{decorating with style} How to Decorate a Boy’s Room That Will Grow with Him

Before I share my tips for decorating a room that will grow with a boy, I first have to fill you in on a very exciting event happening all week long! In honor of March Madness, 15 boy moms (including yours truly) have teamed up to bring you five days of blog posts related to all things boy. Each day this week has a new theme – beginning today with boys’ rooms, and wrapping up on Friday with an “All Things Boy” link party and a huge giveaway of the Ultimate Boy Mom Bundle {worth over $500}!

Use a Layered Approach

The first layer in a room is the walls. From paint to wallpaper, the walls of the room can have a major impact or can instead serve as a subtle backdrop. Either can work well in a growing boy’s room, so long as you steer clear of choices that are too childish.

The second layer – the furniture – should be the layer that will really stand the test of time in the room. You may update a piece or two of furniture over the years {a crib/toddler bed exchanged for a twin or double bed, for example}, but the right dressers and bookshelves can easily grow with the boy.

The third layer – the art and textiles – can be updated more easily, and at less expense, than furniture, but being mindful of you selections can save a lot of money down the road.

The final layer – the accessories and toys – is where you can really personalize the space and this layer is the easiest to update as your child grows.

Start with a Sophisticated Color Palette, Then Add Pops of Color
In order to design a boy’s room that is going to stand the test of time, start with a sophisticated color palette – one that you might use elsewhere in your home. But it is a child’s room, after all, so don’t be afraid to add pops of brighter colors that you might not choose for your adult spaces. Sophisticated does not have to mean a lack of color – nor does it have to mean just one or two color, it simply necessitates combining colors in a way that doesn’t look too childish.

For example, navy looks great with grays, browns, or white, but can be also enhanced by pops of a brighter color, like orange or kelly green. Intense colors like red and orange work best in limited quantities, but both can have a very sophisticated feel when paired with gray.

For Beckett’s room, the design plan was inspired by menswear, so I chose to begin with the colors most often found in a man’s wardrobe – browns, grays and blues. But to make it more fun, I added a few pops of bright yellow. The yellow adds a playful and unexpected touch, perfect for a little boy, but in combination with the other colors, the palette remains sophisticated that he won’t outgrow.

When choosing paint color(s), you’ll have to decided between a neutrals (like grey or beige) versus color. Avoid colors that are too bright or two pastel. Pastel colors are traditional hallmarks of nurseries {though less so these days}, and bright, vibrant shades are traditional for toddler and pre-school spaces, but they feel less appropriate for a boy in his teenage years. Instead, if you want to paint the walls a color (as opposed to a neutral), opt for a shade with a gray undertone, which mutes the color a bit. Slightly muted shades allow you to achieve a sophisticated feel without being limited to neutral wall colors.

Cooper’s room is still set up as a nursery, but over time we’ll be making changes to convert it into a big boy room that we’ll want to last for many years to come. When designing the nursery, we didn’t know if we’d be having boys or girls, so I wanted the space to be gender neutral without being neutral in color. I chose teal {my favorite color and one I’ve used throughout our home} as the main color for the space, but I was careful to select teals with gray undertones {those on the right}.  The two sets of paint swatches below illustrate the difference between the brighter shades on the left and the more muted shades on the right.

Don’t Be Afraid to Go Bold
Keeping the overall color palette sophisticated will allow the room to grow with the boy through his teen years, but one thing that kids and teens have in common is that they like things bold – so don’t be afraid to make some big choices in when designing your boy’s room – just be strategic about it. If you want to go bold on the walls {which admittedly is not for everyone!}, consider classic patterns that are also found in adult decor.

My design style is pretty bold to begin with, so I didn’t hesitate to go bold on the walls of my sons’ rooms. In Cooper’s nursery, my husband and I painted ombre stripes on all the walls of the room. Because stripes are such a classic design element, they will work just as well for a teenager as they do for a toddler.

Now that we’ve talked about the first two layers of the room – the walls and the furniture – we can move on to the final two layers – the textiles and the accessories. It’s in these two layers that you can really personalize the space and address your son’s interests.

In order for the room to grow with him, it’s best to avoid characters and themey-themes. But this doesn’t mean the room can’t be fun and creative. In Beckett’s menswear-inspired bedroom, we turned mens’ belts into hanging shelves and dresser drawer  pulls, and I framed calendar photos of dogs wearing mens’ suits to create inexpensive and whimsical art.

It’s important to give a boy a space that expresses his interests, but don’t invest too much in decorating around those interests because we all know that kids change so quickly and it can be hard to keep up. Instead, fill the shelves and bins with books and toys that address his current interests, and then add art and accessories that will help to expand his horizons. For example, Beckett loves animals, so his bookshelf is packed with animal books, and then we use the globes on top of the bookshelf to talk about where those animals live. At only three years old, he can name which animals live in Africa, Asia and Australia, and he can point to each on his globes.

Beckett’s favorite thing to do is to look at books, so I took special care to add elements in his room that would foster a love of reading. We provided him with two comfy chairs {room for his brother to join him}, as well as a hanging play tent where he can often be found for hours with stacks of books. {I’ll be sharing the tutorial for this play tent on Wednesday!}

If your son just can’t live without some superheros in his room, for example, there are plenty of options to make it easy to update! How about some Spiderman sheets on his bed? {Sheets are less expensive to replace than the bedspread}. If he really wants superheros on his walls, consider a vintage framed movie poster, or framed pages from a comic book. Or if you expect his interests will change next week, invest even less by simply displaying some of his favorite superhero toys on his shelves {and then swap them out for dinosaur toys when superheros are so last-week}.

Another way to accessories a little boys room that will stand the test of time as he grows up is to fill the room with nods to the men in his life. One of Beckett’s grandpa’s works at Denver International Airport, so I included a small framed travel poster of the airport together with some decorative airplanes. And one of his great grandpa’s was a cross-country bus driver for Trailways, so his vintage toy Trailways bus sits on a high shelf. This serves as a great way to share family stories and connect the generations. 

And the top of Beckett’s hanging play tent is another special nod tribute to all of the men in our family. The roof is made from ties collected from dad, great grandpas, grandpas, and uncles. Obviously not everyone will want a play tent covered in neckties, but think creatively about other ways you can incorporate some special family mementos in the form of framed art, sports memorabilia, or pillows made from special shirts, for example.

Break Some of the Rules, but with a Plan in Mind
Make the space work for you and your son! This will mean breaking some of the “rules.” There is no way you can design a room that will take your son from toddler to teen years without at least a few tweaks along the way! And there is nothing wrong with that. But make those transitions easier by planning ahead as much as possible.

So what rules did we break in Beckett’s room? Well, as you probably noticed, we do have some kid-sized furniture – namely those two adorable reading chairs. We just couldn’t pass them up, and he spends so much time sitting in them and reading that they are well worth it even though he’ll someday outgrow them.

We’ll also have to upgrade Beckett from toddler bed to real bed in another year or two, but that’s where the planning comes in. When I decided on the layout for the bedroom furniture in his room, I also measured how a twin bed would later fit the space. The plan is to put the twin bed on the same wall as his toddler bed, but to tuck the head of the bed into his hanging tent. This will allow the tent to have a longer life span in his room, and will make going to bed at night that much more fun. I also anticipate moving the storage trunk over to become his nightstand, and eventually replacing the small chairs with a desk when he’s old enough to need one.

There’s no way to predict how your son’s interests will evolve over time, or how his needs might change, but by planning as best you can, and by avoiding surefire pitfalls {like primary colored rooms and theme everything}, you’ll have the best chance of designing a room he can grow into for many years!