Except for one piece of artwork and a small table, Dillan's bedroom makeover is complete!
Let me remind you of what it looked like before:
Nothing fancy...kind of boring actually. And he had outgrown it.
These before pics were taken after we had already started taking the room apart in preparation for painting. Before that, you would've seen lots of posters on the wall and typical teenager stuff on the dresser, etc.
The first thing we did was pick out paint. Dillan has a favorite shirt in a beautiful shade of blue and wanted that color on the walls. So I took the shirt to Home Depot and got them to use their little machine to match the color....much easier than trying to match up color samples!
At this time, we had not bought the new furniture, but since the painting had to be done first anyway, I got started on it right away. Dillan was away at college and Scott working out of town, so I had several days to take my time and get the job done.
I was a good little girl and taped up the trim first.
I also made sure to put plastic on the floor as I went around painting.
I trimmed out the top of the walls next to the ceiling all around the room first.
This picture of the wall the closet is on was taken after I had trimmed out everything and removed the tape.
Once everything is trimmed, it's much easier then to fill in the rest of the walls with a roller.
I just moved the existing furniture around depending on which wall I was working on.
With closets on one wall and a window taking up most of another one, it didn't take long!
Isn't it a beautiful color of blue?
I did the entire thing in three nights. I worked on it in the evenings after getting home from work.
1st night - trim work 2nd night - finished trim 3rd night - rolled walls
Scott went behind me when he got home and really perfected the trim work around the top of the room. With popcorn ceilings, it can be kind of tricky getting the paint right up to the edge! But he's an expert at it!
We decided to keep the bed Dillan had for now, but to find a new headboard. After painting, the first thing we did was look for a used dresser. We gave away Dillan's old dresser, so Dillan needed something to put his clothes in...pronto!
I told you that I wanted to DIY this room as much as possible...and to complete it on a budget. I didn't really have a certain figure in mind, but I didn't want to go out and purchase all new furniture.
It took a few weeks, but I finally found a used dresser in Warner Robins that I thought would fit in nicely with the Retro/Modern theme we were going for. This is what it looked like online (I accidentally deleted the before pic I took of the dresser with my camera....oops!)
We only paid $30.00 for the dresser!
The dresser needed a good sanding before even thinking about getting the spray paint out! I purchased basic gloss black spray paint from Walmart for the body of the dresser.
Once all of the drawers were removed, I cleaned them inside and out with warm water and a mild dish detergent. We also inspected all of the tracts on the bottom of the drawers to make sure they worked correctly. There was only one that had to be replaced. Can't remember how much it was, but it was probably around $5-$8 dollars at Home Depot or Lowe's.
We removed all of the handles off the drawers and sanded/cleaned the build-up off of them.
The brass on them looked pretty good after that, but that's the wrong color for this project!
Here's a closer look at the top of the dresser. A little more sanding had to be done on the edges than the top, but it smoothed out really well.
In the right place, this shabby-chic look might be pretty nice!
The drawers cleaned up well.
But they couldn't stay like that. We needed them to resemble the look of mirrors.
Rust-Oleum's American Accents Bright Metallics was the paint for the job. I also bought it at Walmart for $ 3.77.
I can spray, but Scott is much better at it than me. He says I get in too big of a hurry. The trick is to take your time and spray in even smooth strokes.
When he got through with the first drawer, he didn't like it at all. We didn't think about the fact that any flaw or dent in the wood would show with a metallic spray paint. But I absolutely loved it! I think it resembles the look of old tin...and to me, that fits in very well with the retro/modern feel for the room.
Can't you just imagine what real tin would look like on drawer fronts? Wow! That would be cool!!! But I don't have a clue how to do something like that - so this is the next best thing.
We were thankful for a bright sunny day to get outside and paint. We were having alot of rain and cold days early on this spring and it held up progress on this room.
Here's the dresser body during spraying.....
While we were painting, we went ahead and painted the little shelf that Dillan had to display his vintage cameras in (that was totally his own great idea!). We also spray painted a metal filing cabinet my mom gave us that Dillan was going to use for a night stand....clever, huh?
Here's a close up of the filing cabinet.
It has two large drawers for plenty of storage.
Dillan loves to read and has saved all of his favorite books over the years. So a bookshelf was a "must" for his room. He didn't have one before, so we found this one at Target for @ $35.00.
I mentioned we needed to get him another headboard as well. I came across this one on Amazon.com. It's a bookcase headboard and we purchased it for $ 89.73 plus tax. Another item was checked off our list!
So, let me give you a quick tour of the finished room. When you walk into the room, the bed is on your left. This is the view of the wall on that side of the room. As I said before, one side of the room is mostly closet space. You can also see the filing cabinet/night stand next to the bed.
If you look straight ahead when walking in the room, you see the fabulous DIY dresser. This dresser is the focal point and inspiration for the entire room. Dillan didn't want a typical dresser with a mounted mirror, so we placed it on the wall in front of the window. We bought the white lamp at Target for 20.00 with a discount card. The funky piece in the center of the dresser came from Bealls Outlet. It holds three small votives in the back of it. I bought electric candles to go in there. The silver hand on the right corner of the dresser also came from Bealls. The two items together costs @ $30.00....I think. I already had the glass vase. You can barely see it in this picture. It's next to the hand. We plan on putting some branches of some sorts in there....just haven't gotten around to it yet.
When you enter the room, the wall on the right is another focal point for the room. This shelf holds Dillan's vintage camera collection. He already had two cameras. We found two more for him at flea markets for the price of $3 and $5. The last camera to complete the collection belonged to my great aunt at one time. It's the tall skinny one one the far right on bottom shelf. The framed $1 bill is the first dollar Dillan made as a photographer. Thanks again to Trisha & Glenn Ledford for believing in him. It was the first of many beautiful pictures to be taken by Dillan. By the way, if you click on the Moore Creative Images button on the top of my home page, you can see a little of Dillan's work.
The book shelf is on that same wall with the camera.
Dillan also found the small juke box radio at a yard sale (Peaches to Beaches Yard Sale, actually....ever heard of it? Miles and miles of treasures!!!) He paid only $5.00 for it. He put a few books and his wooden manicin figure on the top to add some height.
I spotted this cool Viking figure at the same yard sale for only .25! He's posed on the shelf with the medieval books. How appropriate!
We originally had in mind to buy black & white Chevron fabric for the panels. Hobby Lobby didn't have the size stripe I wanted, so I opted for this. We actually ended up liking it better anyway. The white sheers were purchased at Walmart.
Here's a look at the bed if you're standing in front of the dresser looking that way. This small wall is just big enough for the bed and night stand. The only thing missing is some framed art work above the bed. The black & white poster we wanted was sold out, so we're working on something else.
This cute lamp is actually silver, although it doesn't look it in this picture. I spotted it at Fred's Dolllar Store for only $ 19.99.
I thought it would be neat to put one of Dillan's photography business cards in the place of a drawer label.
You see the small lion head shelf on the wall?
Here's a better look at it. We also found it at the yard sale for only $ 10.00.
And that bad boy is some kind of heavy! He reminds me of Narnia....one of our fave movies.
The view from the far side of the room.
Another look at the dresser....can you tell how much I LOVE this dresser?!
I told Dillan I think we need to add a small, narrow table of sorts for this wall. That would give him a place to put is wallet and phone and stuff when he first comes in. I just feel like something needs to be under that camera display? We'll know it when we see it!
So there you have it! Well, what do you think? Pretty drastic, right?
Just some art work over the bed, that small table, and maybe a couple of colorful throw pillow added to the bed and we are completely done! This project was so much fun to me!
More importantly, Dillan loves his new room. It's much more functional for him and reflects his own personal style. We got it done just in time for him to enjoy this summer when he's home from college.
Since this was done on a budget, let me give you a break-down of the prices
and let's see how we came out:
dresser 30.00
spray paint - 10.00
book shelf - 35.00
file cabinet/nightstand - FREE
curtains - black/white fabric from Hobby Lobby 35.00, white sheers 13.00 from Walmart
comforter - 40.00 at Walmart
2 lamps - 40.00
book case headboard - 89.73 + tax
other accessories - 65.73
Total: @ 365.00
Not bad at all for a complete bedroom makeover!
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