Chic Your Room

When I moved into my flat, my bedroom was bright pink and covered in Disney princesses. Hardly ideal for anyone over the age of ten...

It was one of the first things I had to change because the garish colours were keeping me awake at night and it wasn't exactly somewhere I wanted to chill out in or show my friends. However, I had just finished university and I didn't have a job lined up so I needed to do it as cheaply as possible. Here is how I turned my room from a Disney nightmare to a chic and sophisticated chill-out zone on a budget.

First of all I had to get that garish pink off the walls, so I painted the whole room white. This took about three or four coats of paint as it was such a hot pink. I used Wilkinson's own brand white paint as it came in huge cans for about £6 and I needed a lot of it! I probably ended up using two 5L cans of white paint to cover it all. The white made the room seem much larger than before so I decided I would keep that colour and accent it with another colour. I chose one of my favourite colours - mint which cost about £12 from Wilkinson's (look out for offers, I bought it when all paints were 20% off). I painted two of the main walls mint to add a bit of warmth to the room. Already, it looked miles better!

I also had a tapestry, that I had bought from Urban Outfitters whilst I was at university, which I used to cover up one of the white walls to add some pattern and a few brighter colours to the mix. Tapestries are great statement pieces for any room and can be hung on the wall with a few pins or also used as a throw on a bed or sofa - the choice is yours! This tapestry cost me £20 as I was able to nab it in the sale.

Urban Outifitters have a wide range of tapestries
 to brighten your rooms

So now that the walls were looking great, I needed to do some work on the furniture. When I moved in there was a dilapidated chest of drawers that were on their last legs, quite literally! These had to go, so I went at them with a hammer (which really wasn't difficult as they were now mainly held together with glue). I unscrewed the handles and kept hold of these in case I needed them later on. There was also a matching desk, which was just as broken so I took this apart also but salvaged the shelving unit to store DVDs on.

I kept one piece of the original furniture, which was an old red mirror that I had acquired several years ago from some work colleagues. However, this too was showing its age and was in need of a bit of TLC. I bought a can of gold spray paint (also from Wilkinson's - that shop has EVERYTHING!) for £5 and sprayed the frame to make it look a bit more glam.

A bit of gold spray paint helped
revive this old mirror

However, after throwing out half my furniture, I was now in desperate need of some more. New furniture is ridiculously expensive, especially chests of drawers. So I went charity shopping. I managed to acquire all of my furniture from The British Heart Foundation. It didn't all look great at first, but with a bit of imagination and DIY (or rather CIY) you can spruce it up and make it exactly what you want. In total, I spent £60 on furniture and this got me a huge chest of drawers, a bedside table and an ornament shelf.

The bedside table was pretty tacky when I bought it, but I could see it had potential. Its previous owner had sprayed it gold (gold spray paint doesn't look good on everything!!) and they had put a bit of what looked like blue carpet underneath the glass top. I repainted it white, leaving the feet, interior and handle gold. I also removed the scrappy piece of carpet and replaced it with a scrap of Cath Kidston fabric I had that luckily was the perfect size. (Tip: Always fold over the ends of the fabrics to get a neat finish.)

This £15 cabinet just needed a lick
 of paint and a bit of fabric

The chest of drawers was pretty much fine, but it did have some very ugly little grey knobs for handles. I took these off and replaced them with the ones I had salvaged and spray painted gold.

With a new set of knobs, this chest of drawers
 looks great at just £30

The ornament table was perfect, I needed something to display all my trinkets and photos on and this slotted perfectly into one of the corners, this was a very lucky find at only £10.

A great charity shop find at only £10

The finishing touches were also super cheap and easy to come by. I got this great lamp off ebay for £12.99, it's beautiful, gives off a light and casts a lovely pattern on the walls. 

I love this lamp, just £12.99 on eBay

I also use high quality sheets of wrapping paper as posters, this is a cheap way of decorating your walls as they only cost about £3 - a lot of money for wrapping paper, but not so much for a poster! 

Wrapping paper makes great posters

Finally, I remembered that my mum had a lovely pair of curtains from her old house that she was no longer using and I asked if I could have them for my room which she very kindly obliged. So it was goodbye to the Disney Princess blind and hello to free chic silk curtains!

These free curtains went great with the colour scheme

So to completely redecorate and furnish my room it cost about £100. Half of which went to charity, which is great! Always keep an eye out for pieces that have potential and don't be afraid to ask friends and family if they've got anything you might need.

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