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Mat’s Hemingway-inspired DIY Flooring

When you first met guest posters Mat and Guerrin, we talked about how Mat’s former apartment made the cover of Apartment Therapy’s Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces (see it here). Mat has since moved to Brooklyn and is now transforming another unsuspecting rental--this time with a Hemingway-esque feel, starting with the floors. Oh, the magical floors! Read it and weep. Gorgeous, ya'll.

Guerrin: Mat, where the heck have you been? I’ve been calling you for two days and nobody has been able to get in touch with you. What gives??

Mat: Parallelograms...Parallelograms.

G: What the...your eyes are bloodshot and you’re a complete mess. You like a candidate for A&E’s "Intervention." Mat...are you high right now?

M: Did anyone see you?

G: Well, just your landlord downstairs...

M: Get in, QUICK!

G: Are you in some kind of trouble? Oof, these fumes...hey, these floors. You painted ‘em. They look incred!

M: Thanks, I’ve been at it all night. It’s the first step in my apartment’s Ernest Hemingway transformation. I’m beginning from the bottom up. You see, as Hemingway was an adventurer in life and his writing, I too will be an adventurer...but in home decor!

G: Why don’t you just have a seat. I’m gonna make you some coffee.

M: Ok, but we have to keep our voices down, if the landlord finds out, it’s eviction city, toot sweet. So you remember what my floors looked like before, right?

G: You mean, where parquet came to die?

M: Precisely. Hemingway never would have tolerated such a floor. In fact, he probably would have ripped them up by hand in a drunken tirade. So, I was down in the Keys on my family’s annual fishing trip and visited his Key West home.



M: I was completely entranced with the detailed, colorful tiles throughout the house. My favorite were these bright yellow, deco tiles in the kitchen and bathroom. Also these hand-painted yellow and red tiles around pool.

M: I knew I wanted to do something bold like this in my great room--the only room in my apartment whose floors got beaten by the ugly stick. And remember when we were at the Standard Grill last weekend...

G: How could I forget? Those oysters, that Pims cup, the gorgeous old-world interior...oh, and those patterned tiles!

M: It’s exactly as I imagined Café Select or one of the many other fabulous bars and restaurants would look like that Jake and Lady Ashley bop around to in The Sun Also Rises. And this discovery! It was too good to be true!

G: Lord, have mercy. Mat, sit down and speak slowly. How did you do this?

M: (Speaking very quickly) So in this pattern there are three colors--I wanted to stick with vibrant yellow and brick combo I saw in Key West, and I decided to leave the parquet as the third “color” to add some additional texture and increase the wow-factor. The first step was to cut out the diamond shapes out of contact paper and stick them to the floor, using the existing tiles as a guide. For my project, I used approximately 82 diamonds.

G: Sheesh. Your poor fingers must have been blistering from peeling all those little shapes. Why didn’t you call me? I would’ve helped you!

M: Because it hurt so good! The next step was to prime the entire floor, two coats. And then go over the whole floor with gold paint, two coats.

G: Waiting for four coats of paint to dry? All I imagine is you sitting atop a pile of furniture in your bedroom, feverishly reading The Old Man and the Sea and drinking heavily.

M: You know me too well. Once the gold paint dried, I taped out the brick colored parallelograms and painted each one. Individually. By hand. Two coats.

G: Ok, this project is officially a D.I.CRY.

M: After the paint dried, I carefully removed all the contact paper and painters tape. Because the parquet was showing through, and I wanted to make sure the paint didn’t chip away over time, I applied a couple of coats of low-lustre sealant.

G: I can’t believe you did this project in one night! That explains the strange message you left at 5am asking me to come by and make sure you are still breathing.

M: Yeah, the fumes were crazy, but the floor turned out great! And right when I was finished there was a knock at the door. And who was on the other side? Hemingway himself! And he brought friends along--Martin Van Buren and Tupac Shakur! And we all played twister and ate Totinos Pizza Rolls!

G: Wow. We gotta get you out of here and get you some air, Crazytown. Come on, there’s a new cocktail at The Counting Room. From what I’ve heard, it’s a variation on a classic Hemingway daiquiri. You’ll love it.

M: Ok. (Calling into the other room) Tupac, I’m going out so hold down the fort! And keep Ernest out of the liquor cabinet!

Delicious Vanishing Sun Cocktail from Maksym Pazuniak

from The Counting Room in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

1.5 oz Clement Rhum Agricole

0.75 oz lime

0.75 oz grapefruit

0.50 oz honey syrup (1:1 honey:water formula)

0.25 oz maraschino liqueur

4 - 6 mint leaves

1 dash Angostura bitters

1 dash Regan's orange bitters

Shake everything and strain into a coupe – no garnish.

Among other fantastical projects, best friends Mat Sanders and Guerrin Gardner have appeared as Sandy the Dandy and Charlie McGee, which was a critics’ pick in Time Out New York, The Onion, and NYTheatre.com. They’re currently developing a multitude of new comedic ventures, including a monthly comedy variety show and a live-action, highly stylized version of the Dick Van Dyke Show. See more of their work at toomuchery.com.