Turning a Rental Space Into A Playroom

We loved Rebecca's great tips last week on making a rental home your own. So when we spotted her tips in action, we wanted to find out more...

Jessica's family is renting this home on a temporary basis but wanted to make the space cozy. The "Before" image reveals dated carpeting and dreary drapes. And while the wood paneling is awesome, the context in this room unfortunately reads drab and uninviting. In order to make the playroom bright and cozy, Jessica adds a wall to wall striped rug that is colorful and cheery. She also incorporates playful DIY curtains and a bright blue vintage chair to match. A bookcase painted white and familiar artwork hung on the wall rounds out the room and makes the spot a place to call home.

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(Images: Jump Up and Down)

Comments (19)

Call me crazy - I like the paneling...

...but the carpet - Eeek!
(I think i'd have to accidentally set it on fire...)

I mean the wall-to-wall...
...not the area rug

i'm a huge fan of knotty pine panelling... there is something so nostalgic and safe feeling whenever i am in a room with real knotty pine walls... i've been putting some money aside to redo my small bedroom walls in tongue and groove stained pine... my bedroom is sort of log cabin/boy scout/1940's kids room....i'm getting pretty sick of the drywall in there.... needs to be warmed up!

FantasticMrFaux, my thought exactly.

I think she did a great job making the space lighter. That's something hard to do when you can't change anything that's physically attached to the house (carpet, paneling, light fixtures etc)

Eparcey - yes! That's what I was thinking too - the before picture is so dark and dreary, even with the sun shining in AND the lamp on; the finished room looks so much more cheerful and light.

FantasticMrFaux and Cyb -- Reread the article above and you will see this is a RENTAL, which means she probably can not change the paneling. I think she did well given the limits of a rental.

I like the finished product! Much more cheery. And I agree-- there's not much more she could do without being allowed to change the walls or floors.

i love the striped area rug—where was it purchased?

is the striped rug from target? i think i have the same one in my daughter's nursery...

http://pearlsandgreentea.blogspot.com/

Any reason you chose not to take the curtains to the floor so the light area doesn't seem so chopped off? I know there are reasons like it's the length the curtains were....lol. I like that you took the initiative and did something nice with the room instead of just accepting it the way it was. Great job!

baileyb - I disagree. Not all windows look great with floor length curtains and these are a set of them - they are much too wide and big to see a point. Anyways, why would they make shorter curtains if everyone's "had" to be floor-length.

It looks lighter because the angle is different. The new rug is fine, the curtains look droopy, but better.

I'd have put low bookcases under the windows, and then put plants on top of those.

Dear Mr Faux - I agree. Yes, we can see it's a playroom now, but that hardly constitutes a spatial make over. I quite like the cave-ish quality of the room. It would have been fun to go all out and have got the kids in on it. Together you could make a big shaggy green fake forest floor/rag rug complete with cut out fabric leaves woven in (they could have made sock bugs to hide in it as well) and built some 'boulders' to sit on from cardboard and old chairs and covered them in grey wool blankets - shaggy wool moss stitched on in places. or just wood stumps if you could get 'em. I would have gone for heavier curtains so you could make the space darker for watching movies, nap time or pretending you are Max with the wild things depending on the age of the offspring, the curtains of course would have to have magic trees and vines and stars sewn onto them. . . . but then I guess it depends if this is a two year rental or 6 months. . .

Sorry but this is perfectly hideous.

Okay... I think it looks cute. I love the rug and the chair and the artwork on the wall. For everyone talking crap about this not being much of a makeover- get a grip. It sounds like this is a very temporary situation for the inhabitants, perhaps related to changes in employment status or circumstance, perhaps the inhabitants didn't have a budget to buy billowing floor length drapes or an Eammes rocker or low bookshelves with coordinating succulents to put below the windows... Or maybe they want to save the money they could spend on those items to purchase something bigger, like, i dunno- A HOUSE. Renting is about smaller budgets, temporary situations, and making the best with what you have for a lot of us. Considering that, I think it looks very cute and it makes me feel better about covering my ugly rental carpeting with a cute green area rug like theirs.