Under-$35 Decorating Ideas That Transform Every Room
As Sherry and John Petersik—the bloggers and authors behind
Young House Love—show, a few well-placed updates can make every corner feel like your new favorite place to be.
By Candace Braun Davison
Photo: Sherry and John Petersik/Young House Love
A New Use for Your Dinner Napkins in the Dining Room
Those fancy ikat dinner napkins you love but never actually use—or the pillowcases that live in the closet—can
get a second life covering your dining room chairs. "Fabric is fabric," says Sherry Petersik, who blogs about her home renovations and decorating ideas with her husband, John, on
YoungHouseLove.com. "People get intimidated by the thought of re-covering chairs, but it's as easy as unscrewing the seat, taking off the existing fabric, stapling on the new one and screwing the seat back on."
Photo: Sherry and John Petersik/Young House Love
The Laundry-Room Lamp With Real Character
Washer, dryer, yawn. When it comes to laundry rooms, we tend to focus on function above all else; with rooms that small, we usually don't have much of a choice. Unless we look up. A statement-making light fixture is an easy way to inject your personality into even the most cramped spaces,
like the Petersiks did with their modern-meets-playful lamp. They surrounded a $4 light fixture with a cylinder of fencing wire, then clipped 320 clothespins to the outside. "We kept the clothespins bare, but some readers have painted or stained them, or put colored tape on them to make it their own," Sherry says.
Photo: Sherry and John Petersik/Young House Love
The Best Reason to Splurge on a $9 Mug
That chevron-print, monogrammed mug you love doesn't have to stay on the store's shelves just because you can't afford a full set. It may work better on its own, as a pencil holder on your desk. In fact,
you can revamp your whole workspace just by shopping the other rooms of your house. A brass planter serves as a way to corral all of the Petersiks' chargers and cables and a padded storage ottoman tucked under the desk takes the place of a filing cabinet. Little, homey touches can make getting down to business feel less like work.
Photo: Sherry and John Petersik/Young House Love
The Most Overlooked Way to Revitalize Your Living Room
Paint gets all the glory for transforming the way a room looks, but there's an even cheaper—and cleaner—way to create a major impact. Sherry and John recommend taking a good, hard look at your windows. For just $10, you can buy
two Vivan curtains from Ikea (if you prefer a classic look) or use two canvas-like drop cloths (if your style skews rustic). Hang them about 18 inches wider than the window and about 4 inches below the ceiling to make your windows look supersized, Sherry says.
Photo: Sherry and John Petersik/Young House Love
The 10-for-1 Deal That Livens Up Any Entryway
If you love the look of a collage of art and photos on the wall but hate the idea of collecting frames that go with each other, Sherry has the perfect shortcut: Get thee to the thrift store, stat. "For the cost of one $20 frame at the store, you can get 10," Sherry says. "Look beyond the art and focus on two things: whether you like the shape of the frame and if the glass is broken."
Once you've found a few frames you like, pop out the glass and set the bare frames on a layer of newspapers outside. Spray them all one color—this will give them a cohesive look, regardless of the frames' styles or the art you place inside. (
One tip: Cut extra newspaper to the sizes of your frames and use them as a template to arrange your frames, so you can figure out a layout you like before putting a single hole in the wall.)
Photo: Kip Dawkins/Courtesy of Artisan Books
Take a Low-End Table to New Heights
If you only buy one piece of furniture for the rest of the year, we have one suggestion: the $8 Ikea Lack table.
The Petersiks have found ways to furnish a whole bedroom using it—building a headboard, an open bookcase and stylish shelves that double as wall art—using a few nails and a spare hour or three.
Photo: Sherry and John Petersik/Young House Love
The 3-Step Bathroom Makeover
Creating a whole new look for your bathroom comes down to swapping a few key elements: your shower curtain, trash can and soap pump. To give the space a spa-like feel, Sherry uses a white, waffle-weave curtain, and turns to stores like Target, HomeGoods and T.J. Maxx for neutral accessories.
Next: 6 Rules for Choosing the Perfect Paint Color
Published 09/20/2013
