For the past month or so we’ve been tearing apart the bedroom on our main floor so we can redo it for the primary bedroom. It’s down to the studs and I’ve been slowly been planning all the fun stuff I’m going to do in there! Since it’s time to start putting it back together, I thought I’d share my main bedroom plans!
video overview
Let’s start with the video where I show before and during footage plus dive into the plans. Then, I’ll dive in with more details below:
If the video doesn’t work here, you can watch it on YouTube here. I’d be so grateful if you subscribed to my YouTube channel! Videos are actually released on YouTube first (usually the night before they’re published on the blog). Thank you!
main bedroom plans
Here’s the scoop- we live in a three bedroom house with one child. This home has three bedrooms- a main bedroom, my son’s room, and a guest bedroom. Previously, when we rented our house out for Air BNB, that made great sense. The more bedrooms, the more guests you can accommodate!
But we never use the guest room for actual guests (ok, ok, we have once in the 5 years of living here). So I thought of something I’d use everyday- an office/ craft room! My husband and I work from home so having a dedicated space for both us sounds amazing. And a place I can do projects and not have to clean up at night?! Yes, please!
One of the big reasons we started on this project is that the office was in our main bedroom and there was stuff everywhere from our jobs and it was hard to sleep. I need a little more separation! Just a place where I can close the door and not think about it at night. Which I think is understandable. So let’s get into the plans!
before photos
Let’s start with showing the before photos of the room. We’ve done a little work on this room- painting the walls, crown molding, lots of cosmetic love. But there were real issues in here that a paint brush and trim couldn’t help.
One thing I HATED was the closet situation. There’s a closet next to the door coming into the room so there was so much wasted space. You can’t put furniture next to two walkways. Essentially, it was space that attracted clutter but wasn’t useful. Not thanks!
Another tricky thing is the wall behind the bed. There’s two issues that bothered me. First of all, there’s a window that looks out to the garage. Obviously the house didn’t originally have a garage when the window was added, but it’s not useless and makes centering the bed on the wall tricky. There’s also a bump out for the chimney above it that is not my favorite.
Also, there was bead board on some walls and it wasn’t on others. The room felt like a big mish mash and such an after thought. The floors were beat up. AND they slope down quite a bit in one corner. That’ll be fun to fix- lol.
That bed was not my favorite either. Let me tell you the story of it. We had another bed when the house was rented out as an Air BNB. It was a perfectly good bed. Then one day we got a message that the guest had broken it. Doing what? I’ll never know. They wanted a new bed THAT DAY!
We called every furniture store in our town to see if they had something in stock that they could deliver that day. We finally found a bed, but no delivery was available. So we paid our cleaning person a bunch of money to pick it up and set it up.
THEN I totally didn’t realize that the old bed didn’t need a box spring, but the new bed did. So I got one overnighted. And had to pay again for set-up. The whole thing was so stressful and expensive. So I hate that bed and it was a lovely day when I sold the whole thing on Facebook Marketplace. Ha!
changes I want to make
Here are the main pain points I want to solve with this renovation-
- Close off the window in the bedroom that looked into the garage
- Remove the chimney bump out in the bedroom
- Update the flooring (the old stuff was really beat up)
- Solve the floor plan issues
- Have more storage in the walk in closet
- Make it a prettier, more relaxing room
- Eventually, once this is done, I’ll be able to use the bedroom we’re currently in upstairs as an office and craft room.
I also think this will add value to the house!
- we’ll have a main bedroom with a walk in closet and on ensuite bathroom.
- Plus we’re solving layout problems and creating a better, more modern floor plan
- while doing these renovations, we added a hall closet off the living room. More storage is always good!
mood board- main bedroom plans
I made two mood boards for this space. First up, the main bedroom. I want this to be a romantic, serene space.
sconce / night stand / artwork / bed / chandelier / pillow / pink chinoiserie wallpaper / pagoda lantern / flooring /
If you remember, we redid our main bedroom a few years ago. That is the space that will become the office. But since the furniture is only a few years old, we’ll re-use the bed and night stands. They’re still in great shape! So I figure, might as well keep using them to save a little money and I always like to be kind to the environment where I can.
The big cosmetic changes in the the room will come from new floors and wallpaper on the wall behind the bed. I LOVE a pretty chinoiserie wallpaper and I think this Laura Ashley mural will make a big statement will still being traditional and really gorgeous.
I’m also really excited for the lighting! We’ll update the fan to a chandelier and do coordinating sconces behind the bed. The lighting is all from Kichler’s new Homestead lighting line they just launched. It feels like what you’d find in a historic home. Which works great since our house was built in 1905!
For the walls next to the bed I’m pretty sure I’ll re-use the rainbow botanical art I created for the room previously. Every room needs a rainbow moment, right?! 😉 Those walls will also have some decorative trim to add interest.
Another thing I’m really looking forward to is we’ll be building another DIY fireplace! Our house gets cold in the winter so this’ll be nice. Plus my dream house has a fireplace in every room just for the cozy vibes- lol. I hand painted some tile and bought some architectural salvage pieces for this project so I think it’ll be really fun to see it come together.
I’ve been planning on adding a canopy to my existing bed. The main reason was to hide the chimney bump out, but my husband was able to remove that so I’m not sure now. I still like the idea of how romantic it’d be. If we don’t do it for the reveal, it’s a project I can go back and revisit. Essentially, my plan is to add a wood canopy frame to my existing bed and curtains.
Do you think I should do this?
I recently found a pair of these bamboo William Sonoma home chairs on Facebook Marketplace for $75! They’re in excellent shape and will look great on either side of the bed. They’re the exact look I want for the room and were such a steal!
Honestly, this space is similar to my bedroom in Florida (that we sold in January). I miss that room so much so I’m hoping for a similar vibe with a more historic twist on it.
mood board- closet
wallpaper / clam shell mirror / vintage rug / fringe ottoman / flooring / pendant light /
Second, we have the walk-in closet. I am actually the most excited for this room! We have plans to make the built in closet look really high end with some carpentry and lighting. It’ll be fun to have a fancy closet! I’m putting in wallpaper that I custom created to reference the original wallpaper we found in the room.
I also have a DIY planned next week to make my own version of that floor length mirror. Hopefully I can pull it off!
Above the door to the closet and to door leading to the rest of the house, we’ll have stained glass for the transom windows. This was a bit of a splurge. I searched for months for vintage matching pieces in the perfect size. Then I looked into buying ready made stained glass.
Finally, I found a stained glass artist and commissioned her to make a custom piece for me. I’m SO excited about this detail! I feel like stained glass is the perfect way to add architectural detail while staying true to the age of the house. It’ll be like the jewelry for the closet and the bedroom. I couldn’t be more thrilled about it!!!
Floor plan
Next, let me show you the floor plan. This is what we started with-
As you can see, the room was. an L shape with lots of wasted space by the closet. I hated the window on the back wall (since it looks into the dark garage).
And here is what the current plan is. I added in furniture is the exact size of what we own so I could make sure it works. It does!
So on the back wall- no more window. We’re solving the L shaped room issue by creating a walk in closet and changing the door entrance to the room. To create a long rectangular room, We have to move the wall the door to the closet is on.
If you look at how the floor plan used to look, you can see we’re moving one wall back and one wall forward to create a straight wall. We have an electric fireplace planned to sit center on that wall and then on either side will be two doors. Both doors will have the transom window over them. I think that symmetry will be beautiful!
Besides two chairs, I added in a dog bed into the room. Our sweet pups are getting older and one can’t climb up stairs and one can’t climb down stairs. So they’ve been sleeping downstairs while the renovation is going on. They prefer to sleep with us so that will be a nice benefit of moving the bedroom down here.
blast from the past
While my husband was tearing out the old ceiling, he found this book. It was published in 1888! A reader suggested I look up Edwin Jinks (the name in the book) on a family history website. I did and he was born in 1884 and lived in Logan.
He was 20 when the house was built and it looks like his parents Robert and Elizabeth Jinks may have been the first owners of my house in 1905! Was Edwin around when my house was built and put his school book in the ceiling during construction?
Robert and Elizabeth were both from England and came to the US. It was cool to learn about some of the people who lived here over 100 years ago!
current pictures of the room
And now, here’s what the room currently looks like as it’s down to the studs. The old wood floors were painted pink. You can see that the window is gone and the old chimney support has been removed.
This view is where our new walk in closet will be. We ended up adding a hall closet that opens from the living room and this is the back of it.
Over here will be my side of the bed. A few months ago we bought these vintage doors- they’re solid wood and so gorgeous. We put up one to the ensuite bathroom. The other two will go to the closet and the door to the rest of the house.
One thing that’s weird about the room that we won’t be changing is the door to the front porch. On the front of the house, this is the door that’s centered and is a huge part of the curb appeal. We talked about removing it, but I don’t want to ruin how the front of our house looks. And sometimes it’s handy to have the access.
timeline
Ok, let’s talk about how long it’ll take to make my main bedroom plans a reality.
Now that demo is pretty much done, my husband and I sat down and guessed how long everything will take-
- 1 day tear out floors
- 2 days lay new sub floor
- 2 days framing the wall
- 1 day electrician
- 2 days insulation
- 3 days install drywall
- 3 days drywall mud
- 2 days drywall sanding
- 2 days install floors
- 2 days hang doors and transom
- 1 day install lights
- 2 days shiplap ceiling
- 2 days crown molding
- 1 day trim (baseboards, decorative molding)
- 1 day install shutters
- 2 days build fireplace
- 1 day prime
- 1 day wallpaper
- 1 day paint
- 1 day clean/stage
- 1 day photos
- 5 extra days of things going wrong
That’s a total of 39 business days to finish the bedroom. I estimate we’ll be done by June 24th
conclusion
Welp! That’s the main bedroom plans! Any questions? Are you overwhelmed for all the work we have to do?
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I love your site! So inspiring even if I don’t have the skills or money to accomplish anything close in our old house. I want your white porcelain cat that is sitting upright on the floor!!! Can I buy it or do you have a source? Thanks, Seana
Hi Seana! Thank you! The cat is vintage. If you search “porcelain persian cat large” on eBay or Etsy you can find a few. Thanks, Ashley