Master Bedroom Makeover Without Buying New Furniture

A few weeks ago I told you about a call I received from a college friend asking for help giving her master bedroom a new, more sophisticated look, and today I’m ecstatic to show you the dramatic transformation we achieved in the space despite keeping the room layout and most of the same furniture!

In my two prior posts about this space, I shared a lot of information about the space and the design plans, so I won’t rehash all of that here {since I know you really just want to see the pretty pictures}, but you can find those details at these links:

Back Story, Before Photos, and Inspiration | Challenges, Goals, and Design Plans

So without further ado, I give you the side by side before and afters…

I’ll just remind you of a few quick details to give you context. The major goal for the room was to give it a more pulled together sophisticated look, while reusing as much of the client’s existing furniture and art as possible. The layout of the room already made sense, so there was no need for that to change. The client wanted the room to be bright and neutral, and asked that I introduce gray into the color scheme while still balancing the yellowish tone of the wood mantle and baseboards.

I think it’s a pretty drastic transformation considering that the layout of the room is identical, and the art above both the bed and dresser is the same. Isn’t it amazing what a new rug, drapes, bedding and pillows can do?!

Want to take a closer look around? You’re in luck! I have a lot more photos for you!

Let’s start at the entrance to the room and work our way around. The master bedroom has double doors at the entry, with an arched art nook. We painted the inset of the arch a darker shade of gray and hung a white framed mirror.

Turning to the right, you enter the bedroom…

I want to point out the rug, since that was one of the starting point for the design. The rug pulls together all of the colors of the room – starting with the gray the client requested, and tying in the black furniture, the golden tone of the wood, and the red accents.

The pattern of the rug pushed the client’s comfort zone a bit, but once they saw how it tied the room together, they grew to really love it!

The client previously had a deep, brown leather bench at the end of the bed, which was solid all the way to the floor. The new bench is a better match to the furniture, and the open base gives it a much less bulky feel. It’s a better fit for both the style and the space.

The client loves white bedding, so we selected a pure white duvet with a charcoal grey detail for a classic, sophisticated look.

For the new headboard, we simply shopped the client’s house and relocated this button-tufted upholstered headboard from the guest room.

We chose a collection of grey and white pillows with touches of red and gold to pull in just a bit of color and texture.

The client’s original nightstands were much too tall and narrow, and the lamps much too large. We selected new nightstands with a better scale and replaced the lamps with classic sconces.

Styling nightstands with sconces can be a challenge, because there is a large space to fill between the nightstand and the light. We addressed this issue by hanging a black and white framed photo below each sconce, then styled the nightstands with the client’s photos and books.

The client was original interested in painting the fireplace mantle because they don’t love the yellow time of the wood, but since it matches all of the other wood in the house, we quickly decided it would be a better choice to keep the wood and find a way to incorporate its yellow tone into the room.

I kept the fireplace styling simple with an abstract painting, a tall carved giraffe, and some red flowers for a pop of color.

This painting above the fireplace is the only new piece of art in the room, and it helps to add the touch of modern the client was looking for, while also tying together the blacks and grays of the room with the yellow of the wood.

The large painting of aspens above the dresser was in the original room, but it feels like much more of a focal point in the redesigned space! And the yellow and orange leaves now coordinate with the other golden tones in the space.

On the other side of the room, a chest of drawers remains in its original location, with the client’s wedding photos above.

The wedding photos were previously framed in floating frames with no mats and were hung haphazardly. We transferred the photos to classic black frames with pure white mats, and rehung them in a simple grid to give them a more intentional and sophisticated look. The three wood candle holders on the chest coordinate with the wood mantle on the other side of the room.

Of course, the final element of the room that I would be remiss not to mention is the drapes. The charcoal colored drapes have a white dotted pattern that is both classic and a bit modern. The drapes are hung much higher than before, which makes the windows feel even larger and highlights the natural light in the space.