When it's time to transition your tween's bedroom from superhero to sports star, create his athletic dream world, but don't bet everything on this room design. Children 10 to 12 years old are notoriously fickle and this week's fascination with skateboarding can change overnight to Japanese animation. Keep the basics neutral and build your sports themed tween bedroom around accessories and repurposed sporting goods.
Instructions
Preparing the Room
1. Sit down with your son and determine what you want to keep and what you want to change in the bedroom. Decide what you can alter slightly to save money.
2. Choose a theme for the bedroom. You can pick your child's favorite sport or you can choose to combine several different sports so that if your child's interests change, you don't have to change his bedroom.
3. Purchase neutral bedding and wall color so that the room can continue to transition as your son grows up, with minimal cost to you.
4. Go through the garage, visit thrift stores and garage sales for old sports equipment that goes along with the theme. Look for objects that are decorative but can also work as seating or storage.
Creating the Room
5. Create a neutral background for the bedroom. Paint the room in a color that will go along with the theme, such as a rich green or warm brown rather than a color that will seem childish or garish in a few years, like vivid purple or bright orange.
6. Re-purpose existing room accessories to go the theme. Disassemble lamps and recreate them as sports accessories. Drill through a stack of tennis or baseballs and stack them as the base of a table lamp. Update existing bulletin boards by attaching tennis rackets or hockey sticks to it. Transform the posts of the headboard and footboard by replacing finials with sports balls.
7. Create an accent wall by assembling your old equipment in a design on the wall. If you do not have enough authentic sports equipment, use wallpaper border or wallpaper cutouts to add to your design. Make your own wallpaper cutouts by cutting shapes from wallpaper or borders.
8. Create new accessories for the bedroom with stencils. Transform plain laundry baskets and garbage pails with a stencil and acrylic paint. Update an old dresser by painting it and changing out the knobs for miniature sports-themed pulls and stenciling a design on the front.
9. Finish the room by turning sports jerseys and T-shirts that do not fit anymore into pillowcases. Turn the sleeves inside out and sew them shut then pull over a pillow. Stretch sports jerseys and T-shirts over a plain canvas purchased at the craft store.
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