When kids hear “go to your room!” they usually go kicking and screaming. But if upstairs were more fun than downstairs, we’d have to invent a new punishment.
Children’s rooms can be creative spaces for kids to enjoy while they learn and grow, and caring about their rooms might make kids want to keep things tidy.
“There is definitely a sense that if children feel proud of their rooms, they work much harder at keeping it straight, doing their chores and being motivated and aware about not just what their room looks like, but what other rooms look like in the rest of the house,” said Deborah Lehr, the CEO of Peggy Quish, a Maryland-based children’s furniture company.
Peggy Quish chairs are antique style, but in bright modern colors, so they appeal to kids while matching the rest of a home’s adult-focused decor. The balance between grown-up interiors and kids’ spaces is hard to strike, but making children’s bedrooms cozy and coordinated is vital: It’s the one spot that belongs to them, according to Lehr.
“For my children, a bedroom is a room they can lock themselves inside and feel is very much theirs, that it’s comfortable,” she said. “And part of it being comfortable for them is having a coordinated look.”
For a child to have a well-decorated, harmonious room “spurs creativity,” according to Kristen Fountain, owner of Kristen F. Davis Designs in Atlanta. “And it probably builds confidence, because if kids have a place to go that’s not, ‘don’t touch this or don’t put your hands on that,’ they feel comfortable expressing themselves and being themselves,” Fountain said.
Fountain is a faux/decorative painter who specializes in playful murals for nurseries or children’s rooms. She paints horses, giraffes and other critters to match quilt patterns and specializes in large cartoon trees. Fountain says integrating chalkboard paint into children’s rooms could make practicing math or handwriting fun. She says magnetic paint can have just as many possibilities: Kids can move personalized magnets with chore lists, drawings or anything else around on their walls.
Fountain says people often take inspiration from hobbies by doing things like sports-themed rooms.
Things might turn out so nice that Mom and Dad won’t want to leave either.
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