This room needed to be a space where both husband and wife felt comfortable in. This pink and brown colour scheme fit the bill as it has both masculine and feminine qualities.
This homeowner decided to work with some of what she all ready had. Dark brown antique furniture and blush-coloured walls were the starting point. Not wanting to repaint the room she chose to work with the soft pink wall colour and gained further inspiration for the rest of the room from a piece of chocolate topped with pink icing. The homeowner luckily had a soft, pink satin curtain panel that was hanging in another room at the time which would work well in the new scheme. The pink panel was a starting point for the window treatment but because it was not wide enough for a sufficient treatment she needed to find chocolate brown panels in a similar fabric to flank it. As well, she decided that the bedding should be brown (to keep the masculine feel) with soft pink bed sheets as accents. So, at this point she needed to find the bedding, curtain panels and sheets to help complete the space. These three items can easily run into the hundreds of dollars but our homeowner bade her time and kept her eyes open for deals. She also knew that she'd need some artwork and kept this in mind when shopping for decorating items.
This is a good place to remind you that patience can sometimes be a virtue. When you are in a hurry to finish a room, you'll run out and pay full price for items that, if you waited, might be found in other venues for a lot less money.
Budget savers
Case in point; our homeowner found a comforter/pillow sham set in a dark chocolate shimmery fabric for $20. The clearance store only had one queen set and one twin set so she bought both. She used the twin set to create the dark curtain panels she needed by simply removing the fleece backing and cutting the top piece of the bedspread in half and seaming the edges. At the same discount store, she found a mottled brown sheet set for her queen-sized bed for $8 and a suede accent pillow in dark brown for $3. She planned to use the sheets to create a bed skirt, which in the end, turned out great. At yet another discount shop she found a soft pink corduroy neck pillow for under $5.
The headboard needed to be recovered as well. It was fashioned from two panels of plywood which had previously been covered in another fabric. Our clever homeowner used the dark brown fleece backing from her curtain project to recover the headboard using a hot glue gun.
Artwork
Our crafty homeowner used clothing to create unique artwork for her bedroom walls. She happened upon a sale on summer dresses found some that were chocolate brown with pink accents for $3 each. She bought two dresses and used one to create two pieces of artwork by stretching the fabric over two stretcher frames. (The frames were found at a thrift shop for $1 each.). She has displayed the second dress on a dressing dummy she had and created a lovely vignette in one corner of the room. She found a brown and tan suede skirt in a retro pattern at a thrift store for $1 and stretched it over a stretcher frame (which she also got at the thrift store for $2) to create a unique piece of artwork for over the head of the bed.
This is another great place to remind you that artwork can be inexpensive yet still stunning. Keep your mind open to the possibilities.
Our homeowner found a set of pink flannel bed sheets at Winners for $40, which was a reasonable price and the room was pretty much complete.
This entire room was redecorated for just over $100, which these days, is no small feat. Shopping wisely and thinking creatively saved this homeowner tons of money.
The homeowner is happy with her creations and is comfortable in the fact that the artwork can be easily updated with new and different fabric on a whim as her tastes evolve. The chocolate brown bedding can be interchanged with different accent colours down the road as well without a huge investment.
Take your inspiration from things that you love, whether it be a piece of chocolate, a destination or a song. Life is full of wonderful options for the home.
