00:00Hi, my name is Angela, and welcome to my four-floor suite digs.
00:03Please take off your shoes, hit the subscribe button, and come on in.
00:08I live on the border of Gramercy and Kipps Bay with my husband, Andrew.
00:11We pay $3,750 in rent.
00:14I really hesitate to say I think it's worth it for the space in New York,
00:17but I think you'll kind of see maybe what I'm talking about.
00:20We moved from Hong Kong to New York, so we had our eye on this specific building.
00:24We are all over Street Easy, like salt to pepper, like bread to butter.
00:28No, that's not even a thing.
00:30The history of this building is super unique.
00:32It is a former ice cream factory, turned into a brothel,
00:34and you'll see these kind of like unique characteristics throughout.
00:37Fun fact, there are two entrances to this apartment.
00:39The front one, as you saw, goes right onto the street.
00:41It used to be a loading dock when it was an ice cream factory,
00:44and when it was a brothel, it was a private entrance.
00:46It has so many unique characteristics, I can't wait to show you.
00:49And here is my kitchen.
00:50I'm making tomato sauce later.
00:52I'm the one that cooks in this household because Andrew,
00:54I don't want to say that he can't cook, he can.
00:57It's just very basic.
00:58When we first started dating, he cooked me our first meal ever,
01:01and you know, you're kind of expecting this three-course meal.
01:04It was a chicken breast and sautéed spinach.
01:07And I was like, oh, okay.
01:10And he said, what?
01:11It's all protein.
01:12So now I do the cooking, and my favorite thing to cook is shrimp scampi.
01:15This is my bathroom.
01:16This is the only place in the whole house that has a door,
01:20and it's the only place you can ever get a little bit of privacy.
01:22It's on the first floor, which makes it kind of a pain,
01:25especially at night if you have to go.
01:27The bedroom is on the third floor.
01:28You need to wake up.
01:29Be careful.
01:30Go down death-defying stairs.
01:32Do your business, and then come back up and go to bed.
01:35I wish the bathroom was a sanctuary for me.
01:37However, it's not.
01:38It would be my favorite place to hang out in the house if it was all white.
01:42But it's not.
01:42It's kind of dark and a little bit small.
01:44This is the second floor.
01:48The dining table is right behind me, and this is my office.
01:51I spend about 50% of the time at my desk,
01:54and the other 50% of the time at the dining table.
01:56So I guess it's all the office.
01:58I am a fashion and beauty blogger at Mostly Black on Instagram
02:01because I mostly wear black.
02:03I cover a lot of the sample sales in New York City,
02:05so I'm always looking for a deal.
02:06So what we did was we went to West Elm and Crate and Barrel.
02:09We found all the things we liked,
02:10and then we searched every day on Craigslist for those items until we got them.
02:13So the most expensive thing in this apartment is definitely this glass table.
02:16It's about 8 feet long by 4 feet, and it weighs 300 pounds.
02:21I'm not even joking.
02:22I think it retails somewhere between $6,000 to $8,000,
02:25but I got it for free off Craigslist.
02:27We don't do much hosting in our place
02:28because usually I become the only host and Andrew becomes the guest.
02:32So the new rule is if we're hosting, we're catering,
02:35and catering is just too expensive.
02:37These stairs lead to the third floor.
02:39Come on up.
02:40This is the third floor landing,
02:42and up these steps is the fourth floor.
02:45This is the living room slash guest bedroom.
02:47When we originally saw the listing on StreetEasy,
02:49the space was completely different.
02:51It was all digitally rendered photos,
02:53so when we came to see the apartment,
02:54it was completely different than what we thought.
02:57The biggest surprise was definitely the pink rug on the fourth and third floor.
03:01I have to say I don't mind it.
03:03I kind of like it.
03:04It's really fun, like a Pepto pink.
03:05We moved from Hong Kong to New York,
03:07and we spent two months living in hotels.
03:09When we had our eye on this specific building,
03:11we needed to wait for a unit to open up.
03:14Once it did, we were the first people to call the realtor.
03:16We had all of our stuff in one big stack,
03:18and we submitted it right away.
03:20I'm originally from Canada,
03:21and I moved to Hong Kong for four years.
03:23Back in both Hong Kong and in Canada,
03:26actually the landlord pays the broker's fees,
03:28and you don't.
03:29So it was quite a shock to see an extra 15% price tag on top of your rent.
03:34Back down to the third floor landing,
03:35we call this area the runway.
03:38Watch your head.
03:39This is an iron beam.
03:40It hurts a lot if you hit it.
03:42And this is our bedroom.
03:44Andrew and I met in Hong Kong on Tinder.
03:45We both swiped right.
03:46I was his first Tinder date.
03:48It was one and done.
03:49I wouldn't say it was love at first sight,
03:50but I definitely knew we were going to be together.
03:52On our very first date,
03:53I walked up the stairs.
03:55I saw Andrew looking down at his phone,
03:57and in my mind I said,
03:58it's done.
03:59The most sentimental thing in my apartment
04:01is a book Andrew wrote for me
04:02called What I Love About Angela by Andrew.
04:04He has 50 things that he loves about me,
04:06and I love it because I'm kind of a words person,
04:09and here it all is written down.
04:11Like 23.
04:12I believe the world needs your unique perspective on life.
04:16The space was really challenging to decorate
04:18because on its own it's very unique.
04:20We have exposed brick,
04:21industrial beams,
04:23a pink carpet on two floors,
04:25ladders,
04:26and steep stairs,
04:27all made out of dark wood.
04:29Besides that,
04:29Andrew and I have completely different design aesthetics,
04:31and the only thing we could agree on
04:33was Beach House Chic.
04:34It doesn't exactly translate in this space,
04:36but we're hoping when we move to our next place
04:38and it's all on one level,
04:40everything will come together.
04:41My favorite places to get decor inspiration
04:43are RH Modern,
04:44although I don't live in a mansion,
04:46so it's hard to put any other stuff into my place.
04:48ABC Carpet and Home,
04:49I think everything is beautiful,
04:51albeit a little bit overpriced.
04:52And if I'm on a budget,
04:53then H&M is perfect for reasonably priced items.
04:56My best home find
04:57is definitely my three-piece
04:58reclaimed barn wood set from West Elm.
05:01I got them from three different vendors,
05:02my bed frame,
05:03my dresser,
05:04and my dining table.
05:05And all from Craigslist!
05:06The next thing I would look for in an apartment
05:08is definitely natural light.
05:09There's only one window on the third floor,
05:12so it means the first and second floor
05:14don't really get light.
05:15The fourth floor gets a little bit of light,
05:18and since we have blackout curtains,
05:20it's kind of like living in an eternal darkness.
05:22I cover a lot of sample sales in New York City,
05:24and I often get asked,
05:25where do you put all your shopping?
05:27Well, I have five and a half closets.
05:30This is one of them.
05:30And here we have another closet,
05:32and this is closet number three.
05:33This is closet four.
05:34That's closet five.
05:36And this is closet five and a half.
05:38I know a lot of people are curious
05:39about what's inside people's closets.
05:41I'm happy to show you mine,
05:42but it's not Marie Kondo's.
05:46So I like to organize everything
05:47with my shoes up at the top.
05:49I have bags over here that are flat,
05:51and then I've tried to organize things
05:53by color and commodity all the way through here.
05:56Andrew is definitely the organized one
05:58between the two of us.
05:59I think I'm causing him anxiety.
06:01He actually said to me the other day,
06:03we need to clean,
06:03and I said to him,
06:05don't you dare use the C word with me.
06:09So yeah, I'm kind of the method to the madness,
06:11and he's the one who's neat and tidy.
06:13It's really hard to decide
06:14on my favorite part of the apartment.
06:15There are so many spaces that I love.
06:17I probably spend the least amount of time
06:18in the living room.
06:19I obviously sleep,
06:21so I spend a lot of time in the bedroom.
06:22I spend a lot of time in the office,
06:24and I still can't decide
06:25which is my favorite, to be honest.
06:30Thanks for stopping by
06:31what I like to call the hamster cage.
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