In my previous post, I focused on the organization component of my daughter Grace’s recent bedroom makeover. It basically involved overhauling her closet with the installation of a customized Elfa closet storage system. Today, I’ll reveal how the decor of the bedroom was updated in an effort to transform the room into a space she can truly enjoy throughout her teen years.
When we moved into our home 9 years ago, my daughter was almost 2 years old, and I thought it would be fun to involve her in the process of decorating her new room. I allowed her to select the paint colors of the room and celebrated her love of sea creatures by creating a homemade stamped “sea life” border around the perimeter of her room.
Room “Issues”
Although there are many aspects of the room that have stood the test of time beautifully (e.g., the furniture), there was room for improvement on several fronts. First, the bedroom was dark as a consequence of the magenta paint color and the window treatment.
Second, the green wall color choice was less than optimal (remember, it was chosen by a 2-year old after all). It’s difficult to appreciate how jarring the neon green walls were by merely viewing these photos. Although Grace really enjoyed it, the color was headache-inducing for me to say the least. And after 8 years, it was time to bid adieu to the sea life border.
In addition, it was becoming increasingly apparent that my little trinket collector would require more display space than this mere 12″ x 12″ bulletin board would accommodate.
Finally, we needed to address a few furniture placement issues and replace the bedding, since (although cute), her 5-year quilt had seen better days.
Redesign Objectives
So in a nutshell, the design objectives for this room were to:
1. Lighten and brighten
2. Tone down the neon
3. Create additional display space
4. Improve room Flow
5. Remove “Little Kid” elements
6. Freshen up bedding
7. Add fun pops of color
May I present the new and improved “Big Girl” Room…
Objectives 1, 2, and 5 were achieved via painting the walls and replacing the old valence with a new one that’s narrower and mounted close to the ceiling line. I chose to paint over the magenta using the white trim color in order to unify the chair rail and the bottom portion of the wall. We vanquished the neon green by painting over it with a softer, fresher shade of green.
In order to achieve Objective 3, I created a display wall by covering several cork bulletin boards with magenta-colored fabric that I scored from the remnant bin at Joann’s. My daughter wanted to add cork to the entire wall, but I thought that this would be more than sufficient. We relocated her original bulletin board to the interior of her closet.
The room flow was improved by switching the original position of the vanity and bookcase. In the original configuration, it was difficult for my daughter to access the far side of her room because there was insufficient clearance between the bed and the vanity. With this simple repositioning,Objective 4 was met.
Now for the fun part! After an extensive search for bedding, my daughter and I fell in love with this funky duvet/sham set I found in the clearance bin for a grand total of $38! Can you tell I’m a sucker for the clearance bins yet?!? The bed skirt was yet another clearance find at Tuesday Morning. I love love love it! Objective 6…CHECK!
Of course, the addition of the colorful bedding helps to achieve Objective 7, but we took it to the next level with the addition of the fun paper lanterns and ribbon in a variety of festive patterns and colors. We couldn’t resist these cute vinyl picture frames that offered a perfect dose of magenta “pop” on the bookcase wall.
And for the grand finale, we spray painted the letters to match her funky new duvet cover. There you have it!
I’m hoping that this will be the last time we will need to decorate this space until it’s time to transform it into my craft room once Gracie goes off to college!
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