Make sure your decorating ideas tie in with her interests.
Teenage girls spend most of their time at home in their bedrooms, where they also store the majority of their belongings. Decorating your teen girl's bedroom on a set budget can be frustrating when you have no idea where to begin. The main goal is organized functionality combined with expressive comfort. If you or your teen girl are creative you can save a significant amount of money by making some of the decorations and accents yourselves.
Furniture
Girls this age require an adequate amount of storage space. If you don't have the money for a new bed with built-in storage compartments, consider purchasing less expensive shelves that can be attached to her walls instead. Search thrift stores and garage sales for bookshelves, baskets and storage totes that fit underneath the bed. Old trunks can be used for storage and as tables. If you are not happy with the way the furniture looks, apply a new coat of paint in her favorite color, or replace the hardware with something you find more attractive. You can dress up her bed with a new headboard. These headboards often have built-in storage shelving. Rearrange her bedroom furniture. If one of her concerns is adding seating for visitors look for couches at yard sales and either make or purchase a sofa cover in her favorite color.
Lighting
Lighting is an inexpensive way to change the appearance of an entire room. Your choice of lighting should reflect her personal style preferences. You can string large black lights, or alter white holiday light strings with layered purple or turquoise tulle flower petals wire wrapped around each bulb. Paper lanterns shaped like balls or stars are also popular options. If these ideas don't suit her style, consider purchasing rope style lights or lava lamps in her favorite colors. You can either purchase new lamp shades or cover existing shades with semi-sheer fabric squares to create more subtle lighting effects throughout the room. Lamp bases can also be painted to match the rest of the room.
Accents
Room accents are a predominant factor in successful decorating strategies. Purchase comfortable pillows and a bed set in her favorite color. You can add appliques to make bedding more personalized. Try making your own curtains using attractive fabrics. Tapestries with different designs can be used as tablecloths, wall hangings, curtains, and they can even be sewn onto sheets or bedspreads. Inexpensive carpets help tie the room together and protect the carpets underneath from spills and stains. Encourage your teen to make collages out of her favorite photos, or cut out pictures from magazines for collage materials. Replace old doorknobs and paint her light switch covering plates and the edging on her full-length mirror. If her bed has tall posts, drape tulle fabric over them and place dried flower petals inside the parts of the tulle that dip down from the posts.Candle lanterns, decorative mirrors and sun catchers also work well as room accents.
Walls
Let her paint the walls. Paint isn't very expensive and it can be used to revamp her furniture as well. If you aren't allowed to paint your walls because you live in an apartment, purchase a variety of posters and print out artwork by her favorite artist. Enter the name of her favorite artist into your preferred search engine followed by the word art, or look for specific pictures by their titles if they are known. You can also cut her favorite pictures out of old calendars and use them to decorate her walls.
Tags: favorite color, your teen, built-in storage, consider purchasing, favorite artist