Monday, February 24, 2020

Our Master Bedroom Makeover!

I've been wanting to change up our master bedroom for a long time now - we had a headboard that we bought shortly after we moved in to this house back in 2000, and while it's still nice, I was tired of it.  Our dresser, which we didn't use as a dresser but rather as a holder of good bags and boxes, ribbon, tissue paper, etc, was bought with wedding present money back in 1984.  The nightstands rotated in and out according to whatever I was moving around in the rest of the house, and except for a chair that we bought about seven years ago, everything else was on the chopping block.

And then I herniated the disc in my back and everything got put on hold.

But before that happened, I watched an episode of Orlando Soria's Unspouse My House on HGTV, (and if you aren't following him on Instagram you're missing out on a very funny and creative person) where he put two identical dressers next to each other because the woman living there had a lot of clothes and he wanted her to have space for everything and I loved that idea.  I've always been of the mindset that if you have two dressers (which we didn't) they should be different, like a tall one and a wide one.  But we had the wall space to do this, and I found a dresser online that would work for this (you can't get one that has an edge hanging over the dresser or it won't align perfectly with the other dresser), so that was my starting point.  Until everything stopped...maaaannn 2019 was a bad year.  But a couple months ago the dresser went on sale for the lowest price I'd seen - and yes I had been checking pricing on it every so often - so I bought two of them and our great master bedroom makeover had officially begun!

Naturally I can't find many decent pictures of the old bedroom, but here's a potato-quality one from 2013:
The only thing that stayed in the bedroom is the chair.  The nightstand was moved late last year into the red guest bedroom. 

Since I don't have much to compare it to, I'll just get right into the after pictures:
The dressers that started it all!  These are from All Modern and are called the Parocela 7-drawer dresser, but you can find the same exact one at Wayfair, Joss & Main, and other sites...all for different prices which makes no sense except welcome to internet shopping.

We each have a dresser and have finally gotten out of the bin game in our closets, which has made organizing our closets much easier.  Plus we both let go of a lot of clothes and that helped immensely.

We've needed a new mattress for about five years now and after sleeping on the Tulo foam mattress that Allie bought for her guest room, decided to get one for ourselves.  I wanted to get a new bed to go with the dressers and we went back and forth on getting an upholstered headboard vs a wooden one; we finally decided on the wooden headboard...which ended up being the entire bed with side and foot rails.  While I found similar looking beds online, the reviews weren't great plus there were obvious screw holes on the sides of the headboard where you put it together.  We found a better quality one in town at Star Furniture, on sale (of course) and when it arrived I was really pleased to see that it went with the dresser color so well:
An after shot, but still a before one, too.

I wasn't sure about buying matching nightstands - would the entire room look too matchy-matchy?  In the end I bought them, only not from All Modern because by the time I decided to get them they were out of stock.  Instead I got them from Amazon.  They were the exact same thing as the Parocela set but they were called Alpine instead. You kind of have to be a detective when buying furniture online.

Oh - I also bought new bedding!  After having gray sheets for a decade, I was going for a bit of color in the room.  I wanted a coastal vibe without being too beach themed, and when I found this quilt at Pottery Barn  - its the Hanna, in Beach Glass colorway - I was happy.  Plus, it was on a huge sale, and it's really easy to get free shipping at Pottery Barn vs. West Elm or Crate and Barrel.  You know how I like free shipping, LOL.  The only thing I'm missing is one king-sized sham that I'll use for a pop of color throw pillow - it's backordered until April (it was a heck of a sale - the euro shams that go with my quilt are backordered now).  Here's the pillow:
The pattern is called Del Mar Coastal, which of course caught my eye because my Grandmother had a house in Del Mar, California and I spent many summers there.  I really liked the pattern plus the bit of orange in it.

For sheets, I wanted to try out some coral-printed sheets but was worried that it might be too theme-y, so when I came across a set at Macy's for the super sale price of $20 - for king-sized, no less - I bought them.  Turns out I like them; they probably won't last too long considering the quality is most-likely not stellar, but now I know that I'm good with coral, so I'll be on the lookout for a better set.

Next up was lamps.  I have such a hard time with lamps!  I never can get the height right.  We only went through one pair (modern, orange, super cute, super small) before my dream lamps went on sale at Pottery Barn and I bought them - and I'm so glad I did.  Again, I was worried about everything being too matchy-matchy but Pottery Barn does a good job of making their stuff go together without feeling like everything is a set, if that makes sense:
This is the Eva lamp, which is seeded blown glass, in Jade colorway.  The lamps are the right height and substantial-looking next to the headboard.

You can see the dried grass I bought at World Market on my bargain shopping trip with my parent last week - I think it adds to the coastal look.  The last thing I needed to work on was art above the headboard.  I've never really put anything above our headboards because when you grow up in California, you are very cognizant that an earthquake could happen and whatever is over your bed could fall on you.  But we're in Texas and while I'm probably jinxing it, we're pretty earthquake safe here, so I started looking at what I had for art, and after my mom suggested printing out some of the pictures I'd taken from my recent trip to California, that set the stage for a wall that I absolutely love!  Here's the first go-round:
OK so obviously I didn't order enough pictures, but I liked where this was going.  The round mirror was something I bought in Oregon years ago, the framed picture was something I bought in Santa Fe a few years ago, and the ceramic starfish was something I bought in Los Gatos, California many years ago.  Putting memorable things that I'd gotten during trips along with pictures that I'd taken, or in the case of a couple of them, Barbara had taken, made this wall very meaningful to me.

Here's the finished wall:
That's more like it!  
Barbara took the picture of the California poppies and the one of the water/rocks below it, while I took the rest.  The pictures are printed on metal - I used Mpix online and the most reasonable way to do this was to use their Collagewall Display system.  Plus getting it for 25% off helped.  I had a couple of smaller 5x5 pictures from the system that I didn't use here but it worked out because I was able to print a couple more pictures from our trip to Universal Studios.  I ordered the white starfish from Amazon - they are from the Philippines and not only arrived all unbroken, but with barely a sea smell at all.  I hot glued loops of thread on the back to hang them.

Except for the Del Mar pillow, the room is just about finished.  I want to get a live plant for the aqua-colored plantar that I found at Home goods but it's apparently not quite indoor houseplant season here in Texas yet.  I also want a plant for the coral colored plantar (from Ikea, of course):
I found the set of starfish at Homegoods - the largest one is on the wall by the bed.

I'm so thrilled with how this room turned out - and it makes me miss California a tiny bit less.  Turns out, it was easier than I thought to bring the coast to Texas!

16 comments:

  1. King size shams - I buy the body pillows at Target (for $10) to fill King size shams. The body pillows are a little long, so the pillow is nice and full. I buy a king size hypo allergy cover for the body pillow, which helps contain it.

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    1. I have a pillow ready for the sham but if it doesn't plump it up enough, I'll try your idea - thanks!

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  2. I love this!!! The light blue and the coastal vibe make the room look so bright! And the furniture you chose has kind of a retro/mid-century look to it without being too over the top.

    We have two dressers in our bedroom, so I guess we're ahead of the curve haha. Not only are they different heights, but also different colors and finishes of wood. One is from Terry's childhood bedroom and the other was my roommate's back in Chicago (and when she moved away in 2005 she let me keep it, which is to say, didn't want to move it, ha!).

    Can you please come to Ohio later this year once we've bought a house to help me decorate? I love everything you do with your house and that you help the kadults with :)

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    1. LOL on not wanting to move the dresser - I get that, I really do. I'd love to come help you decorate! And I'd love to see you again, too! :)

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    2. I do too - I've moved that thing 7 times since she "gave it to me" :)

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  3. Loooks amazing. I need a redo SOOOOOO bad. Love those dressers. I may have to finally give up my 1980s formica bedroom set (shudder!).

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    1. Oh man, 80s furniture. Our old dresser was the last remaining purchase from the 80s - funny how you can "see" a certain time period in furniture, isn't it?

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  4. I love your decorating! I especially love those starfish dishes from Home Goods! Plus, I love that you look out for sales and get a lot of stuff on sale!

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    1. Thanks! My criteria for decorating tchotchkes is: first, hand made, second bought on vacation (still preferably hand made), and then Home Goods/TJ Maxx - but not from China. The starfish are from Turkey, the aqua plantar is from Portugal, and I bought a blown glass vase that didn't work color-wise in the bedroom but I love it in our living room, from Spain. I think you find a little more interesting things that way.

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  5. Love the colors and the beach house vibe! I have some photos I was looking at making wall-worthy, so I'll go check out that Mpix website - thanks for the tip!

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    1. You're welcome, and look for discount codes and/or sign up for emails from Mpix - it helps with the cost big time.

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  6. This looks great! I love everything over the headboard. I never would have thought to put those there - and never would have thought about the earthquake risk in CA!

    Now I am wondering if a wood headboard would have been better for us - the cats climb and claw at our fabric one. LOL.

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    1. I can imagine how much fun your cats have with the a fabric headboard! And yeah, the earthquake/wall risk is always a consideration - those things happen without warning and BAM, something falls down. You don't want to be under it.

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  7. Gorgeous! I wouldn't expect anything less. I really want to do over our bedroom as well but I think this year all the decorating money is going to a roof :(

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    1. Even with insurance, the deductible for a roof is so high! I feel for you - we had that hail storm a couple of years ago and had to get a new roof. Glad we have it now but wasn't thrilled with paying for it back then.

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  8. Love it!!!! It looks great! I love the pop of coral color in the room!

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