Teenage Son Room Makeover

I'm not going to try to get clever with this post title...the following pictures are pretty clear...my teen son is in desperate need of a room makeover. As I am of the born-organized persuasion, looking in on this scenario every day just grates on my being.

Perhaps it's a little his fault and perhaps it's a little ours, but the fact is this room contains more stuff than necessary, the stuff has no proper home, and it just plain lacks personality. As BigCountry left today for a four day varsity football camp with his high school football team, I am planning on surprising him with a room makeover. Not only have we talked about this and have just never done it, I'd like to give him something other than a monetary appreciation for finishing his first year of public high school with a 4.0 grade point average.



As you can see, his walls are painted gray and the predominant color if you can find it is red and black, his high school colors. I plan on sticking with that color scheme. The majority of his wooden furniture belonged to both sides of his grandparents originally and is not something that my husband wants to part with. It doesn't particularly work with the clean lines I'd like to use, but every room needs a challenge to work around.



Here's the game plan:

*Replace hodge-podge bedding with black and red color scheme.

*Find something in that color scheme to organize his desk top and completely purge his desk drawers (no, I don't feel this is invasive...it'll all go in storage totes for him to sort through later) as it would appear he does not use them to store the stuff that is accumulating on his desk surface. As decorators always say, everything needs a place to call home.

*Use large storage containers of some sort to store his sports equipment in. He plays three sports a year, and the equipment and accompanying minutia that comes along with it seem to multiply every year. I actually would prefer if they were out open in his room because then they will be used...in other words, easy access.

*The closet isn't too bad other than we have stuff stored on his top shelf which needs to be removed so that infrequently used items can be placed up there.

There needs to be some way to entice this child to contain his dirty laundry. That may be my biggest challenge.



Probably his shelf with team memorabilia may be the only item in his room that I will leave alone.



Depending on how the shopping goes for the above items, additional touches would be locating some peel and stick vinyl striping (I'm not sure if it even exists) and the possibility of painting a large chalkboard area on one wall (hoping he wouldn't consider it childish but more of a two-way conversation area for visitors and even our family.

Now that I've officially published my intent, I'm committed to following this through. The current state of affairs will never do, and with a great room to come home to every day, we can only hope he'll take a little more pride in it than he currently expresses. But then again, we are talking a teen boy here. Check back soon. The after-pictures will be coming!

For the rest of the story and photos of the completed room, please jump to the Room Makeover Completed post. You'll be amazed.