Children’s rooms evolve as they grow. Our own children are now men. Hopefully we’ve given them the spaces they needed – warm and safe, to bright and stimulating, to practical for play and study.
Infant’s nursery
Young infants should feel comfortable and cosy with soft warm colours and textures. Yet the room needs to be practical, with a changing surface and plenty of storage for clothes and toys. You also need good task lighting, as well as mood lighting at story time.
With lovely warm browns as the backdrop, we stencilled teddy bears on the walls and wardrobe, bought a lush rug and sat cuddly toys around the room. The nursing chair took pride of place in the room.
Toddler’s bedroom
By the time children are toddling, use stimulating primary colours and interesting shapes. Here we painted each wall a different colour, and all the furniture to create a vibrant scheme. As ever, there is plenty of storage for toys and games. Two lengths of bullnose timber formed the colourful peg rail with painted wooden knobs from which to hang things.
A blackboard is great fun and easy to make with blackboard paint on the wall.
Young children might enjoy a themed bedroom, perhaps based on a favourite book character. We made this train bed from MDF and a length of downpipe, hanging puffs of cotton wool from the ceiling for the steam.
Pre-teens’ bedrooms
Older children start to express their own personalities in pre-teen years. They develop interests in music, film and TV, animals, sport, dance, and their rooms naturally take on these themes. Storage remains critical as they amass more stuff, although large toys from their early years will now be consigned to the loft or a car boot sale. Here we designed this bespoke furniture incorporating wardrobe, shelves, drawers and a desk, to make best use of a small space.
Teenagers’ bedrooms
Teenagers will want a more grown-up space. Here we made the fabric wall art to suit the interests of two teenage girls, matched to other furnishings in the room.
Kids want a separate space
Inevitably these days, children will have gadgets. Depending on your parenting style, you may draw the line at a TV or gaming in the bedroom. But, as more homework is done online, they will almost certainly have a laptop or other device. You may want to create a separate room for your children to give them more space. We did this with a basement they could use for gaming and watching films without taking over the living room.
Children’s rooms change with time. In their early years, you will probably do most of the planning and decorating. As the kids grow up, let them express their own personality in this one space that belongs to them.
