing
elephants = scanned from book
"Morning Swing" = Tummy Mountain
Make a Wish (edition 2) = yumi yumi

Second row
"You're beautiful / It's true" = made up by me in Photoshop
Peacock Girl = Lindsay Brackeen
une duex trios = postcard from Blue bonbon
Fairy School Portrait of Ophelia = High On Craft
In Bloom = original watercolor from Orange Studio by Helen Dardik
"Animal ballroom" = watercolor done by me in high school

Third row
"Do not go" = original postcard from yaelfran
"Spring bunny" = original AECO painting from Ashley White Jacobsen
Baldwin = Tim's sally

Thanks, Stefanie! Check out more of our favorite kids' rooms and send us a shot of your own!

As the weather gets cooler, kids and mamas cuddle up inside more often to read those favorite stories. ("Again, again!") We're loving this new cloud shelf from Fawn & Forest for displaying each day's literary canon. So cute and graphic!

-- Joanna Goddard, Cup of Jo
P.S. Cloud mobiles, and a great bookcase in a Brooklyn nursery.
(Via Minor Details)

Candice and Nick, teachers from the Vientiane International School in Laos, sent us photos of their multicultural haven for their sons, 5-year-old Jonas (Jojo) and 2-year-old Deacon (Deeds). These are two lucky boys! We had to get more info.

One awesome piece of furniture that the boys have in their room is the shelf that stands between their beds. Where did you get it?
 
They’re pagoda shelves that were made locally. We use it to stack their clothes on.

The hammock of stuffed animals is a great space-saver. What other tricks did you use to fit two boys in a small room?
 
Before we moved into this house, I did a great big purge of our stuff, especially toys. We moved from a 1,500-square-foot three-bedroom house to a 864-square-foot two-bedroom house. We only have one closet, and I put all of the family clothes in there. I removed a wardrobe from the boys’ room to give them more space, and I store out-of-season clothes in suitcases, which would otherwise be empty. There's also a canvas pocket shoe organizer hung over the bedroom door for storing action figures.

We also had to take their bunk bed apart, because the top bunk was about 10 inches away from the ceiling fan! Jojo's bed is about 20 inches off of the ground. It is just the right height to slide large-wheeled plastic bins underneath. There's also room for a stroller, a large yoga ball, and a plastic bin full of wooden train tracks. Under Deeds's bed is a collapsible fabric tunnel for playing.

Tell us about this great canopy.
 
I wanted the canopy for creating an "isolated" space for quiet activities, like reading. I put a large floor pillow from Lao Cotton underneath for comfy seating. Plus, it just looks really magical and fun! They mostly use it though to play pretend. Most recently it has been a train car. They pile in their stuffed toys and blankets. 

You seem to be a fan of locally made items. Are there any more?
 
The striped rug is made from T-shirt remnants. The comforters are hotel-type duvets from the Chinese market. The blue curtains are from Lao Cotton. The baskets and canopy were purchased in Bali. The cat rug was something we got on a trip to Thailand. And the strings of elephants and bells on the pagoda shelves were found in Malaysia.

Do you have any tips for saving money while decorating a room?
 
I am thrifty at heart and buy secondhand when possible, but I also think there are some items where buying high quality in the beginning will save you money in the long run, especially when it comes to bedding. The green curtains were $20 for each panel, which could have been done more cheaply using local seamstresses, but I really wanted the light-, sound-, and heat-insulating properties. It makes the space more usable in the heat of the day. "Handmade" doesn't always have to mean "expensive" though. There are plenty of talented people out there who don't charge an arm and a leg for their craft. If you look around and take your time to select special items, you will definitely have a unique and personal space that you can take pride in. Being able to do things yourself is also a big money saver! My husband used a picture from a Montessori catalog as inspiration to design the low shelves. The one in the catalog was about $400. 

Is there anything you wish you did differently?
 
I ordered these specific curtains because they are blackout curtains. I got them on Walmart.com and they were supposed to be sage, but I call that color forest. Not my fave. I wanted sage!

Do you plan on adding anything else to the room?
 
The boys' room is still awaiting wall art. We have some pictures we could hang up but have also talked about contacting a local mural artist to paint the walls. We saw his work on the side of a local cafe and got his number from the owner.

Thanks, Candice! Check out more of our favorite kids' rooms and send us a shot of your own!

As the wallpaper renaissance brings an ever-growing array of modern options to the marketplace, I find myself drawn to something totally old-school: the '50s-style papers in Lizzie Allen's London collection. Her hand screen-printed narrative designs are cleverly detailed and perfectly colored, a fresh twist on the baseball wallpaper from your father's childhood bedroom.