Bye Bye Ugly Almond Outlets

Hello all, work has been limiting my blogging time (how dare work do that, right?) but I'm back this week with a few things to share. I hope you had a lovely weekend. Mine was rather satisfying. The boyfriend and I tackled a bunch of small projects that we're been putting off for weeks (some months). It's funny how those little projects can actually have a noticeable impact on the feeling of the room.

Most of the projects were pretty mundane and not necessarily "blogworthy" so I'll spare you but this one was simple and makes me very happy so I had to share. Our entire condo was plagued with a case "Hideous Almond Colored Outlet Syndrome" and I could no longer stand the sight of them. The old beige outlets became exponentially less attractive once the walls were given a coat of dove gray paint.

Replacing outlets it really simple. All you need is the new outlet and cover, a screwdriver, and needle-nose pliers. Total project cost - roughly $2.50; Total time require - about 10 minutes.

Since I'm not a license electrician I'll refrain from giving you the exact step by step instructions but I can give you the basic idea of how this works. The most important thing - Cut power to the outlet from the main panel before you start anything.

After the power as been turned off, it's just a matter of unscrewing the old outlet, detaching the wires coming from the wall, reattaching those in the same locations on the new outlet, cramming all of the wires back into the junction box, screwing in the new outlet and adding a shiny new outlet cover.


Viola! Goodbye old, dirty outlets and hello shiny new white outlets. This makes me happier than I think it really should.

(please excuse my dirty windowsill, I'm saving that project for next weekend)

Hope you all had a wonderful, crossing things off the To Do list, weekend!

Sign up to receive Design Evolution updates via RSS feed or email.