The Tween's Room Teaser!

For months now I've had the tween's room on my "projects under construction" list on the right side of the blog- We've been working on it, it's just not completely done. So, in order to give myself a little kick in the pants, I thought I'd start sharing the room bit by bit (maybe this way we'll get it all done before the month's over) I thought I'd start with the before pictures...I obviously didn't straighten the room before taking these pictures! Those who have teenagers know THIS is the reality! We decorated this room 5 years ago for my other teenage daughter, who has since moved to the other end of the house. The furniture was purchased 8 years ago at a yard sale for $300 (It's all Lexington, heavy, solid wood)
I'm not sure how well the vanity shows up in the right corner, but it's purple! We picked that up at an estate sale and painted it purple (her favorite color) Mr. Right built the shadow boxes above the vanity.
The lights were purchased at IKEA and Mr. Right installed them. The curtains are actually an extra pair of bedsheets and dictated the colors in the room. The wall treatment is tissue paper. When putting up the tissue paper (with glue and water) Mr. Right wanted to know how we would ever take it down. "It will be just like wallpaper," I said, "Spray a little hot water, and it will peel right off," I assured him. Boy was I WRONG!!! The tissue paper wall was the first item under attack for the make-over. We sprayed, scraped and sprayed some more (we even added fabric softener to the water because someone said that works on wallpaper) This is how the wall looked after a few hours...
At the rate I was going it would only take me 72 hours of spraying and scraping to have the wall clean. We needed a new plan. To Home Depot we went. What could I cover the wall with? Sheet metal, to use as a giant magnet board? Corkboard? Wallpaper, that would cost $300 plus dollars and 2 weeks to order? Then I saw some panels that were made to look like antique ceiling tin- perfect! Only problem- to do the one wall would cost $800 plus dollars- No can do! So off to Lowes we went. Just when I thought all hope was lost I found an interesting product in the very back of the store. Paintable wallpaper- with the antique ceiling tin pattern!

At $12 per roll and only 2 rolls needed It was the perfect solution. Here it is on the wall...

So now we had to decide what paint treatment to use. I did a sample piece, trying to make it look like vintage tin by using a cream paint and glaze treatment. The problem (sorry no picture) was that it blended the wall to0 much (since the other walls were painted tan) So then I tried this...I used a dry brush and a tiny bit of black paint to just catch the raised portion of the pattern. I kinda liked the effect- unfortunately the bright tissue could still be seen through the wallpaper- so we tried another treatment...Here, I painted the wallpaper tan to match the other walls. Then applied the black dry brush treatment. I thought I liked it, so we did the whole wall- til 1:30 in the morning. There's nothing like sleeping on a design decision- When I woke up I hated it! The black was not consistant and it created so much pattern I didn't think I could use the bedding I had found- so, I painted the whole wall black! I know some people shy away from using black on walls, but I love it. Can't show you the whole thing (remember the title said "Teaser") so here's a little peek...I guess you can also see the vanity isn't purple anymore. Let me know what you think of the black wall. There's more to come so keep checking back and see how we transform a loud, bright tween's room, to a more sophisticated space. Love, Kelly