Do you want to know how to plan for a beautiful girls bedroom makeover?
You may have a bunch of inspiration photos but need guidance to know what ideas will actually work.
Some mantle details of my daughter’s bedroom in the ‘before’ stage. Each accessory is meaningful to her, so that means that they will be making a reappearance in the makeover, or be thoughtfully handed on to another little person who can treasure them.
Come with me as I breakdown the process I took as I planned a long over due makeover of my daughter’s bedroom. It’s more than unicorns and rainbows despite how it might appear on Instagram, but that doesn’t mean it has to be difficult or overwhelming.
These 5 tips will give you a solid starting plan to tackle your own makeover.
MAKEOVER TIP 1.
Find function that flows
Whether the space you dream of creating is a soft, whimsical one, or a bold, energetic one, it will only work as well as it functions. You might have lots of inspirational images of rooms you love, but do those elements fit in the room you’re planning?
This is where thinking about how the room will function comes into play. There is nothing worse than a makeover with lots of lovely details, but you stub your toe on an awkwardly placed reading chair, or your ‘little lady’ doesn’t have enough space for her craft supplies. Here’s how to plan for the function factor…
The craft/homework/Lego playing space gets a lot of mileage in this room. All it needs is a little freshen up in places to help it stay a functional zone for years to come.
Ask yourself the following questions:
How does she currently use the space?
Does she like to create a cosy reading nook for herself, or prefer to have space to swing her toy cat? Is she into spreading Lego all over the floor, or does she have a neatly organised gel pen collection?
Make note of how she uses her room day to day, this will give you a great starting point in understanding how her room needs to work for her.
In our bedroom makeover we wanted to keep lots of floor space for playing so our furniture choices were minimal. The limitations of the room is its size, so we needed to think of ways for it to feel larger than it actually is!
What are the limitations of the space?
What are the glaringly obvious problems with her space? While you may not be able to fix all of these, recognising them is half the solution. Is the room on the small size, or does it feel too large and cavernous? What are the things she complains about, or the frustration points for you?
Brainstorm your ideas and see what sort of list you come up with. Your list will probably be a mix of practical and aesthetic things, and from there you can prioritise what is most important to your family to change.
How would she like to use the space?
This is where you can invite the little girl in your life to share her dreams for her new space. Be prepared for A LOT of ideas to come at you here! As you listen hear the repeating threads that might emerge, things like the feel, style, the use of the space.
These are the points you will want to hone in on and address the best you can. For my daughter the overarching theme was for a cosier space, it was all about the feeling of the space for her.
MAKEOVER TIP 2.
Discover a look that delights
When we think about children’s rooms and colour palettes things can get a little crazy. Some mums are happy to embrace the superhero theme, and others are not (honestly, I’m more in the not category here). But that being said, as a designer my job is to listen to what the client wants and not to push my style aesthetic onto them.
We already had some muted colours in the bedlinen that my daughter wanted carried into her bedroom makeover. Being such a sentimental gal she also wanted to keep the patchwork quilt I made for her as a toddler (lucky the colours all sit well together)!
It often comes down to delivering the favourite colours/themes your daughter loves in a cohesive and clever way. For my young client, she loved green and fairy lights and so we chatted about how to incorporate mood lighting and her favourite colour into her new space.
When it comes to room colours, remember that often a muted or toned down version of the colour creates a more calm and mature space that works well into the future. A favourite theme can be incorporated in your accessories, such as figurines or wall decals, which are easier to swap out when the craze has past.
Also keep in mind that a room that has a couple of elements of a certain style, be it bohemian or eclectic works much better than a room that is monopolised by one style. This is especially the case if the rest of your home has none of this design style at all! A collected and personalised room is much more meaningful full stop. Your aim is to create a room that will grow with daughter, and a makeover that is built to last.
MAKEOVER TIP 3.
Pull the practical punches
As pretty as the fairy lights on the mantle are, practically it involves running an extension cord along the wall to have them there. We spent time thinking about how to display the lights in a more practical way that minimised tripping over cords. When it came to thinking about what feature we wanted to highlight, it was the mantle all the way.
Too often the practical aspects of a room makeover are overlooked. But remember your room makeover will only be the bomb if you have ticked all the practical boxes. Things to consider might be:
Power point placement (you may need extension cords to plug things in)
Position of light switches (they need to be easy to access)
Types of window coverings (block out window coverings or sheers, curtains or blinds)
Heating and cooling needs (ceiling fan or ducted cooling, natural ventilation from windows)
Sound acoustics (extra rugs and cushions to help absorb noise)
Along with all those important practical points, another thing that is helpful to think about is what do you want to disguise or highlight in the room? If you are working within an existing footprint, work out the number one feature of the room you want to highlight (what you love the most), and one thing you can’t wait to hide. For our makeover, the mantle piece was the highlight, and the smaller than average size of the room was what we set about disguising. Just picking one of each helps keep you focused and not chasing rabbit trails.
MAKEOVER TIP 4.
Nail a fabulous floorplan
It’s common to have so many lovely pieces you want to fit into your new room makeover. Usually though we end up with a cramped space and things don’t fit comfortably.
How do we overcome this dilemma?
Whilst having a log for a bedside table is sorta cute, it’s far from practical. Part of our planning around the floorplan was a bedside table that was at the right height to use, and narrow enough not to block the doorway.
Measure the space (preferably once it is empty), and measure the furniture you know will go back into the room. Tape out the placement of furniture on the floor and walls, including the height to get the best sense of how all your chosen pieces will work together.
Alternatively you can plot the furniture and room size on graph paper at a chosen scale, this way you can play around with different layouts before committing in reality. Don’t forget about the heights of items too. This will help you find solutions to how high the bedside table needs to be in comparison to the bed, or how high the bed can be in relation to the ceiling fan (this was a super important one for us)!
If you don’t skip this step you can be guaranteed of a well thought out space with the perfect amount of furniture for it to feel spacious and practical.
MAKEOVER TIP 5.
Settle a sensible budget
The thing with budgets is we always think we need a bigger one. In reality a smaller budget often delivers a smarter design, as we are forced to get more creative and be content with what we have. Whatever the budget is for your girl’s room makeover, accept it and make peace with it! If you are constantly grumbling about the amount you can invest it won’t be an enjoyable process, and at the end of the day design is meant to be a joy. We found that pricing out our big ticket items was a helpful place to start, and this meant we didn’t overspend on the smaller accessories which is so tempting to do. Sticking to a rough allocation of funds for each item helped us determine a sensible budget for the makeover in the first place, and stopped us going too far over!
Part of our budget planning was using the relatively economical design tool, paint! As you can see here the walls are looking tired, chipped and plain old bare. To fix this doesn’t have to be pricey, nor eat up a lot of your precious budget.
With these 5 tips we were able to plan for our bedroom makeover, and I hope they will give you confidence to do the same. Armed with these guidelines you can be sure that your bedroom makeover will be an enjoyable process, and will give you confidence that you’re on the right track.
Still not sure how to narrow down all your ideas for your bedroom makeover?
Sometimes chatting with someone and looking at the space together can bring the clarity you need. Reach out to Design Release at hello@designrelease.com.au and in a two hour consultation we can brainstorm, talk layouts and colours, suggest what pieces to edit or add, and generally address any uncertainty you might have.
Together we can anticipate the joy and excitement the end result will bring!
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