Author | Nicole Hostetter
A few months ago, at the start of social distancing measures and a life in isolation with a toddler and preschooler, I stumbled upon an online sleep calculator in between checking my e-mail and witnessing the world as I knew it disappear.
The calculator was a welcome distraction, and using it I discovered that over the course of 36 years, I’ve accumulated more than 92,000 hours of sleep. That’s just over 11 years of my life spent in bed.
And when I looked at my bedroom that night, I had to ask myself, “Is this a space I want to spend another 92,000 hours?”
Last, But Definitely Not Least
The answer was no.
Our bedroom was the last room to get any love after our recent move.
On moving day I put up some semi-sheer curtains from my daughter’s old nursery, threw some old sheets and blankets on the bed, and stuffed our socks and t-shirts into a wire shelving unit in the closet.
When we moved in I was in the last months of pregnancy with our second child. Between taking care of the necessities (dealing with leaks, doing a major bathroom renovation) and trying to give our 2-year-old daughter a cozy space of her own to feel comfortable in our new home, fancying up our personal space felt frivolous. And so it went on the back burner. Which, in hindsight, was a mistake.
Why? Because we are the Mom and Dad, the center of the house. We’re the ones caring for our children, and for one another. We’re the ones working, cleaning, feeding, running, doing. And at the end of the day there should be a special space for us to rest and recharge. Having a bedroom sanctuary, a space for just me and my husband is good for us, which means it’s good for our family as a whole.
If I live for another 36 years and spend another 92,000 hours in my bedroom, shouldn’t it be all I want from a bedroom and more?
So what changed?
Well, my son is almost two now, and this moment seemed as good a time as any to do a project with the extra time we have on hand.
Using a favorite painting as inspiration for the project, I was able to transform our bedroom from a mishmosh of clutter and an absence of aesthetic pleasure into a sanctuary my husband and I love to be at the end of a chaotic day.
1. Center your space.
Is there an object you love in your bedroom right now? Something that has followed you from bedroom to bedroom no matter where you lived? Maybe it’s a treasured photo, or a special keepsake or jewelry box. It could be a lamp, quilt, or rug.
Whatever it is, think of that object and hold it in your heart. It’s going to be the base of your space.
For us it was a painting.
Before we had kids, my husband and I purchased a painting from Leslie Banta, an artist in Staunton, where we lived at the time. It’s a dreamy cloudscape - sunset or sunrise, depending on your mood, with lots of lovely blues and pinks. It’s hung in the four bedrooms we’ve had since we started living together. Including this one.
I used this painting as the palette for everything - wall color, sheets, rug, duvet. It can be overwhelming to go to the store and have a seemingly infinite choice of styles and colors to pick from. Having a guide makes things easier and eliminates some guesswork.
For me, picking colors and centering the space around a common theme became easier once I had my painting as the guide.
Look at your object and decide what you love about it. Is it the style? The era? The color or material? Use this object to serve as a guide as you bring in things that complement it.
2. Create some ambiance
Now that you have a general idea for the feeling of your room, it’s time to create the space. Lighting and color will play big roles in the way your room feels, and it’s worth paying attention to each as you work.
First, the wall color you choose will have a big impact. You can opt for a color that energizes you, or one that relaxes you.
We chose Magnolia Home’s Display — a shade of blue described on their site as “deep dolphin-gray with blue undertones.” I had brought home a ton of swatches and ended up trying to pick the closest match to the sky of the painting to provide cohesion. Though you might be tempted to pick a color on sight at the store, definitely bring them home and look at them in your space. So many of the colors I loved in the store were “off” in our room. But when I settled on a color, it transformed everything.
I thought that painting the room a dark color would make it feel smaller, but it was amazing how color actually opened up the space and added depth at the same time.
So don’t be afraid of color. Make your bedroom a jewel box with rich emerald green, or create a spa atmosphere with washed out blues and greens. Use that object from step number one to help pick a color that makes you happy.
Then look at your lighting.
At the end of the day, when you’re ready to relax and unwind, having lighting options besides the overhead light is important. Bedside lamps can provide style and adjustable light levels to keep things calm and peaceful. Choose lamps that go with your theme, and still leave you space on your bedside table (if you use them) for storage.
(Speaking of storage: Only store things in your bedroom that belong there. Clear the space of any clutter, office supplies, electronics, projects, or piles. It will go miles toward making the space feel calm.)
Left | Wood Square Base Table Lamp (Target $27.99)
Center | Cappi (Safavieh $65)
Right | Mallorca Recycled Glass Table Lamp (Pottery Barn $179-299)
I opted for gold lamps with a sleek design and unique shape to replace the five-dollar clip-on gooseneck desk lamps we’d been using on our headboard.
The updated lamps made the room feel polished, and added gold as a new color I could incorporate into the rest of the room’s decor (I ended up using it in the mirror over the dresser and on the $2 Ikea curtain rods, which I spray painted).
Allow natural light in, when possible. Hang your curtains wide and high to make a small room feel larger. I traded out my daughter’s nursery curtains for creamy sateen panels, and the roller blinds for more polished cellular shades. Use blackout shades if your room gets too much light at night. Play with textures and colors here too to find what makes your room feel good.
Scent is the last thing to consider. We use a diffuser in our bedroom. I fill it with water and a few drops of lavender essential oil after the kids go to sleep and we go downstairs to watch TV or work on our own projects. When we come back up for bed, the room smells good and I now associate that scent with sleep.
During the day I often use the diffuser with grapefruit essential oil to add some brightness to the room.
Both of these scents make me happy, and they make the bedroom a place I want to be.
3. Focus on your bedding.
Perhaps most important in this endeavor is taking some time to seriously consider your bed.
Think about the best sleep you’ve ever had: Where were you, and what was the bed like?
For me, it’s Marblehead, Massachusetts. A guest bedroom in my aunts’ house. The sheets are white and clean. The blankets are thick and cozy. Maybe I slept well there because I was happy to be with them, in their home by the harbor. Maybe it was having eaten my fill of lobster and clams at dinner each night. Maybe it was the salt air, or the white wine.
It was probably all of those things, but the comfort of the bed and the uncluttered order of the room certainly helped too.
I learned later on when I went to do my own bedroom upgrade that they used Pottery Barn for their bedding. So when it was time for me to splurge, I decided to go with a store I knew I liked.
Find your bedding at a place you like, just be sure the quality is there; ask family and friends, read reviews online, and get your hands on it if you can, to be sure it feels good.
Left | Nate Berkus Micro Texture Duvet Cover Set (Target $60-70) Includes two shams
Center | Soft Cotton Duvet Cover (Pottery Barn $129-159)
Right | Positano Duvet (Serena & Lily $328-$378)
I ordered Pottery Barn’s Soft Cotton Duvet Cover and Sham set, which is one of their lower-priced options. This set comes in a wonderful variety of neutral shades that can serve well as a backdrop for a more colorful quilt or rug. I chose the dusty rose shade, since it matched the clouds in our painting really well.
Left | Cashmere Blend Quilt (Casaluna for Target $89-119)
Center | Pickstitch Handcrafted Linen/Cotton Quilt (Pottery Barn $149-$219) Right | Linen Loft Quilt (Parachute $279-299)
I thought about doing a dark navy quilt, but ended up opting for the Pick-Stitch Handcrafted Cotton-Linen Quilt in flax because our room is small and I wanted to keep it feeling open.
I then replaced the old comforter I’d been using as a duvet insert with a proper insert. Having ties at the corner immediately made a difference and eliminated all of the shifting and bunching I’d had problems with before. Also, since there were choices as to how warm I wanted the insert to be, I was able to get a medium-weight duvet that could work across seasons.
As for sheets, I find myself buying only one set over and over: Target’s Threshold 400 thread count performance sheet set. I don’t keep buying them because they wear out, I keep buying them because they have nice patterns and color options, and they’re neither too soft and stretchy or too stiff and crisp.
Our mattress didn’t need any updating, as we’d purchased a memory foam bed-in-a-box a few years ago. But I did replace my deflated down alternative pillow with a shredded microfiber one.
Left | The Original (Coop Home Goods $59-65)
Center | The Original (Casper $65-85) *Currently on sale for $59-77
Right | Down Pillow (Boll and Branch $150-195)
One of the things I loved most about my new pillow was that I could remove the filling or add in more to get the perfect height and alignment. Of all the changes we made to the bedroom, this is one of my favorites; my sleep quality immediately improved on the first night. And I learned that paying $60 for a long-lasting pillow might be worth it, considering I’d been paying $10 for the ones that deflated within a few months and left my neck stiff each morning.
Giving our bed some much-needed TLC immediately upgraded the comfort and luxe feeling of our previously neglected bedroom.
It was now a place I couldn’t wait to be at the end of the day.
Tie it all Together
Transforming your bedroom is a great weekend project, and can be done on as small or large a budget as you like.
You can do a large overhaul all at once, or choose just one area to focus on at a time.
No matter which route you take, spending time on evaluating and improving your bedroom now will pay dividends in the hours you later spend getting better sleep and feeling more rested.
Go ahead and choose your favorite piece. Freshen up your bedding, focusing on comfort, texture, and quality. Add in some ambiance until your bedroom feels like a retreat. You’ll be spending more time in your sanctuary before you know it!
30" Flush Mount Round Mirror (Target $71)
Ainia Linen Curtains (Ikea $60) per pair
Constellation Pierced Porcelain Hurricane Candle Holder (West Elm $10-60)
Lavender Essential Oil (White Oak Lavender Farm $45) for 1 oz *Local*
Some questions to guide the process:
What object do you most love in your bedroom?
How can you minimize clutter in your bedroom to make it a space solely for sleeping and relaxing?
Are your mattress and pillow supportive and comfortable?
What else could improve the quality of your sleep?
Do you have lighting that can be dimmed?
Is there a color that makes you feel calm, and if so how would it look on the walls?
Note: This post is not sponsored.
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