Our Nest

This is what building a home Ikea-style looks like: cookie-cutter furniture so easy to construct it seems to materialize from thin air. This furniture is characterless and about as sturdy as an octogenarian’s knee-joints. It’s not how I imagined I would fashion my own home, but then I remind myself that this is only a temporary set-up. I imagined scouring second hand furniture shops and thrift stores for pre-loved items, items just begging to be taken home and touched up.

Pre-loved is all I’ve known. If my parents ever bought new furniture I don’t recall it. Our family home is a hodgepodge of weird but wonderful items: the “hodda dodda”, for example, so called for the sound it makes when rolled across a table to collect crumbs; the fully-functioning four-piece toaster I scored at a school jumbo sale for 50 cents; or the living-room rocking chair, beloved despite its unattractive vomit-green covering and dangerously escaping springs. I wouldn’t remember such purchases had they come from Ikea!

I loved my regular visits to the Sallies or Percy’s Mart with my mom (these were so regular that we knew when the Sallies would be putting out “new stock” — Mondays). And our search wasn’t limited to furniture — we took home clothing and shoes and books and kitchen-ware too. We shopped second-hand out of economic necessity, something that, as a self-conscious teenager, I was ashamed to admit. We were also driven by the satisfaction of finding real treasures. That is, items that were well crafted out of sturdy materials and were, therefore, likely to withstand the onslaughts of time and everyday use. And if they didn’t, well…no fortune lost. But even had we the funds to purchase new items I doubt we would have gone down that route: why further encourage mass production, over consumption, and waste? This is something I’ve grown to appreciate as I learn more about the way we — humanity — are treating our natural resources and environment.

Here is every man’s dilemma: kit-set furniture is not only readily available and inexpensive but also highly convenient, while second-hand shopping for very specific items can take considerable time and energy. (It can also be costly, especially as it grows in popularity and becomes fashionable thanks, in large part, to pop-cultural references and celebrity endorsements. I’m looking at you, Macklemore). Anyway, with family and friends descending upon us in less than a week, we have had limited time to turn this sparsely-furnished bachelor pad into an inviting home for two plus guests. I spent ten minutes scanning furniture on Craig’s List (Kiwis, think ‘Trademe’) but decided shopping this way wasn’t practicable for us at this time. So, Ikea it is. We made one trip to Ikea — a warehouse of dazzling and dizzying proportions (no exaggeration, I was so overwhelmed I felt like throwing up). It took us at least an hour to walk (swiftly!) through its showrooms — just a single floor — identifying items we felt we needed. Small items we took home with us that day, larger items were delivered to us ten days after our order was placed. This might sound prosaic to you, but it was my first Ikea experience so… The upshot of buying Ikea furniture is that it has provided myself and Oli with an immediate project we can accomplish together. We also enlisted the help of family — Oli’s brother and sis-in-law joined us for the day. Assembling various pieces of ply-wood CAN be a meaningful activity after all. Our house-hold items are not unique, but they were put together with much love, excitement, and anticipation in a truly collaborative spirit (except when I was bugging Oli to do this or that next, ahem… ).

Late last night I spotted a coffee table in sound condition standing next to our communal skips, destined for the rubbish heap. Much to Oli’s chagrin, I insisted we take it home and find some use for it (I have it in mind as a table for our yet-to-be-acquired indoor plants). Oli bemoaned the fact that it didn’t match our other all-black (Ikea) furniture. And it LOOKED clean enough, but who knew what previous life it had lived, or what vermin had made a home of it before we claimed it as our own? And so on… Many minutes after installation, Oli comes to me and says “You know, I’m glad we rescued that table. I just saw it from a different angle in the room and…it looks good”. Yes! A second-hand collection is an eclectic, diverse mix of shapes, forms, and colors, and therein lies its beauty. The next nest we make will have these attributes.