Decorating your Dorm Room Saving Space

For more tips on decorating your dorm room, see our article Ideas for Decorating your College Dorm Room.

Dorm Decorating Ideas - It's All About Space

Saving space is the key to effective dorm decorating. You have to make the most of the small area and this can be especially challenging if you have a lot of clothes, books and other items you need to keep. Smart furniture purchases and creative decorating will help!

• Pack smartly. Remember that living in a dorm is a temporary arrangement, so only bring essential items you can't live without. Bring your favorite teddy bear, but leave the collection of Elvis plates at home or in storage.

• Stash your stuff out of sight to keep the clutter away. The most obvious place is the closet and the space underneath the bed.

• Closet organizers and hanging shelves are great space-savers and can help you store more in the small space.

Dorm Furniture

The over-reaching theme for dorm furniture should be tall, thin and narrow. Not only does this conserve valuable floor real estate, but tall furniture draws the eye upwards and gives the illusion of a taller room. A small but effective first step.

When arranging furniture in your dorm room, try to keep an open walking space. This may seem obvious, but a well-structured furniture setting is the key to giving the illusion of more space. Allow a clear and unbroken path around your room by keeping furniture moved to the side and awkward corners turned to flow with the scene.

Portable and storable furniture is also a great way to conserve space. Bean bag chairs, foldable tables and similar items let you have furniture when you need it and the extra space when you need that.

Most stores have a section devoted to small and portable pieces of furniture. Do some shopping in stores near the school and online to find creative furniture items that fit your budget and lifestyle. Target has a good selection of inexpensive but stylish dorm furniture.

Decorating the Walls

One of the most often overlooked areas for dorm decoration is the walls. Sure, you can't put furniture there, but sprucing up the drab space will go a long way to making the room feel more like a home away from home.

For starters, choose a theme. It may be something as simple as soccer or horses or a more intricate design to match evolving college-bound tastes. Either way, your theme is the most important decision and you have to settle on it before you can really begin.

• Avoid disparate, cluttered elements on your walls. If you want to hang dozens of pictures of your friends, keep them in one area, preferably on a tack board or similar space. This keeps them tied as one element and looks (and feels) much more organized.

• Bigger can be better. Rather than cluttering your wall with posters, a large collage might look better.

• Unite different posters and pictures by giving them a common frame. This pulls them together and creates a pleasing arrangement on your wall no matter what the pictures contain.

• Finding posters, art prints, pictures or drawings to hang shouldn't be too difficult. Check art supply shops, department stores, and sites on the internet such as Posters.com for a plethora of ideas.

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