6 Tips for Decorating a Nursery on a Budget

1.07.2010
Creating a beautiful nursery doesn't have to break the bank. When we designed Violet's nursery, we didn't really have much money at all for decorating - at the time we were trying to save as much as possible for me to stay home (unpaid) for at least eight months. We decided to set our budget at $1000, and considering that we basically gutted the room and started from scratch, installing hardwood floors, bead board, trim, and painting, I'd say that we had to run a pretty tight ship! Here are a few tips for decorating a nursery on a budget:

1. Reuse, Repurpose, Refinish - We desperately wanted to refinish our wood floors, but they were coated in a layer of impenetrable black glue as a previous homeowner had installed a cheap laminate at some point. Instead we went with new hardwood flooring from Lumber Liquidators, which is the same company we used for the wood flooring in the rest of our home. We bought a red oak that was on close out for $1.49 per square foot. It looks beautiful and we bought enough for the entire second floor, so more to come on that! (Cost for the nursery = $110)

Although we weren't able to refinish the floors, we did refinish an old hand-me-down dresser - adding a fresh coat of white paint and new knobs and found a pre-owned glider at a yard sale down the street. If you don't get as lucky as us in the hand-me-down and yard sale departments, try Craigslist, or a mom's group on Facebook for great deals and steals on baby stuff.

2. Seek Inspiration Before You Buy
Favorite websites I've found for nursery inspiration include Apartment Therapy, Houzz.com, and, of course, Pinterest. One of my current favorites is Priscilla Barros' showstopper of a nursery:






3. Get Organized: 
I have a Pinterest board for my favorite nurseries and kids' rooms, but I also like to get more detailed when I'm planning a space and have a board for that specific room. After I've pinned a few things, I prefer to start an idea board or mood board to keep things cohesive. The two easiest programs I've found for doing so are Pages and Photoshop, but there are a lot of online sites that offer idea board tools, and you can even create one in Microsoft Word. (or the good old fashioned way - paper and glue!)







4. Choose One Decorative Piece to Build Your Room Around 
If you pick one fantastic item to serve as your focal point, it will focus your thoughts and make you less likely to buy billions of little items to serve the same purpose. (And it doesn't have to be expensive to be fantastic) We chose curtains from Urban Outfitters (Cost $70 total for four panels) and based the colors of the room around them:

5. Think Outside the Box
Don't necessarily feel that you need to look for exclusively 'baby' items at one of the big box baby stores. Our curtains, for example, were not from a baby related store in any way. If you are worried about not being able to register for these items, consider an Amazon or BabyLi.st baby registry. We created one of these in addition to the traditional Babies R Us registry and I love it! They basically allow you to add items from virtually any website to a registry that your friends and loved ones can visit.

6. Do It Yourself - DIY projects are a HUGE money saver. I painted the tree onto the wall myself rather than purchasing a pricey wall decal or artwork, my husband installed all of the beadboard, trim and wood flooring, I painted the dresser, hemmed the curtains, and made the pillows with the help of a coworker who is helped me out (I'm not much of a sewer!) If you aren't handy, don't be afraid to ask a few trusted friends and relatives or check out one of the many DIY tutorials on the web (of course, if it involves serious power tools, don't do anything unsafe - if you don't know what you're doing it's best to leave that type of thing to the professionals!)

We ended up staying well under budget, coming in at just under $900 (see the full budget breakdown here), and I'm thrilled with how the space turned out!

Do you have any money saving tips that you use when designing a new space? I'd love to hear them! xo, Lauren



7 comments:

  1. I LOVE those curtains you chose. I am seriously thinking of where they would go in my house. I can tell it is going to turn out fantastic. Oh how I love nurseries! Good luck.

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  2. Thanks, I love them too - inexpensive and they are even nicer in person!

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  3. I love your decorating ideas! My New Year's resolution is to finally make my house into a home but I not an idea person. I'm a DIY'r who needs direction so I'm reading book by an interior decorator called "At Home With Laurie Ann". She gives practical, inexpensive advice on how to update what you have and add the ""WOW" factor to any room. I can hardly wait until spring to pick up some garage sale finds and start thinking outside the box.

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  5. Thanks, I love them too - inexpensive and they are even nicer in person!

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  6. I LOVE those curtains you chose. I am seriously thinking of where they would go in my house. I can tell it is going to turn out fantastic. Oh how I love nurseries! Good luck.

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  7. These are some really good decorating ideas. And all on a low budget, nice job. Way to go.

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