When choosing furniture for a bedroom, it’s tempting to buy a matching furniture set where you get everything together – a headboard, nightstands, chest of drawers, and mirror. It’s a quick and easy way to furnish an entire room and you can often get furniture sets for a super low price. But this is a case where it’s better not to take the easy route! Most beautifully decorated rooms have pieces that feel like they’ve been collected over time rather than purchased in a single visit to Furniture Fair. You may already have a matching set of bedroom furniture and that’s ok – I used to too! But I bet you’d love your space a little more if you started breaking up your matching set and bringing some personality to your space. A good start to having this “collected” feel would be to switch out one or both of your nightstands to something unique and “non-matchy”. You could buy a typical nightstand in a different finish or material than the rest of your bedroom furniture (search Craigslist if you don’t want to spend a lot of money!) or you could try out one of these unique ideas:
*Use a vintage step ladder with wide rungs that you can stack a lamp, clock, and a few bedside books on:
{Martha Stewart} |
Antique stores, flea markets, or your grandparents’ basement are great places to look for a vintage step ladder but if none of those pan out for you, searching on ebay and Etsy will bring up lots of great options such as this pretty little lady:
{Etsy: Timeless N Chic} |
*Another idea is to make a nightstand out of stacked vintage suitcases:
{House Beautiful} |
{A Beach Cottage} |
{The Old Painted Cottage} |
There are lots of sources for great luggage racks – one that I’ve seen in person and love is Ballard Designs’ Gaspar Luggage Rack
*A unique nightstand can also be created with a folding tray table:
{Horchow} |
{Norske Interior} |
*My favorite idea of the bunch is to use a desk instead of a nightstand and get two uses out of one piece of furniture such as {this desk turned nightstand} via Gary Riggs Home, {this gorgeous acrylic one} via Lonny, and this one via Design Indulgence:
{AHL Christmas Showhouse via Design Indulgence} |
*Yet another option is to use some type of rolling cart such as a bar cart (see this post on bar carts for some great options) or this IKEA kitchen cart:
{The Freelancer’s Fashion Blog} |
*A very simple bedside solution is to stack a few nightstand essentials on a pretty chair next to your bed as seen in {this bedroom by Jute Interior Design}.
*Finally, a chest of drawers can be used as a nightstand, which is a particularly good idea when space is tight!
{Phoebe Howard} |
{Velvet & Linen} |
I hope that gave you a few ideas and inspiration for changing up your bedroom in ways that you’ll love!
Yes, I committed this sin as well and am slowly trying to fix this error.
Good luck on your last minute to do’s, I will be doing the same.
Thanks Stacey, I’m off work tomorrow and hoping to bang out my 20+ item to-do list! Hope you get yours done too and have a great Christmas!
I have also seen a designer’s small New York apartment where he used a stack of large books as a bedside table. It was a great way to store the books yet be able to see them while also using them as a small piece of furniture in a tight space.
That’s so smart!!