Bohemian Bedroom on a Budget

We have been doing a little bit of a room switch around our house lately. My oldest son moved out of the house to attend college and my daughter made a switch into his much larger bedroom. {In case you missed it, you can see her complete silver and white glam bedroom transformation in this post.} In the midst of the move, we had bags full of clothes and treasures of my son's to donate and the things he really wanted to hang on to got moved down into his new room. It sat unfinished for weeks until I decided what I wanted to do with the room. My son would prefer decorating in flags and Americana. He requested the cheap tourist framed constitution that he picked up at a yard sale be hung on the wall. I decided that I get to over rule him since he's gone nine months out of the year. Since I walk past the room every day, I wanted something I would like to look at but that was still masculine enough that he felt like he still had ownership of the room when he came home even though we really know whose room it really is.

Like nearly all my DIY projects, the room make over was done on a budget using many items I already had in my home. The rest of the items I either made or found at Goodwill outlet or on clearance at Target. I did the total room redo for $135 and I'm going to show you how!

This whole room was designed around a $1 blanket I picked up at a garage sale. A few years ago, I got a vintage wool Hudson Bay company blanket for a buck. It's nearly 100 years old but it started my little obsession with Pendleton wool and Hudson Bay Company blankets. I'm especially obsessed with this one and would do a crazy happy dance if I found one at a garage sale for $1. It's the unicorn I hope to find. I get a little sidetracked when I talk about it so let me back up. The Hudson Bay Company blanket is that little piece of green you see peeking out. It's similar to this one that you can find on Amazon for $450, except that it's one of the originals. I loved the color and it made me start thinking along the lines of tribal or bohemian as the decor style I would run with. I'm not sure why I call it bohemian rather than tribal, but I think they both have similar design styles, and I like saying boho, so there you have it!

A bohemian style is characterized by wood, leather, fur, plants tons of textures and colors as well as patterns. The most common patterns are geometric, like hexagons and triangles.  When you walk into the room, these hexagon wall hangings are the first thing that you see.

I found the three of these on sale at Joann's for $4. They were unfinished so I bought DecoArt bronze metallic paint and painted them. The DecoArt metallic line is my absolute favorite because they actually come out metallic. I was going to make some concrete planters and add succulents, but after I saw these potted succulents at Target for $7.99 I knew I couldn't make them for much cheaper. It was the only purchase I made that was full price {a rare thing for me!}.

I picked up most of the linens on clearance at Target. After the back to school rush, many of the twin size sheets and blankets were on sale because the college rush to purchase was over. I got a sheet set for $9.99, a cream colored blanket with geometric pattern for $9.99 and two black and white tribal pillows for $7 each.

The rust colored pillow at the front was bought at Goodwill outlet for about a dollar {you pay by the pound so I'm not sure the exact price}. I made the two pillows that you see towards the front. I love the plain IKEA pillow covers {you may remember them from this customizable wedding gift} that cost $4 each. I created the Washington pillow and the tribal pattern pillow in my Silhouette design software and then cut the design out of heat transfer vinyl.  Total cost for all of the pillows was $25.

Remember the macrame wall hangings that were popular back in the 70's? Well, they are making their way back! I bet you can't guess where I found this yellow one. I was walking through the aisles of Target and saw it sitting in the kitchen section.

It's a place mat! I added some tassels that I made, a wooden dowel and a string and it's got a whole new life. It was only $3.

The lamp was marked down to $15 and that included the lamp shade which fit the style of the room perfectly. Besides the place mat wall hanging, I also created two canvases that flank both sides of the room as well.

This bear string art canvas is probably my favorite detail in the whole room!

I can't wait to show you the tutorial because it's such a slick technique using embroidery floss. I got the canvas for a quarter and painted over it with white paint. It cost me about $1.50 to create this large piece of art for the room.

You can see the pumpkin cactus sitting on top of the book shelf. The tutorial for those can be found here.

I'm not so great at keeping plants alive, but I thought I would try my hand at this fiddle leaf fig. I bought it half price at Lowe's for $10.

I found the planter on clearance for $2. It was plain white so I took the same pattern I used for one of the tribal pillows above and cut it out of vinyl and I used it like a sticker to decorate the pot.

The canvas behind the fiddle leaf fig was purchased because I need some art to anchor this side of the wall since the other side had the string art bear. I used wooden stickers I got on clearance at Target and painted some of the wooden stickers black and some the same bronze that I painted the hexagon shelves. I used embroidery floss in the center of the canvas to tie the two large art pieces together in the room. This canvas cost me about $10 to create.

This room has a lot of angles, so it's hard to take any great photographs of it so that you can see the whole room at once. This gives you an idea of the large map poster I hung just above the bed.  We had this map rolled up in the closet. I think it was hung by staples in one of the kids rooms at one time or another. I used two balsa wood sticks that I found for $2 at Lowe's to mount the poster and make it look like a vintage or classroom style map.

The globe was bought at a garage sale years ago. I don't even remember how much I paid for it. I painted the water on the map black to make the land stand out more. The cow hide rug is a bit small for the room, but I had it already, and I like to use what I have. I bought it at a garage sale years ago for $10.

The final detail was the cow head I mounted on the wall above the window. My son actually got it for me as a birthday gift a few years ago when he went to Mexico with my parents.

So what do you think? I love how it turned out! And I love it more since I was able to do it on such a budget! There are a few things I will still be keeping my eyes peeled for. I would love to find a very light colored leather butterfly chair to put in the room and I may change out the cow hide rug to something that fits better scale wise in the space. For now, I love that it's one of the only rooms in the house that doesn't get dirty. I walk past it and smile. I'm guessing when my son gets home all of the pillows will be piled on the floor and the blankets will be thrown off but until then, I'm soaking it all in!

I am excited to share with you a few of the tutorials for projects in the room. Stay tuned. If you would like to catch a video of the room, you can find a sneak peek on my Facebook page that I recorded a few weeks ago.

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