Recycling with Rik

Harley rider-turned decorator looks for recycling deals to remodel guest, 'throne' rooms

Rik Nelson   /  Correspondent

Jim Nelson turned the rear fender from a friend's motorcycle into a lamp. (Joe Barrentine/The Spokesman-Review) Find it used •Habitat-Spokane Builder's Surplus Store, 860 E. Trent Ave., 535-9517 •Brown Building Materials, 112 N. Erie St., 535-0112 •The Ugly Duck, 1727 W. Sinto Ave., 326-0199 •St. Vincent de Paul Society's As-Is Store, 2901 E. Trent Ave., 535-2491 •Salvage Warehouse, 2121 E. Broadway Ave., 533-1903 •MoMike Demolition, www.MoMike.com

Jim Nelson puts the "cycle" in recycle. He's fashioned a wall light sconce from a purple Harley FXR fender. A guitar-toting Jerry Garcia doll straddles the fender's red taillight. The fender itself is from a deceased friend's motorcycle.

Nelson, a Harley-Davidson motorcycle enthusiast, recently converted his Medical Lake garage into a guest room/den and added a bathroom. All of the building materials came from local discounters and "reusables" suppliers.

The project took life in part out of necessity, in part from a long-held dream. Nelson's daughter told him she needed a place to stay for a few months and he offered to remodel his garage into living quarters. His stipulation was that he got to do the decorating so it would be how he wanted it when she moved out.

That was an important stipulation. The conversion was Nelson's opportunity to realize his 45-year-old dream: The Harley Room.

"I've been working on, building and riding motorcycles since I was 11 years old," Nelson says, "and I've been collecting Harley-Davidson paraphernalia nearly that long, about 12 boxes of it."

In addition, Nelson was in the Coast Guard for 30 years and had memorabilia from that career, too. "I was running out of room," he says. So the remodel began.

Over the years, Nelson had donated materials to the Habitat-Spokane Builder's Surplus Store, so he knew he could find most of the materials he'd need there. Nelson bought electrical wiring and light fixtures, plywood and wallboard, lumber and cabinet supplies for an entertainment center, the stainless steel sink for his wet bar, even a free-standing fireplace.

Nelson says he found the prices very affordable. "They cost about $4,200," he says. "Retail they'd probably be about triple that, and everything's been top quality."

On one of his visits to the store, Nelson found some wall paint that hadn't found a lot of takers. "People looked at that pea-green paint and said it was the color of baby. ..." He pauses. "But with all the black paint I was using in the room, the green took on more of a tan look, an earth tone."

Black as a dominant color in a guest room? Of course. With chrome highlights! Well, it's a Harley Room, after all, and with Nelson's deft touch, the room has the elemental "cool" of a silver-studded black leather motorcycle jacket.

The black walls are further softened, personalized, with photos and Nelson's awards. In 2003, Nelson received First Place in Silverwood's "The 100 Years of Harley and Classic Bike Show" for a motorcycle "trike" he built. That's on the wall.

But the room is, among other things, a tribute to Nelson's friends who have died, and they're on the walls, too – with their motorcycles.

Does more than 40 years of memorabilia in one space create a cluttered look? No, Nelson's arrangements have the clarity and intelligence of a well-installed art show or museum exhibit; the room's clean lines, organization and personal flair are reminiscent of the elegance and muscularity of a classic car or chopper.

But the bathroom is Nelson's interior design tour-de-force. He used five-bar aluminum plating (bought at a Stock Steel, now the CDA Company), typically seen as flooring on truck beds, as baseboard molding. Its metallic sheen connects over black toilet, sink and countertop, to the chrome vanity lights, telescoping shaving mirror and medicine cabinet. The five-bar pattern is bold, yet delicate, very similar to a traditional basket weave quilting pattern.

Near eye-level, the room is encircled by the yellow and orange flames of a wallpaper border Nelson found, discontinued and discounted, at Wal-Mart.

From aluminum channeling, he custom-built frames for the flames: They extend around the room; from wall to mirror, mirror to window and window to shower, creating a unity with, yet counterpoint to, the baseboard.

Finally, Nelson has appointed the "throne room" with Harley books and other memorabilia which connect the room visually and thematically to the adjoining guest room.

"The whole Harley Room is sort of a 3-D scrapbook," Nelson says.

"The bikes I've built, awards, mementos of my Coast Guard career, and memories of my friends."