Rita rents a two-bedroom, kitchen-bathroom-balcony apartment. Because she suffers from severe depression, she receives a reduced earning capacity pension. It's not a lot of money and Rita can't make any great leaps with it. Nevertheless, she has furnished her rented apartment in a very stylish and colorful way with a lot of skill, good ideas and inexpensive second-hand purchases and vintage furniture.

Rita has lived in her apartment in an apartment building in Andernach since summer 2019. Her two-bedroom apartment covers around 70 m² and the rent is 510 euros warm per month. Rita has to live frugally, as she has been receiving a reduced earning capacity pension for six years. She has to get by on that. But Rita has a knack for making a lot out of a little. And you can't tell that her apartment is on a tight budget.
Rita is a design lover. She is particularly fond of the look of design classics from the 70s. With a lot of patience and knowing exactly what to look for, she is always able to find design bargains and vintage furniture for just a few euros on the internet. Rita is also very skilled in craftsmanship and design. If she can't buy an expensive designer vase second-hand, she simply starts pottering herself. She has also sewn all her curtains herself, as well as many cushions and chair covers. In this way, she keeps the costs low.

Rita's apartment is a colorful place. Her color and pattern combinations are rather unusual and daring. Pink, orange, blue, coral, green - her living-dining area alone features a wide variety of colors. She does not follow a clear concept when putting them together, but proceeds intuitively. She repeatedly scans the room and senses which color might be missing in which place. Rita loves mixing pink and orange. Orange is always a must, it's her signature color. The downside of her good sense of color, however
however, is that Rita finds it difficult to switch off.

Making her home nice and cozy is particularly important to Rita. Because her home is also her cocoon, her safe space. Due to her depression and anxiety disorders, there are always long periods when she can't go outside. Surrounding herself with beautiful things at home is good for the soul. Curtains are also very important to her so that she can isolate herself a little. So there is also a curtain on the balcony and in the bedroom the curtain even runs along the wall so that the room radiates as much peace and security as possible.

Rita is particularly proud of the fact that only originals that she has received as gifts or heirlooms hang on her walls. She has also painted some of the pictures herself. Particularly valuable originals hang in the kitchen: the works of her little grandson. Rita is very happy that her grandson and her two daughters also live in Andernach.

Rita reports on her interior design ideas and also on the topic of depression on Instagram: @frauschneidertutnet

00:00 Rita's apartment is her safe space
00:30 Living and dining room
06:05 Balcony
07:25 Bedroom
10:00 Hallway
12:57 Kitchen/workshop

A film by Annette Dany (editor), Stefanie Vier (camera), Dennis Jankovic (camera / sound) and Alex Jung (editor).