Does it feel like I’m throwing too many renovation projects at you? I hope not! This house is just wayyy bigger than our last one and has SO much work that needs to be done. Plus, you know me… I can’t just sit by and look at ugly interiors. So back in November, Sean and I began round 1 of our main bedroom suite makeover… and have yet to finish it. A lot got in the way (more on that here), but we’re finally back to it. So today I want to share the before photos of the space, my design plans, the to do list, and a bit about why we are renovating this room in stages.
All About Our Cabin Bedroom Suite Renovation, Part 1
Before photos
I know it can be challenging to understand a floor plan from photos, so I tried my best to provide notes whenever possible about where the image is!
This is the view when you walk into the room 
Our closet (we already removed the sliding mirror doors) 
The gas stove that will provide our heat 
To the right of the door. This is where our water heater is located 
The door that leads to the dining room. Note the cat damage on the bottom left. 
This door leads to our patio and hot tub 
Our bed will go here, with our heads against the green wall. See the cut out square on the bump out? The previous owners mounted their TV there so it was floating in the middle of the room
The ‘view’ from our bed + bathroom
I have big plans for this area, but for now we are keeping it as is (with a few improvements) 
Why we are renovating in stages
Before I dig into the design plan, let’s talk about why we are doing this project in stages. The first is because of our budget. We are just not able to fully tackle the bathroom portion of the main bedroom suite right now. It needs a lot of work, especially since we have to deal with the super-duper cool vanity in the bedroom. Ideally, we’d like to be able to move a few walls around in order to make a proper main bedroom suite bath. But that takes time and money… and we just are not there yet!
However, we DO want to move into the space sooner rather than later. So for now, we are going to focus on energy on the bedroom area itself and make that as good as possible until we can renovate the bathroom.
The Design Plan + Moodboard
My biggest design dilemma with this room is that it feels very disjointed and disconnected from the rest of the house. It feels almost like a basement, especially now that we’ve stripped it down to the linoleum layer. So my biggest goal is to make it feel more like an actual bedroom while also making it match the rest of the house. Adding charm is the name of the game!
To do this, I have a few tricks up my sleeves:
- Add paneling: this is literally a timber cabin, but there is absolutely no evidence of that in this room. Adding paneling will bring some of the texture in from the rest of the house (like the dining room ceiling) to make it feel more united.
- Create sexy ambiance: the key to a really good bedroom design (especially for a ‘grown up’ main bedroom suite) is to pay close attention to the ambiance and sexy vibes. To me, that means the right amount of lighting, moody colors, soft textures, and evocative artwork.
- Embrace the weird bathroom… for now: we’re going to paint the vanity the same color as the walls in order to basically “disappear” it and just make it go away visually.
- Temporary flooring: this project isn’t sponsored, nor do we have a big budget. So we are making do by putting down sheets of plywood for the floor. We’ll paint it to seal the surface texture and make it look more refined and livable until we’re able to commit to longterm flooring. I’ve also bought a few truly gorgeous rugs that will totally distract you from the plywood!
So this is my moodboard that I created in Photoshop. I do this to help visualize how all the items I’ve bought and want to get work together. It’s especially helpful when mixing patterns like with the rugs!
Sources for products shown on moodboard:
- Clare Paint in Current Mood — check out my review of Clare here
- Zinus bed frame — we’re doing the headboard-less look until I’m able to visualize the space better since the window placement is so odd
- Lenia nightstands
- Grey velvet ottoman — the same one in our living room, but I want to get a real coffee table and put this in front of our gas stove
- Clara dresser (same from our old house)
- Brooklinen throw blanket, striped sheets, and heathered cashmere duvet cover
- custom curtains and shades from Wovn Home — still deciding on colors, but doing relaxed shades for the windows and Euro pleat drapes for the closets
- pillow from Bunglo by Shay Spaniola
- rugs from Etsy — patterned Moroccan rug and Turkish rag rug
- vintage wooden mini lamps
- oval wool rug in Old Rose
- Dutton Brown color twink flush mount — for the closet lighting
- Matin table lamp
- slim circular LED flush mounts — I’m really excited about how low profile these are since our ceiling is so low
- Fifth Avenue One-Piece D Grip Entry Set with Coventry Knob
- Button Tip Square Hinges
- Black Porcelain Coventry Knob with Georgetown Rosette
- Button Tip Round Hinges
- large felt bins with lids
- Ansel table lamp
The To Do List
We’ve actually tackled quite a bit of this already as you might have seen on Instagram. If you haven’t been following along, I highly recommend catching up with the Highlight.
Remove carpetingInstall paneling and mouldingTrim out the windows with moulding- Install plywood flooring
Patch holes and imperfections on ceiling and walls not covered in paneling- Paint
- Install new hardware, lighting, curtains, mirror, vanity light, etc
- Layout furniture and style surfaces
- Organize closet
So yeah… yet another big project!! And another green room. Am I nuts to go green again?? We will see… I just know that I’ve always been obsessed with Current Mood and desperately wanted to use it. Leave a comment and let me know what you think of this project!
