Things to Consider When Upgrading your Bedroom
Refreshing your bedroom can be an exciting project, but there are a few things to consider when upgrading your bedroom. We’ve put together a few hints and tips to consider when you’re putting your bedroom project together.
Colour Scheme
Of course this is nearly always the first thing on the agenda. The colour scheme is a very individual thing, but it’s the key to the whole space. Often starting with the tone helps. Are you going to go dark and moody, light and fresh, or perhaps, as is one of the current trends, plenty of colour?
Many people think of the colour scheme as the paint and/or wallpaper on the wall, but it can be so much more than this. It can come from the blinds, or curtains, the doors on the cabinets, or a rug or carpet. Choosing this early on can make you life a lot easier, so get on Pinterest, browse some magazines and get this nailed down before going any further.
How you Use the Space
To make the most of your bedroom, think about how you intend to use the space, and what are the important parts of your bedroom.
If space is at a premium, you may want to go all-out on storage solutions, where as if you are going to also be working in your bedroom, you will want to make sure you have a comfortable desk to sit at for your work. You are also likely to want to have some practical drawer space to store your work things, so they aren’t on display when you’re not at work.
You can also double up on space. Top boxes can sit above your desk, where the space would normally be wasted, which can offer great storage options, especially for those less-frequently used items, like space linen or your holiday clothes.
If you have plenty of space to work with, consider breaking the area into zones. Storage in one location, the bed in another, and a desk or dressing table in another. A chaise longue or occasional chair can be a lovely addition too, if you have the space.
Storage Space
It’s great to have a lovely new bedroom, but it still needs to be a practical space. Even minimalistic designs need storage space.
Think about the clothes you wear, and how they are best stored. For some people it’s all about the hanging space, but others prefer to fold and store in either shelves or drawers. We have a wide range of internal storage for wardrobes too, so it doesn’t have to just be hanging space, it can also include shelves and internal drawers. All practical storage space, but hidden from prying eyes with wardrobe doors.
Don’t forget, we have a habit of collecting excess clutter over the years, so we would always recommend going for more, not less storage space.
There are plenty of options to go for, not just traditional bedroom wardrobes and drawers, but Tall Boys and blind corner wardrobes and stable wardrobes can all help you make the most of the space you have available. Fear not, all our ranges have these units available within them.
Darkness
Having a good sleep regime has proven health and wellbeing benefits, so it’s essential you consider this when putting together your new bedroom upgrade.
One of the simplest, and often overlooked, way of doing this is shutting the light out of your room. There are a number of ways to do this, including black out blinds or black out curtains, but getting these into your scheme will pay back in spades.
Don’t worry, most of these solutions can be built into or hidden behind your overall scheme, whether it’s as a backing to curtains, or putting blackout blinds behind your curtains, so it doesn’t have to affect the overall aesthetics of your room.
Lighting
On the other side of the equation is the light in your room. There are a huge range of bedroom lights available to choose from, for your bedroom.
To get the most out of the lighting in your bedroom, we would suggest mixing up a combination of task light and mood lighting. This can be achieve my adding a mix of ceiling lights, wall lights and/or bedside lamps. If you also have a dressing table or chest of drawers, adding a lamp to that can also spread the light, especially when adding mood lighting to your room.
You also have an option of adding a dimmer to your lights, so that one light, or set of lights, can achieve both mood lighting; when dimmed, or task lighting; when turned up.
If you are conducting building work during your refresh (or it’s a new build), consider installing 5 amp sockets too. These enable you to plug in table lamps straight to the wall, and control them with the light switch on the wall, as you get in many hotel rooms.
Power
As mentioned above, if you are looking to do major reconstruction on your bedroom, consider installing 5 amp sockets. These offer a great flexibility for controlling your lighting. Consider putting a switch both next to your bed, and next to the door, for maximum effect.
This is also a good time to think about wall lights. While they were out of favour for a while, they are now back in abundance, with a new range of more modern designs available. Once again, they particularly work well when controlled from switches next to your bedside table.
If you aren’t able to do a major rewire, we would definitely recommend upgrading to USB sockets. These sockets offer extra USB charging points in between the double sockets, allowing you to charge your phone, tablet or Kindle without taking up a socket point. We would recommend going for USB-C sockets, as most new devices use this type of charging, and offer a quicker charge time too.
