Our Bedroom Glow-up
The “After”. A cozy bedroom glow-up featuring textured layers, starry ocean-inspired artwork, and warm lighting.
I’m so excited to finally share our bedroom refresh.
We bought our home back in 2019, and for a long time, not much changed. Over the past year, I’ve felt this growing pull to make our home feel softer, warmer, and more intentional. I want every space in my home to feel much cozier. I kept putting it off, partly because I didn’t know exactly what I wanted or how to get there. Decision paralysis is very real.
The “Before”. I still love this look, but it was a little too minimal for me and colorless, and I wanted to pull colors from the painting and make everything feel cozier.
What I knew was that I wanted my space to feel layered and lived-in, but still thoughtful and personal. Then, as for a theme, I chose three words to help guide our bedroom: Cozy, Luxe, and Watery-Universe. I really wanted my last word/phrase to be the most personal one of all, something Mark and I love, to help drive the entire space in case I got overwhelmed with all the ideas and options while shopping. “Watery-Universe” may sound a little unusual at first, but it captures two things we’re both drawn to: the calm, moody feeling of the ocean and the dreamy beauty of the cosmos. I loved the idea of blending those two worlds together to create a space that feels peaceful, a little magical, and uniquely ours.
Choosing the Heroes of the Room
Next is choosing a “hero” for the space. This could be a piece of artwork, a favorite piece of furniture, a rug you love, or even something sentimental that you want the room to revolve around. If you already have a beloved “hero” of the room, it often helps decide colors, textures, and personality around it. And for me, our bedroom ended up having two.
The first is a large painting by my friend Kirsten, who is an incredibly talented artist. I fell in love with her work on Instagram and knew I needed one of her pieces in our home. Over time, I’ve collected five of her paintings, large and small, throughout the house. The largest one lives in our bedroom.
One of the hero pieces of the room: an abstract painting that feels like both the cosmos and the ocean.
What I love about this piece is that it feels open to interpretation. Sometimes it looks like a universe of stars swirling inside a colorful nebula. Other times, it feels like the ocean. I’ve always loved space, so that element pulled me in immediately. But I also grew up in landlocked states and have always felt drawn to the ocean. Mark and I especially love the Oregon coast and try to visit whenever we can.
If we couldn’t be there, I wanted to bring some of that feeling into our room.
Once that painting was in place, I wanted a companion piece that carried the same mood. I searched Etsy for everything from starry skies to ocean scenes, casting a pretty wide net. Then I saw a stormy ocean painting that completely stopped me in my tracks. Stormy weather is one of my favorite cozy things, and this painting captured it so beautifully that I knew it belonged here.
A stormy ocean painting that brought the cozy, moody atmosphere of the Oregon coast into our bedroom.
Curtains, Migraines, and Finally Committing
Curtains were something I had been avoiding for years. We only had blinds, and while they worked most of the time, they didn’t cover the decorative windows above the main ones. At night, moonlight would pour in like a flashlight. During the day, especially when I have one of my debilitating migraines, closing the blinds just wasn’t enough, so I’d end up hiding under my blanket.
Still, curtains felt intimidating. Pinch pleat, box pleat, no pleat? What fabric? What color? What kind of rod works with these windows? And then making sure it works with whatever bedding I chose. I’d research, shop, get overwhelmed, and give up again and again.
What finally helped was creating a mood board in Canva.
I pulled in pictures of everything I was considering: bedding, curtains, furniture, decor, frames. I copied images and links and started arranging them visually. Seeing everything together made the decisions feel less abstract and far more manageable. I didn’t commit to buy anything until I could see how it might all work together. I added and deleted ideas constantly, but having a visual plan gave me the confidence to move forward instead of freezing up. It also helped me see where the room needed more color, which balanced everything out. In the end, none of this would have come together as smoothly without visualizing it first.
Creating a Canva mood board helped me visualize how all the pieces would work together before making any purchases.
Layering Color Without Overwhelming the Room
Bedding was another big decision. Both paintings share a strong turquoise tone, which I love, but it’s bold. I didn’t want the color to take over the entire room. The solution was layering.
I found a duvet cover in that main turquoise color and softened it with a silvery gray velvet quilt that felt luxe, gray pillows with subtle basketweave texture that almost matched the quilt, gold pillows for a complementary color that also matched the hardware & furniture, and an oversized knit blanket to add in one more pop of color to tie everything together. When everything came together, it felt cohesive and echoed the artwork without overpowering the space.
Before and after. Layered bedding in turquoise, gray, gold, and white keeps the space cozy without letting one color overpower the room.
Curtains also played an important role in that layering. After so many ideas, I decided on silvery gray velvet pinch pleat drapes that captured the luxe feel I was going for. I didn’t want it to be too matchy-matchy with the bedding I decided on. Plus, in case I ever wanted to switch up the bedding, the curtains will still work with plenty of other options and colors. Here’s the hardware I decided on as well: curtain rod and curtain rings. And the silent hero: curtain gliding tape that let my curtain rings glide quietly and smoothly across the rod with no scraping or getting stuck on the rod seams.
Adding velvet pinch-pleat curtains instantly softened the room and created the luxe feel I was looking for.
Furniture That Supports Real Life
After the main pieces were decided on, I turned to furniture. At the end of most workdays, I retreat to our bedroom to decompress. I wanted a space that was intentionally designed for slowing down. Sometimes I used to just crash on the bed after work, but it wasn’t close to bedtime.
Adding a chair changed everything.
I originally planned on adding a large lounge chair with an ottoman, but the space didn’t quite allow for it. Instead, I found this chair from Living Spaces, which turned out to be a great alternative. It still lets me lounge comfortably, but when it’s not in use, it tucks back neatly and doesn’t take up extra space. And it doesn’t feel like a traditional recliner at all. It’s textured, modern, and inviting, and it created a comfortable spot to unwind outside of the bed.
My chair where I included extra pillows from the bed.
We also upgraded our dressers to ones from West Elm to match the nightstands we had already purchased from them. The black Ikea dressers we used for years will now move into the guest room, which I can’t wait to start thinking about in a future room refresh.
Out with the old, in with the new. These new dressers bring the midcentury-warm vibe I love throughout my home.
Making it Personal
Once the foundation was set (art, curtains, bedding, furniture), it was time for my favorite part: layering in personality.
Lighting, picture frames, mirrors, artwork, pillows, and blankets. These are the details that make a space feel like you.
I shopped our house first, pulling together frames I already owned and finding an arched mirror that echoed the shape of one of my beloved frames. I layered the mirror with the large painting and styled the dresser with our jewelry boxes, framed photos, a Restoration Hardware-style lamp, and a globe “planet” I made over a year ago. It coincidentally happened to match the colors of the room perfectly, and I finally had a reason to display it.
That little globe ended up becoming one of my favorite details in the room.
On my tall dresser, I leaned into a space theme. I stacked a few used space-themed books that I found on eBay and at a local bookstore, including one of my favorite books by Carl Sagan. Sitting on top of the books is a small antique-style telescope that felt like the perfect finishing touch. Next to it is a fun little 3D-printed rocket I found on Etsy, along with a plain black globe I bought years ago from Target that I dotted with stars and constellations using a paint pen.
Will I be making more planet & starry globes someday to sell? I hope so! If there’s enough interest, say so! I’d love to make more. Stay tuned.
Loving the pop of red from one of the stacked space books.
My Favorite Corner
The recliner corner needed its own layers too. I tied it back to the bed with the same pillows and a matching turquoise throw, added a floor lamp that matches the one on the dresser, and grouped several framed pieces together to finish the space. The frames didn’t quite match at first, so I painted them all gold to unify them.
My favorite corner of the room: a cozy recliner, soft blankets, and a collection of ocean- and cosmos-inspired artwork.
Choosing what to put inside those frames took the longest. I went back to my three guiding words to remind myself of the feeling I wanted for the room: specifically cozy and watery-universe. I searched Etsy for digital downloads that captured that same moody magic of the cosmos and the ocean, including another Stormy Sea , a Crescent Moon , and a rainy Cloud . I also created one of the pieces myself by combining a turquoise ocean with the moon in Photoshop, which helped tie together the colors of the room while keeping that dreamy, sleepy atmosphere. While shopping for prints, I found one that showed a hand dropping a handful of starry magic dust, but it only existed in portrait format. Since I needed a landscape version for my layout, I recreated my own version using my hand as the “model” and drew my own starry magic on my iPad so it would fit perfectly with the arrangement.
I also love framing unconventional objects that have meaning to me. One of the pieces is a small Oregon Coast patch I found on Etsy that felt too fun for the room not to frame. Another is a sand dollar I found at one of my favorite beaches on the Oregon coast, Oceanside, near Tillamook. That beach is full of little treasures like jasper and agates, and I’ve always been a bit of a rock and shell hound. Mixing personal pieces like these with the art prints adds a little whimsy and makes the collection feel even more personal.
Next to my favorite corner, on the other wall, I also added two gold-framed black-and-white photos of Oregon near the door to reinforce the ocean theme. I found some free pictures online that I downloaded & printed for now, but Mark & I are headed back to the Oregon coast this spring so that we can take our own personalized pictures with a better camera.
Black-and-white photos of the Oregon coast help tie the ocean theme throughout the space.
Throughout the process, I kept coming back to my three guiding words to make sure every decision stayed true to the feeling I wanted. The cozy elements show up in the layers of pillows, soft bedding, blankets, and the warm glow of timed candles in their votives. The luxe side appears in the soft, slightly shiny textures like the velvet curtains, velvet quilt, and gold accents throughout the room. And the watery-universe theme ties everything together through the artwork, from the two “hero” paintings to the ocean- and cosmos-inspired prints that echo that dreamy mix of sea and stars.
Our New Bedroom Retreat
This room has become our new oasis, especially during the winter when our patio refresh isn’t usable. Am I done decorating this room? Most likely not. I don’t know if a space is ever truly finished to be honest. But it is for now and that alone is a huge win, 6 years in the making!
There are still things I want to do someday, like adding a headboard and eventually replacing the carpet with hardwood floors and a large area rug. That will be a “Bedroom Refresh: Part II” when the budget allows.
For now, though, you’ll usually find me curled up in my recliner, often unwinding at the end of the day, and watching shows on my iPad, with Mimi close by.
Our bedroom in the glow of nighttime. A star projector adds a little extra cosmic magic to the room, turning the ceiling into a dreamy galaxy before bed.
A quiet evening with Mimi in our new bedroom retreat.