While I do like everything that is listed, good luck finding a college that would allow you to mount a swing to the ceiling. It doesn't even seem practical to put it on the list for dorm decorating.

Haha, very true nico6, let's be honest it's a disaster waiting to happen. But I like the ambition :).

You know what goes great with Maroccon stuff and is super cheap? My sister spray painted two old-fashioned rattan chairs that she inherited from our grandmom a Maroccon inspired tealish blue, the smale table that goes with it a light blue and paired it with kelim pillows she had bought in Marocco. It looks great and Maroccan inspried, without being too literal. If you don't have relatives with out of style rattan chairs you can still find them cheap on cragislist or so.

This all looks gorgeous, but I can't agree with this being a great college budget. Sure, for all those kids who's parents are paying for everything. My dorm room had cheap linoleum, and painted concrete walls. It was spruced up with a lot of wash off paint and chalk.

$400 for decor -- not furniture, just decor -- is "on the cheap" for a dorm room? Have you ever been a college student or sent a kid away to college? I went to a private university with a number of people from wealthy families (and many who weren't) and I'd be shocked if any of them spent more than $100 on decor -- a twin-size sheet/bedspread, a few posters and framed personal photos, maybe a butterfly chair. The room is very cute, but $400 for decor in this economy isn't on the cheap, especially given the cost of college. Anyone who's willing to spend that is probably willing to spend even more on designer stuff.

I'm a working young professional, and $400 is still more than I'd spend to decorate a bedroom... though a Moroccan swing does sound pretty cool. :)

This looks gorgeous and the colors added by this design would seriously improve the concrete/hospital white walls and muted linoleum floors!

Though I can't imagine the state of that rug....duct tape + college dirt + floor = gross!

Mind you, I assume the regular college student wouldn't go through all this trouble to design so they'd probably be clean

Well, without the impossible-anyway swing, it's $204. Which seems fine, honestly. Of course, when I went away to college, I just bought sheets (extra long twin), one of those foam egg crate mattress pads, stuff for the shower (basket etc), a swivel chair, and probably a lamp. Anything else I probably already had. I really didn't care in college, I guess, especially since you can't change any of the provided furniture.

Obivously this is meant to be an idea and not a paint-by-the-numbers guide. My college dorm room was so small we rearranged the furniture to use desks and dressers as side tables because there was no room for actual side tables. It's what happens in a dorm room. Everything I see there (with minor modifications) can be used in a dorm room. Instead of a swinging chair, a regular chair. And when you move, these things can easily be used in a regular bedroom so why not pull double duty?

I agree that a lot of this isn't completely realistic but its nice to have it to think about as inspiration. My mom probably spent about $50 on new stuff. We used anything extra we could find and just ended up having to buy a few things. I know people probably spend more but I think it's common to not spend as much. The things are very pretty anyway!

the kid with the swing will be the most popular, hands down.

That table from Urban Outiftters is a piece of junk. I wrote an honest review about it, but of course they never posted it.

The swing is pretty cool, but I can't have anything within a foot of my ceilings much less hanging from the ceiling. The inspectors would flip out, haha.

All the people who say it is way too expensive: Firstly, you don't have to buy everything on the list. Maybe you only buy the beadspread. Or the lamp. Or the side table. Or the rug.

Secondly, you don't have to buy everything at once! Maybe you buy the rug before moving in, than for Christmas you put the lamp on your wish list and the bedspread is your brithday gift. But seriously, they can't make much cheaper lists, because then everything on it would be crap. The biggest bargains of course are thrifted, street finds, but lists can't include those. So just look what you can find on the street, craigslist ect. and maybe add one or two items of that list.

And thirdly, all of those that say most college students don't have that budget for interior stuff- well, most college students probably don't read AT. Those college students that do, probably don't have more money than their classmates, but they have different priorities. Almost every college students spends a little tiny bit of money on things that aren't strictly necessary. Some spend money on beer, some spend money on cigarretes, some spend money on sport equipment- some save their money to buy a bedspread,a table and a lamp for their room.

My daughter (moving into the dorms this fall) has a good friend who just spent $260 on a bedding set. That's not counting the mattress cover needed to guard against bed bugs (boy have things changed!) and a mattress pad. In her defense, the set is really cute and she bought it with money earned working all summer. At least most of the stuff shown above can be used in apartments once a student moves out of the dorms. The XL twin sheets and comforter? I don't think it fits anything but a dorm bed.

It's an inspiration board. Meant to be inspiring, not literal.

I went to a college that now costs upwards of $50,000 a year. So, for some of those kids, no, $400+ is not prohibitively expensive. I knew one kid when I was school who mounted a hammock to his walls. I knew another kid who hid his dorm bed in an unused utility closet and purchased a brand-new queen mattress and bed set. The college didn't really care what you did to the rooms so long as they could charge Mommy & Daddy's credit cards for the damages.

Ballard Designs has similar accent table of much better quality for around $150. Sure it's more money than the cheesy UO table, but at least it won't topple over.

The only thing with that swing is, I suppose you could put it on top of a butterfly chair if you really really really loved the look. Or a papasan. If you have $200 to throw away on a swing, you could probably afford the papasan to actually put it on. And if you threw $200 away on the swing then you obviously care enough about it to give up space for it.

I love how most of the items are from Urban Outfitters...

Dorm rooms are already so cramped that I can't see anyone being able to maneuver their room with a swing and remain on good terms with their roommate.

If you had a sturdy enough loft bed, you could definitely hang a swing from it. I used to have a hammock hanging from my loft bed and it worked completely fine. (That said, it's obviously an unnecessary $200 to spend, and I would definitely buy a hammock or normal chair for like $20 instead, but still. This is just an inspiration board.)

Oh come on people. Maybe four hundred is a lot, but if you aren't spending fifty bucks on beer every weekend and five on coffee every day, you can save up some money. I always spent a bit sprucing up my room in college. Some of those places look like jail cells without some help! A few well placed accessories, some pieces of real furniture, and a nice bedding set make all the difference. Of course you need a little imagination and a certain disregard for rules about holes in the wall....