Create a great kids room that isn’t a hazard to your mood When it comes to planning the kids’ room always starts from the idea that the approach should be totally different than when decorating an adult bedroom. That’s because children’s bedrooms should reflect their personality and not that of their parents. You may like red and gold, but your children may want something bright and colorful. For children, the bedroom is the place to play, read, listen to music, and expose their valuables, day-dream or retreat to be alone for a while.

Paint

Start with painting a room before you go out and buy furniture and accents. It is much easier to pain first; otherwise you may be repainting when you find that nothing matches or flows. “Going too bold with a kids' room can be a mistake, though. You want to play around with a combination of bold colors and subtler accents to create a room where your child can feel awake and alive but still get relaxed enough to sleep at night.” – Kathryn, Houzz Pro.

First of all let's think about the main activities that go on in bedrooms and how they should inform the design.  Sleeping, dressing, playing and studying.

Sleeping

When children (and indeed everyone) get into bed they want to feel safe and cozy.

A headboard goes a long way to promoting these feelings.  If the bed is against a wall it can be fun if the headboard goes round the side and along the length of the bed.  This is also a bonus if your child ever wants to read or study while sitting on the bed, or have friends into their bedroom as the bed effectively doubles as a sofa.

Dressing

Obviously to dress you need a wardrobe or closet and the space to dress.  Beyond that here are a few thoughts on dressing.

• Make sure there's privacy from the outside for getting dressed.  If you have young children you may want to consider putting in a translucent window treatment so that your kids don't have to remember to close the curtains, in order to keep things private every time they get dressed.

Playing

Now depending on the age of the child playing can mean very different things.  It might mean Hotwheels or dolls houses.  Getting older it might mean Lego or Miss World. Then at the tween and tween stage there might be hobbies to accommodate.  Whatever the age there's often other children involved be it play dates or more like a social club!

Playing needs space and storage.  I'll say it again.  Playing needs space and storage.  Storage, storage, storage.

Here's a few play ideas...

• To create space and storage consider installing bunk beds (even if the room is only for one child).

• Consider putting a few heavy duty hooks into the ceilings and/or walls (make sure these go into studs and not just plasterboard).  These can be used for quickly rigging up dens, hanging hammocks or hanging swinging shelves, how about a swing?

Studying

Study areas are most successful if they focus the mind by filtering out distractions.  A desk is great up against a wall (or room divider) so that there's somewhere for shelves and maybe a pin board.  If you can create a study alcove so that the desk has a kind of sheltered feeling with its own light source that would be a great place to study.

When you're playing with bedroom layouts don't forget to include a chair with the desk - make sure there's space for it and that it doesn't get in the way of any door swings.

Remember that this space is intended for your child, and should be able to represent their personality.

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