Hopkins Cribs: Charles Commons 709

It's that time of year again, time for Hopkins Cribs.  Last year I wrote about my room in AMRI Wilson House(one of the older buildings on campus), but now I live in the newest dorm on campus, Charles Commons.  So, let me begin by saying that not having to walk down the hall to the bathroom is one of the most wonderful things ever.  Seriously!  That may be my favorite part of my Charles Commons Suite.  Anyway, I will get to the rest later. 

Let me tell you a little bit about Charles Commons in general.  The building was finished 2 years ago, so I am only the second person to live in this suite.  It's nice and new, which is also wonderful.  The Charles Commons building is equipped with meeting rooms, practice rooms, a laundry room, common kitchen, exercise room (with a couple of treadmills, ellipticals, and bikes), a mail room, and Nolan's, an upperclassman dining hall.  Basically, you never have to leave the building. 

You have food, a place to sleep, and a place to exercise--plus you can receive contact from the outside world in the form of letters and packages with the mail room.  Can you tell I've contemplated never leaving?  In any case, I feel like all these amenities really benefit you when the weather is terrible.  The one thing that's mildly disappointing is that Nolan's is only open for dinner.  It would be really nice if you could grab lunch there too.

In terms of the residences, there are two sides of the building, the St. Paul Side (because we are closer to St. Paul's Street) and a Charles side (closest to North Charles Street).  The St. Paul Side rooms are mostly (if not all) 9-month leases.  The Charles side are either 11-month leases or vacation housing.  I also believe that the Charles side apartments are a little bigger, if only because they are paying for the 11-month lease.  I guess if you are going to live there for that long the architects felt you deserved more space.  In fact, next year my new suite mate, Danielle, and I chose to live in the 11-month because typically 2-person suites do not have living rooms, but if you are on the Charles side you do get a living room, which is nice. Ok, so now on to my own room.

First, my video and then a fuller description:

I live on the 7th floor of the St. Paul side.  Once you get out of the elevators, it's a long walk around until you reach my suite.  My two-person suite is one of the larger doubles on the St. Paul side.  We have a large kitchen with enough space for a small table and a couple of chairs. When we have people over for dinner, we usually move the table into the center of the room to fit more people around. 

So, my room right now is mildly messy--I just wrote a couple of papers--so the pictures in this blog are mostly of the artwork around my room.  I don't think you can really see my posters and photos in the video below, so I figured this would be a good place to display them.  At the beginning of the year, I had a lot of ambitions about cooking.  As a result, we have lots of cooking utensils, pots and pans, and other assorted kitchen goods.  While I really haven't found much time as I thought to cook, occasionally, I make a nice meal. 

Our bathroom is pretty straightforward, I really don't have a lot of stuff so it's pretty clean.  My favorite thing is the shower curtain which has cute hot and cold hooks for the shower bar.  While our bathroom isn't really anything special, I wish I could show you one of my friends bathroom.  Her suite-mates had a competition as to who could decorate and create the best bathroom.  Two of them decorated their bathroom with lots of seaside/water decorations.  They even had a real fish!  The other two decorated their bathroom with candles, plants, cool mirrors, and a cute shelf with canvas pull out drawers in order to create a spa-like atmosphere.  The moral of the story is that you can really do a lot with a custom decorations and have fun at the same time!

Out of all the things I like about my suite, my favorite by far is having my own room.  As much as I enjoyed having a roommate last year, it's great to have privacy.  Upon entering my room, the first thing you will notice is my comforter.   It's a raspberry pink and blue paisley that I combined with pink and navy blue striped sheets.

One of the first things I told my roommate last year was that I had this pink comforter, but I really wasn't a pink person.  It's true!  I'm not a pink person, I just need to say this so that you don't judge me based on my comforter.  It is really important to invest in nice bedding when you go to college.  It will improve your life greatly!  Although, you may not want to make it too comfortable or else you may never get out to go to class. 

Besides my bedding, my favorite things in my room are my books and movies.  I have favorite books such as The Great Gatsby, This Side of Paradise, Vanity Fair, and plenty of travel books.  Besides those, I also have a collection of assorted philosophy books.  My movies include Hook, The Devil Wears Prada, and A Knight's Tale.  I didn't really bring a collection of the classic movies, but just ones that are fun to watch and perfect if I need to de-stress. 

Oh and one more thing I need to tell you about is my desk.  My desk has drawers  that slide out to allow you more room to write.  They are great!  If you get a room in Charles Commons, make sure you make use of those drawers. I didn't realize until a month later and since then use them all the time.  Since you don't get any bookshelves you probably have a lot of stuff on your desk so this helps to create more room.  Obviously, I love them.  So, other than that, the video of my room pretty much speaks for itself and tells you a lot of information about my crib.  If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask.  Until next time...

Comments

[JHU_Kate]

So many different colored utensils...heehee...

[JHU_Lauren]

OMG, do all Commons showers need shower curtains?!! I'm psyched, I bought one this past summer and I didn't get to use it in Wolman, lol. I love the way you did your pictures on the wall too .. I'm definitely coming back to these cribs entries when I'm decorating next semester! :]