I’ve been so absent lately because I have been so busy behind the scenes designing and shooting so many projects. We finished and shot three full rooms in my brother’s house, and then went down to the mountain house to shoot the new rug collection for a week. It’s been a lot and this summer is not slowing down, but it’s extremely fun and fulfilling. I wanted to give you a little update on the next room we are tackling and show you more in-process as we are actually designing it. Here we go. This house has a lot of rooms which is both very fun and kinda daunting to figure out what gets done first. So my strategy is to pitch rooms to the partners that are appropriate to the room and as we secure contracts we tackle said room (if you want a whole substack on the inside of the business let me know in the comments, it’s something I’m very much excited to share as I have a wealth of experience, but probably more specific to those in the biz). When I’m pitching partners I don’t always do them in order, it’s really what contract gets finalized first and then based on the partner’s expectations and deadlines – which means that while you’d think I’d be pulling together the living room or dining room first, instead my 9-year-old niece is about to get a pretty dope bedroom (I’m going to call her Kay from now on here). She moved in with a mattress and an old dresser, which is honestly fine – she’s 9, but it motivated me to jump it on the priority list. I pitched Kay’s room to All Modern because her room (as is much of the house) lends itself to a more post-modern design (curvy, graphic, and contemporary with a lot of streamlined silhouettes and organic materials in non-rustic but warm finishes). They bit, we negotiated, and I pulled the design together, shooting in two weeks. But while Kay is a 9, she, like all girls, is both a child and an aspiring teenager. I learned a lot with Elliot’s bedroom (more on that later) that while they still play with stuffies and crawl into bed with us at night, they stylistically are desperate to identify with being a tween, if not a full-on teen. And I get that. I have proof of me feeling this way on a questionnaire from Kindergarten AND 3rd grade. When asked what I wanted to be when I grew up I said repeatedly “teenager”. So I get it. Ladies, if you want to decorate a “little girls” room you have maybe 6 years to do it. By the time they are 8, they are DONE with anything that looks “little kid” (yes, including butterfly wallpaper…again, more on that cautionary tale later). Anyway, I’ll show you the room and the major pieces. Then if you can help me with some tween ideas that would be just MAGICAL.
The Room – Headboard Wall
The room is big and has beautiful white oak Stuga floors and black Marvin windows. We love the windows and all the natural light they bring in, and I’ll incorporate hits of black into the room to ensure that these don’t become the focus and add window treatments so that their lines are softened. We chose Drift, from Stuga on the ceilings and white oak doors. It’s a pretty, big, well-lit box that literally anybody would be lucky to have.
She has a nice reach-in closet and a built-in bench seat. The ceilings are vaulted (with a really pretty chandelier that didn’t make it into these photos).
Storage Talk…
Ok as a reminder, the plans for this house were done 3-4 years ago when Kay was 5-6 and the future needs were kinda unknown. Besides, they are just kids’ rooms so the architect designed these niches and Ken/Katie put in bench seats. Great. But now Kay wants a desk. Do I think that Kay is going to sit at her desk to do her homework a lot? Who knows. But both she and my daughter really want a desk in their room (Elliot’s is for crafting and journaling, both of which she does like twice a month in her room) to mostly to feel older, I think. All I want to say is, “LADIES, YOU MAY HAVE DECADES OF SITTING AT A DESK LIKE AN ADULT, GRAB A BOOK AND SNUGGLE ON A BENCH SEAT!!” Only time will tell if she’ll use the bench a lot – I’ve stopped pretending that I know what kids will like or dislike in a couple of years. Those developing brains/identities and styles are unpredictable (as they should be). That’s all to say that while we have this awesome bench, we actually do need to bring in a dresser for storage and I’m also very excited to put a cute upholstered cushion on that bench. The sconces are from Rejuvenation and match the chandelier and we love how graphic, modern, and a bit playful they are.
The Closet
As you can see the closet was built out by a carpenter and then wallpapered (by Second Mile) in an awesome large gold Scandi pattern. Near the end of any remodel you start cutting costs, desperate to turn off the firehose of money, and the shelves were so much cheaper than drawers – still awesome, but yeah she needs some basic drawers for clothes.
What 9-Year-Old Kay Wants…
Ok, while I want her to like the room of course, her parents and I are MUCH more focused on making sure it’s simple enough that she can add whatever layer of “Kay stuff” she wants over the next 10 years because we know her style will change and we don’t want to box her in. She wanted lime green graphic wallpaper one day, purple the next. She does NOT want anything hot pink or pink in general (Whoops, too bad? It’s just the bedding!) so her mom and I settled on green for the actual bed (great, but not lime green) and some soft purple accents. So much more will be added of course, but here is the working mood board (most all from All Modern).
Table Mirror | Pink Lamp | Wood Tray | Desk | Desk Chair | Tapestry | Bed | Sconce | Bud Vase Set | Checkered Object | Green Pedestal | Squiggle Mirror | Drum Side Table | Black Lamp | Dresser | Striped Pillowcases | Blush Bedding | Blue Pillow | Floating Shelf | Curtain | Floor Mirror
All the major pieces here could absolutely go in a grownup room (some could even go in a living room). They are high quality and fit perfectly in the house. The accessories are a bit more trendy, but that’s fine – this room can’t look like a serious room so it is fun to bring in some shapes that feel more “now” (like the squiggle lamp and our DIY rick rack curtain – those are from Anthropologie, but we are doing a different version for blackout curtains). I’ll go into more detail about each piece later (including that awesome tapestry that we are using as art above the bed – I hope), but for now, I’m focused on bringing in the more fun stuff that feels more tween. I’m skipping symmetry in this bedroom in exchange for a more fun vibe, and hoping that the desk (on one side) will feel balanced by the dresser on the opposite-of-window wall. The rug, not known as it’s from our new collection, was designed literally just for her room, and yes it’s the most beautiful sophisticated “purple” (dark mauve) ever and one that I would honestly put in my own room (comes out in October!).
But What Do Tweens and Teens Like In Their Rooms?
So this question is for those of you who have or have had a tween/teen. I’m not on TikTok and don’t follow the tween influencers on YouTube (obviously, lol) but I have a sense that they want stuff that feels irreverent, funky, and very personal to them. I think they are still into “aesthetic” style (meaning creating a vibe) which might include some LED string lights, faux greenery (are they still doing that?), posters, and mini-polaroids. We have a fun corkboard DIY that we are trying and I’m on the hunt for funny-shaped pillows for the bench (are food pillows a thing?). I think they like to collect little things (at least Elliot does) so having a more dedicated spot for that could be good. Anyway, let me know if there are any fun themes or ideas that they are into. Charlie just wants posters and does NOT want me to “decorate” it (fine, bro, I have other fish to fry) and I get the feeling that that’s more what they want – a palette for them to put all their “stuff”. So it’s always an interesting existential conundrum when you need to properly reveal a nicely designed room to the internet, but 9-year-olds aren’t exactly excited about white oak. I know I can make it look good, but I want her to really feel like she can grow with it and make it HERS. It’s actually so much fun to work with a great partner and then add a really personal spin. Wish me luck!!!
*Photos by Kaitlin Green
My daughter is 11.5 and your mood board looks similar to the vibe in her bedroom. The faux greenery is on its way out I think. My son is now 14 and was 12 when we last did his room, my advice is keep any art cheap and don’t get too attached to what you hang because he has now ripped down the awesome gallery wall I spent ages on and has tacked up music posters with masking tape. My husband had to take me aside and give me a talking too 🤦♀️🤦♀️
My daughter wants a huge pinboard and to put up Polaroids if her with her friends. Definitely no butterflies or anything pink. It’s all about dusky colours (sage, grey blues) and bare wood, clean lines.
We do still have a lot of plushies in the room, and now also a lot of books.
Even two years ago when we moved into this house both my kids were obsessed with the idea of desks in their room. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them actually sit and do their homework at them though 😝
No input on the tween decor, but was surprised you didn’t decide to turn the built in bench into a banquette desk. Seems like it could be super cute and unique! I will say that if I were a tween (and even now as an adult), I’d be super bummed out by that dresser – it is just too plain and not unique. Allmodern has so many dressers with more character, like:
https://www.allmodern.com/furniture/pdp/williams-7-drawer-dresser-a000752674.html?piid=1641433064
https://www.allmodern.com/furniture/pdp/kamio-6-drawer-dresser-a110014276.html?piid=1577288742
https://www.allmodern.com/baby-kids/pdp/marin-6-drawer-1949-w-dresser-nske1005.html
https://www.allmodern.com/furniture/pdp/santino-6-drawer-dresser-a100013811.html
Love the idea of a banquette desk! Great use of space and potential for cleaner lines and less bitsy furniture pieces.
Both my kids (ages 8 and 12) insisted on desks as well. They do not use the desks!
I have noticed that their school is always telling them that they need a “quiet private” place to focus on homework. My kids do their homework at the kitchen table, bc it’s all on their stupid school computers so we need to make sure they are doing math rather than watching Minecraft videos on YouTube. Anyhow, I get your frustration about the unused desk!
Hahaha, my kids are only 2 and 4, but I dread the day they are required to be on “stupid school computers” ACK
I have 3 teens (one girl). No to the faux greenery now, but definite yes to the food pillows! We have a lot of croissants and sushi pillows. 🙂
This is a great backdrop for a tween room. Leaving a lot of space for the to put their stamp on it is a good idea. Speaking in a self interested way, I’d get her a cute cordless vacuum, as well as a , dustpan and brush, trashcan and laundry bin, make the cleaning habit part of being grownup, fancy and fun. I feel like a super comfy foldout twin easy chair/loveseat is needed here for ipad/ reading/ chilling in and folding out for sleepovers.
*adds cute hand vac to cart*
Fun! (And I have a niece named Kay who lives in the PNW, too.)
My daughter is 21 and in college (which is older than you are asking for, but also what some of the younger set want to be). Her desk at home has been buried under junk for several years but when I talked to her about removing it for something more workable she absolutely refused to let go of it. She also puts up the little Polaroid pictures and has fairy lights under the lofted bed in her dorm while also loving some goth elements (think Taylor Swift Reputation era black and snakes). Most baffling to me is her collection of metal pins from the different places she’s visited/things she’s done – she puts them on her wall cork board. To me they are very 80s, the type of thing we pinned to jeans jackets and hats, and the kind of thing my parents collected when I was a tween/teenager, like souvenir spoons or something, but she’s very into them and that’s all that counts with this kind of thing, isn’t it?
Yes, my girls are super into enamel pins. One has a felt banner where she pins them. The other has a long ribbon where she pins them.
My dad built a desk in my bedroom when I was about Kay’s age. Did I ever sit at it to do homework or crafts, as I’m sure was intended by my parents? Nope! But I did use it daily as my vanity/getting ready area as opposed to the bathroom I shared with my brother. 30 years later I still use a desk in my office at home for hair and makeup instead of the bathroom. Kids seem super into skin care/makeup these days, maybe she’ll use the desk area as a space in her private room to get ready for the day and trying out new looks, especially as she’s approaching middle school age, instead of monopolizing bathroom time.
This! My daughter did use her desk during remote learning, but it evolved into a vanity area. We put a big mirror above and the drawers were filled with her hair and makeup tools and products. She shared a small bathroom with two brothers, so her desk in her bedroom became her private space, with enough space for doing girlfriends’ hair. We put glass on the top of the desk so it’s protected from heat and spills.
With two tween girls in our house, I can agree that faux foliage is out, but the lights – around the top of the room, or cutesy neon, etc are still very in… they like the power to control the colors and even flashing patterns. There are still a lot of pillows – boyfriend pillows, plushies, etc – and they really like a “cool place to sit” like a beanbag or a papasan, etc. Our girls DO use their desks, but for things like bracelet making, etc. I would advocate for desks with DRAWERS, not just cute parsons desks, so that all those beads and pencils and notebooks have a place to go away…
I do not have kids, but I’m so excited to see where this room lands that allow the ever-changing tastes of a kid/tween/teen. From the comments and other posts about kids’ bedrooms, it sounds…challenging!
I would definitely be interested in an Emily Henderson inside-the-business Substack! I love reading how these things happen.
I have a ten yr old obsessed with asking for a “new room” every year for her birthday. Last year it was cottage core – mushrooms, vines, etc. This year she says “remember when we visited that place with the bathtub in the kitchen? That’s the vibe I want” (once we visited a 70 yr old man who lives in an abandoned train station along the Appalachian trail, long story). So now she wants afghans and those antique lamp shades with fringe? I don’t know about this aesthetic!!! In general though, how to do this constantly within a budget without being wasteful is a challenge!
Not sure where you live but in my neck of the woods afghans can be found at local thrift stores.
You can also find lampshades there and then buy fringe to glue to the lamp shades. You possibly could find someone to teach her how to crochet granny squares and then help her put together her own handmade
afghan. I know when my three sisters and I were kids
we tended to keep our rooms neater because we had been allowed to decorate them when my parents built a new house.
I laughed out loud at this comment! So interesting what kids remember and absorb! Such a cute story and good luck : )
A desk can also double as a vanity zone. The tweens love their products!
My daughter is ten and has no desire for any of my decor input :). She wants a glorious mess of all the things she loves. I agree with your approach – build the basic foundation and then create opportunities for her to make it hers in an evolving way over time. When I was a teen, I lived in a converted attic (under the slanted eaves!), but one wall was sound-proofing, which became a constantly-changing collage of posters and magazine pages and record sleeves and photos and I loved it. The cork board suggestion is terrific.
I let my 9-year old daughter paint her room dark purple. She was inspired by Mary Anne’s bedroom makeover in the new Babysitter’s Club on Netflix. I was really nervous at first, but it is honestly awesome. Her large pieces of furniture are all white, and a lot of the decor is metallic. We all love it!
Hey Emily, just a word of caution (from experience), if she doesn’t want pink and you go with those pink linens, she might hate “everything” (when actually it’s just one thing she doesn’t like). I agree that I don’t love the dresser but if that’s her style then great. Good luck! Kids are tough customers! Lol.
I have a twelve-year-old girl. She loves lush fabrics/pillows/blankets. I would also suggest a nice mirror with storage nearby (my kid just has baskets of jewelry/hair clips/makeup on the floor in front of her mirror, drives me nuts). Maybe the desk could be a vanity, or double as one?
The mood board is cute enough, but every time I read a kids room post on here I’m glad I grew up with parents who were not designers. I might have had crappy hand me down furniture as a result, but I was free to take my own risks, and the space was 100% mine to do what I wanted with. The risks I learned to take with my space have served me well in the decades I’ve works as an artist- so my vote is do as little as possible, shoot what you are required to shoot for the partnership and then let her have the space to redesign completely on her own, however she wants!
These days, girls don’t seem to want desks as much as they want vanities with lights. They will not fill the drawers with pencils, paper, or any school supplies. Instead, they will use said drawers to organize their Touchland hand sanitizers, Drunk Elephant, and Glow Recipe products. Ha! Love that Birdie uses her desk for crafting and journaling!
I’d consider a slightly higher bed for sliding Lego and shoe storage beneath. And shelves – all the shelves for displaying their stuff. Trophies, art 🖼️ projects, sentimental things, etc.
when my dd turned 7 she asked me to paint her room mustard yellow, for Christmas she wanted a bench at the end of her bed. She still pours over my design magazines for inspiration. My son is almost a tween, I went with an industrial, old study vibe for his room and it’s aging well. His name letters are down to be replaced with concert posters. I think you have the right approach to buy solid and coordinating furniture and layer in the fun. I probably wouldn’t get too attached to that fabric for over the bed 😉
last thought – canopy beds are having a moment and my dd really wanted one. In a room with a high ceiling like yours it would be great (nice place for string lights too).
Depends on the girls! Mine are 13 and 15 and we’re (as I type) redoing their shared room in Easy Hollywood that hasn’t been changed for the past 6 years. It is now the same empty shell as your photo! For my kids, no way to faux greenery or make-up tables, yes to space for various books, uniforms, athletic gear, ballet clothes, shoes and backpacks. We also still do homework and work at the big kitchen table but I know they’d appreciate their own work space. I hope to see the update soon so we can steal some ideas!
Fairy lights, tulle swaths, LED lights that they can change the colour of, the desk for projects, not homework (you want them to do homework in a central space so you can monitor online behavior), a bean bag chair or something of the sort. Sorry but I think these colours are drab and too adult. Have you shown her? I think asking them along the way empowers them to grow up and try new things, unless they’re totally uninterested. Can’t the art come from photography or a place the family has visited?
I think places for their personal stuff is pretty important to my girls (ages 8 and 11). Both are pros at covering surfaces with a mishmash of collected/made/useful/junky items in their room. We are renovating and they’ve been in a temporary space, but their bedroom is happening soon. Both wanted a magical forest vibe with dark green walls, large tree art or wall hanging somewhere, and fairy lights. I’m just shocked and glad they agreed on a look!!
So the ceiling is Drift but the floors are Shell, right? And what color are the walls/trim?
My two daughters are now in their 20’s, but had very strong preferences growing up and still do today. So my advice: 1. GET RID OF THE PINK BEDDING! She specifically said she does not want pink and the bed is the centerpiece of the room! Why ignore her wishes for the most important item in the room? 2. Add lots of shelving in addition to cork boards! This is good advice for any kid, not just young girls. Kids love to collect all the things, and it’s great to have a place to corral that stuff.
My daughter is 12 and she has had a desk in her room for about 4 years. I found a kid-sized “executive” desk off FB Marketplace, with four-five drawers down each side and a drawer in the middle. She loves the desk and uses it constantly for craft projects and journaling. I think the appeal is all the drawers for organizing all of her craft books, pens, and supplies. She has been gifted so many cutesy craft/stationary supplies at birthday parties over the years, it’s nice to be able to put that stuff somewhere. Since we got the desk, 4 of her friends have sourced nearly identical ones and they all wanted one because of the drawers! We have homework stations in the main spaces of the house, but I imagine she will continue to use her desk as a vanity as she continues to transition into more “teen” interests. Plus, her desk faces the window and gets great natural light! All three of my kids aren’t super picky about how their rooms look – they usually like options I show them, but they are adamant over how their bedding feels and how well it regulates temperature through the night.… Read more »
My daughters are 14 and 18, I am/have been there! Mine also really really want desks, and they do use them some of the time (more for art than homework but that’s fine). They were/are ADAMANT about not having their backs to the door, so keep that on your radar for room layout. They want lots of shelves/other flat surfaces to display the random small objects that are important to them in any given month, and prefer to choose and position their own art/posters and change them up often, so ideally multiple/enormous corkboards or just a decision to be okay with walls full of tack holes for 10ish years (once the photo shoot is done). Light strings or other types of light they can mess with the colors of to suit their moods are still a thing too, though more for younger than older teens now. In your position I’d do photos with whatever bedding you want, and then exchange it (unused of course) and let her choose what she wants from the same company before she moves in. That dresser looks just like the furniture issued in my college dorm rooms in the mid-90s, it cracks me up!
My 11-year-old was annoyed but eventually glad we went with a lighter, more neutral shade of lavender for her bedroom walls when we redid her room a year ago. Now, as she enters middle school, I’m finding what she wants most is places to store her favorite notes and tchotkes/memories from friends and activities. It’s less a specific style and more just a genuine reflection of the things she loves most that is the “theme” of her room these days. So lately I’m looking for cute cork boards and other ways to “pre-decorate” so she has a way to display these things without adding ten bajillion push pin holes to the walls.
My daughter is 12.5 we just redid her room. She wanted it to be darker and moodier than the little girl design of before. She uses her desk ALL THE TIME. She does her make up at it, journals, does video chats with friends. It’s used as much as her bed, basically. She wanted frames for her pictures, but still wanted her pictures. And a giant spider man poster. Okay fine. And YES she collects stuff. Shelf space is essential.
I have a 16 year old girl, and for the last 3-4 years the mainstays in her room have been a makeup vanity area, with lots of shelving, string/fairy lights, and places to post her artwork/photos/mementos, and now she’s into hanging records on her wall. She has a beautiful window seat but honestly still reads on her bed.
I’d love to read the “inside of the business” post or series!
This bedroom is going to be awesome, but if she says she doesn’t want pink I’d say change up that bedding! So many other awesome colors to choose from.
My daughter is older than your niece, but she can sit at her desk all day playing Sims (mostly interior decorating! LOL!) and doing digital art. She also watches other people play video games.
Agree with others not to do pink bedding if she specifically says no pink. I wonder if you can put all the foundational pieces in place and then the two of you go shopping for accessories. Online shopping or in the stores. Maybe give her a budget for decorative items or a list of things she can pick out (desk accessories or throw pillows or lamps, etc). You can make it all look good together. Either that or do what someone else suggested and style it for the shoot and then let her remove what she doesn’t like and add in her own stuff. It needs to be personal and feel like HER.
My now 16 yr old knew EXACTLY what she wanted her room to look like when we renovated/ redecorated 2 yrs ago. No more vines but still string lights, huge corkboard full of photos of her friends, white walls and light colors. Tik tok gave her lots of ideas and once she showed them to me it was really easy to recreate. Not the most original, but she LOVES it and it is a really cute room.
My daughter is 14 and has had a desk for years. She does actually sit at it using her laptop with an external keyboard, and also to do her hair / makeup. She is VERY much in charge of the design/decor in her room and almost never likes any of my suggestions. She is currently painting her room with a pink wall and the rest a creamy ivory (she’s complaining about how much work it is to paint, hee hee), but doing it anyway! She has posters, original art from me and her own hanging on the walls, some ikea shelves and a gold round shelf that hold her collections of hello kitty and anime figures and stuffies. She has other cute items like a macrame plant holder, a color changing little mushroom lamp, and a GIANT full length mirror leaning against the wall. I had a big mirror in my room too growing up, a must have for fit checks! lol She picked out a new light fixture (basic white fabric covered pendant, very simple, but MUST be able to use a hue type lightbulb to change the colors in her room). She definitely has her own personal style.… Read more »
I think Urban Outfitters is good source material/inspiration for what tweens would like. Just a thought.
My pre-teen nephews and nieces have corkboard and/or acoustic felt as walls or sections of them. They help warm the space, add some personality, muffle noise, and provide a space to pin things up. Acoustic felt is now so much more interesting than it used to be with some companies even offering pre-packaged pieces that create art images or murals.