{one room challenge} Week 2 - Does Shopping Count as Progress?

This post is sponsored by Home Decorators Collection, but, as always, all opinions are completely my own. You can view my full disclosure policy here.

Two weeks of the One Room Challenge have already come and gone, and what do I have to show for it?! If you walked into my master bedroom right now, you would think I'd accomplished nothing. But what I have been doing is a whole lot of shopping. So that counts as progress, right?!

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My focus this week has been on identifying a new rug and chair to turn the blah corner of our bedroom into the cozy reading nook that imagine it to be.

The chair that we have there now was a purchase made out of impatience - and that's a story that rarely ends well. I had been dreaming of having a reading nook in bedroom but hadn't been able to find just the right chair. Finally, I gave up on finding the right chair and instead purchased a chair that was a great price because I decided I'd rather have a chair than no chair. In fairness, there is nothing wrong with this chair - it's pretty comfortable and I like the look of it - but it's just not well suited to hours of reading.

What I really want is a chair with a high enough back that I can rest my head, and with softer arms so that I can curl up a bit more. I like to cross my legs when sitting in chairs {am I the only one that does this?}, so it's important that the arms of my new chair be padded.

Since the design plan for the room is very modern, I knew I couldn't just wander into any furniture store and find what I was looking for - so I started my search online. And one of my go to online sources is always Home Decorators Collection.

Well, when Home Decorators Collection found out that I was shopping for a new chair for my One Room Challenge space, they offered to give me one! Pinch me!!

Do you know about Home Decorators Collection?! You probably get their catalogs in the mail - but did you know that they have so much more online? And did you know that you can even purchase HDC branded products - including paint, flooring, window treatments, and more - at Home Depot?

Since I spent most of Week 2 of the One Room Challenge on the Home Decorators Collection website for the perfect chair for my master bedroom reading nook, I thought I'd show you some of the top contenders. Every chair you'll see here is under $500. Yup, you read that right!

When I started shopping for my new chair, the first one that caught my eye on the Home Decorators Collection website was the Rockford Leather Chair. I love the overall square, modern shape of the chair combined with the curved arms. Unfortunately, this is one of the few chairs that doesn't come in different colors - and since brown leather doesn't fit the style of the room, I had to cross this one off the list.

While I was looking at the Rockford Chair, this beauty showed up as a suggestion at the bottom of my screen. They guessed that I would love the similar nailhead detail, and they were right. I also love the Pebble Grey color of the More Club Chair, and I like the curved back - but the back isn't as high as I would like in order to make it a really cozy place to read.

The grey color of the More Club Chair got me thinking in that color direction, so I narrowed my search to grey chairs, and up popped this beauty - the Morgan Tufted Armchair in charcoal. This chair is a quite traditional in shape so I thought it might be a nice compliment to the more modern lines elsewhere in the room, and it had the higher back I was looking for. Individually I liked the turned legs and the button tufting, but combined with the rolled arms, I decided this chair was just a little too traditional.

The search continued, until this happened...the Meloni Armchair caught my eye and it had me at herringbone and nailheads with leather trim!

This chair is darker than I thought I wanted because the current black chair in the room blends right in with the black solar shades. But I'll be adding some light colored drapes that will fill the corner of the room beind the chair, besides which I envision that this chair will read a bit more grey because of the herringbone pattern. Everything else about the chair is exactly what I was looking for - high back for resting my head; low, padded arms for getting cozy and crossing my legs; and nailheads, oh the nailheads! It has a sleek, modern shape, but the curved back softens it up. It's perfect, and it's going to be mine!

I am counting down the day until this beauty shows up on my doorstep!

I can now check chair shopping off of my list, but sadly I can't say the same for rug shopping. I've found the rug I want...

...but the Clyde Area Rug is backordered until late November in the size I need. Womp Womp! I've spent all week searching for other options, and I've found many that would be fine. But none that I am excited about the way I was excited about the Clyde.

Any other time I would just suck it up and wait out the back order. But this is a 6 week challenge after all. If I don't have a rug at the end of the One Room Challenge, my reveal photos will look incomplete at best. But do I want to buy a different rug just because of the time constraints of the challenge when it's going to live in my room for many years to come?! For now my online rug shopping will continue and I am hopeful that I'll find a rug I love even more than the Clyde. Keep your fingers crossed for me, friends!

As you know, I am not in this One Room Challenge thing alone! There are 20 amazing designers headlining the event, and more than 80 other linking participants. Each week they are sharing their updates as well, so be sure to visit our hostess with the mostest, Calling It Home, to see what everyone else is up to.

You can find all of my past One Room Challenge posts here:

SPRING 2015 ONE ROOM CHALLENGE: Rock & Roll Under Stair Playroom


FALL 2014 ONE ROOM CHALLENGE: Modern Metro Master Bedroom



SPRING 2014 ONE ROOM CHALLENGE: Vintage Preppy Little Man's Lounge