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Not Your Grandmother's Wallpaper

Hello! The bedroom decorating continues. So far we have "decorated" the guest bedroom and my son's bedroom. Today we are moving on to my younger daughter's bedroom. I am very excited about this room. When I started to plan the post for this room I thought it would basically be a summary of the room my daughter had in our last house. She moved on from her twin bed bedroom to her teenage full size bed bedroom when we moved into House Number Five. We purchased new linens and a new headboard and since that was not even two years ago the need for new furniture and linens is naught. Then one day I asked her if she would consider wallpaper in her bedroom and that's where the fun comes in! We are doing wallpaper and not just one wall but all walls!


Before we dig in, this is the post where we toured the upstairs as it was (and is still is) when we moved in and this is the post where we talked about the minimal upstairs bedroom renovations just in case....


Here is a look at the existing pieces that we have to work with and following are pictures from my daughter's bedroom in our last house.

Lastly, a close up of the headboard.


A few details on the existing pieces:

  • Bedside table, originally was in my parent's house

  • The bed

  • A trio of poufs that we purchased for here "that are going, Mom"

  • A desk that was both in my mother's room and my bedroom growing up

  • A set of matching chests of drawers that comes from my parent's first apartment. These have been painted many colors over the years and have also been sanded down and stained.

Now for the mood board:

The three poufs will be replaced by some type of chair. Right now the favorite is a hanging rattan chair. I spent a lot of time sourcing wallpaper to give my daughter some options. I was immediately drawn to the top picture in the mood board and have been silently praying that my daughter would like it. I think that some patterns, like the two wallpapers on the board, are able to act as a neutral and I am in favor of having a patterned wallpaper with the existing fabric headboard.


I put together two option boards for my daughter to rank her favorite wallpapers. The first are wallpapers with an obvious, visible white background and the second are wallpapers with more of a pattern that I think will work with the headboard.

a, b, c, d, e, f, g

a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i


My favorite on the first board is "F" which I would do in a heartbeat. I love the yellow and the fun pattern and I know it would work well with the headboard. My daughter's favorite from the first board is "E" which is not surprising since she rides horses. I love the look of the horses because they look to be done in watercolors, the horses are a little too big though, I think, for her room. The top choices for both of us, although not completely the same, all come from the second set of patterned options. My daughter's top three, in no particular order are "E", "G", and "B". You probably noticed that "E" is the wallpaper that is used in the inspiration room that started it all (and incidentally "H" also appeared in the mudroom/powder room decorating post). My tops, again in no particular order, are "A", "B", "C", and "G".


I love "A" and "B" because they introduces color to the room and are almost neutral enough to look like a solid color. I love "C" because it is so similar to the inspiration paper, however it has a blue background which would work better with the headboard. Lastly I like "G" because it the favorite of both us! It is shocking to me that we both chose it. I am over the moon excited about it! I can already envision looking in her room when I get to the top of the stairs and feeling giddy at the sight. I also love that it will complement the pink walls in the guest room when you are standing in the hall and look at one room and then the other - an awesome sightline!


My daughter thinks the headboard needs to be white and I disagree! The closet doors and trim moldings will be painted white though. We will also keep the window treatments simple. Her two windows make up a "corner window" so we will do a very minimal patterned fabric for draperies that flank the "corner window" on the left of one window and the right side of the other window and white wood blinds on the windows as well. I like to have a window treatment that can provide privacy and still let in natural light in a bedroom like mostly closed blinds or shutters do. I love the softness of curtains and their ability to provide total coverage when needed as well. It's going to be so pretty and the hanging chair will be perfect. For the rug, we will get a very simple white jute rug similar to this:


The furniture layout will remain the same as it is now.


As I have been immersed in and inspired by wallpaper lately, I want to share some wallpaper eye candy with you before we part!


The enlarged inspiration photo!


In this next picture the blue and white chairs are upholstered in the same fabric as our family room sofa is currently, I do not know if I would be so bold as to put this wallpaper with that sofa on my own, looking at it though, I love it!


Same wallpaper as the inspiration photo in a powder room!


My daughter and I are both obsessed with having wallpaper on the ceiling and the walls painted and these images almost had us doing it, particularly the first - this paper is on the option board too. I won't rule it out until all is said and done actually!


Postscript, I found these pictures of the inspiration room I ripped out of House Beautiful magazine for my son's room while on my wallpaper hunt. It's amazing how the perspective from these angles changes the overall feel of the room. It's even more beautiful! A friend asked if I had considered painting only one wall the dark blue gray color in my son's room to account for the natural darkness of the room and now seeing this entire room I am inspired to do a mural of sorts on one wall. Stay tuned!


That will do it for us today. Next week we will take a look at the hall bathroom and then the master bathroom. See you there!


Thank you for being here,

Kerry

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Welcome!

Hi, I’m Kerry, a true lover of all things home design.  Thank you for stopping by to check in on the journey.  Please feel free to reach out to me, I love to talk design!

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