I completed this project as part of the bi-annual "One Room Challenge" - where designers and design bloggers transform a space in just six weeks' time. This one is in my own home. The starting point was supposed to be a library and sometimes office for my husband, but it was disorganized, mismatched, and did not feel terribly masculine with its pink beige walls and yellow-toned gumwood millwork. The chair and antique Empire partners desk stayed, and a scheme for this new "Manbrary" concept was built around them. The new space features a total transformation of the wall and ceiling surfaces. The walls envelop the room in a single, camel leather-inspired hue, while a mega-gloss lacquer paint provides contrast and highlights the original millwork. The blue plaid wool Roman shades are a timeless addition that reinforce the masculine feel. Plaster, including ornamental plaster, was repaired and restored, and then the ceiling was painted in a complementary, chalky tone. A range of blues was brought in to complement the scheme of an adjacent room, including painting the built-in bookcases Benjamin Moore's Everard Blue, which provide a dramatic backdrop for books, accessories, and family pictures and memorabilia. I created a cozy seating area in front of the fireplace (which is now actually used!), which can easily be converted into guest seating for impromptu meetings. The globe light fixture brings together both Victorian/traditional elements and the more modern aspects of the space, and softly/evenly illuminates the ornamental plaster above. A stationary bar in blue lacquer (also, serendipitously, available in Everard Blue) was employed as an auxiliary workstation, holding a printer, paper, and providing a place to store the phone and desk lamp when not in use. The new space, the Manbrary, has a modern feel within a traditional, Victorian vernacular, is totally masculine, and yet exhibits none of the cliches of a traditional study or library.