Briar's Big (ger) Boy Room

Moving into our house, I knew I wanted to do Briar's room different. His old room was still a nursery set up, with baby animals and a crib. First things first, he had to get a new bed. I needed something safe, that he wouldn't fall out of but big, so I ended up getting him a Montessori floor bed and so far, it's worked great.

I knew I wanted to do half wallpaper, half board and batten for his room. In our old house, I had used actual board for the board and batten and that was HARD. Between cutting it to size (I don't own a table saw or this would've been way easier) hiding the seams and extending the outlets it was a difficult project. We have BAD texture (that I begged David Weekly not to spray but here we are); I decided to try the skim coating technique instead creating a faux board and batten, well that sucked too and I don't know which technique was worse. Skim coating would've been much more doable for a smaller area or single wall but a whole room is exhausting. Mud is messy and working in Briar's room made it more difficult because I couldn't work when he was sleeping or napping which is when I usually do. For a while it looked like I took this bare room and made the walls more white and it looked more bare. It took me about 2.5 coats of mud to get the walls smooth and then a light sand.

Things finally started rolling when I began framing his window. I was on the fence about doing this but I looked at pictures online and all the board/batten with framed windows looked so much better than without. For this, I cut down the current window sill with my multi-tool and added 4 primed 1 x 4's to the top, bottom, and sides. I also removed the current window sill and replaced it with a 1x6 cut down to size. I cut all of these at an angle so it would look seamless. Next I added Cove Molding to the top of my baseboards because I didn't want to remove them, this would allow the vertical 1 x 3's to sit flush instead of have an overhang (note if you're painting the baseboards like I did, you'll have to lay on the ground to paint the cove molding so do this before nailing them to the wall unlike I did).

Once that was finished I decided to start the upper trim because once that was done, I could measure for how much wallpaper I need and order that. I used a primed 1 x 4 and primed 1 x 2 for the top and chose the height I wanted it and attached it to the wall with brad nails. I really put my miter saw knowledge to the test for this project, mitering all the corners and beveling where I had to attach more wood. I wanted this room to be perfect for my sweet B and thought butt ends would look unfinished. This was my first time beveling/mitering with my miter saw and it was so much easier than my circular saw.

I decided to use 1 x 3 furring strips to save some money to get the batten look. I went to our local hardware store and picked out ones that had very little wood rot and weren't warped. I then measured the distance from the top of the cove molding to the horizontal 1 x 4 and cut the 1 x 3's to length; I needed about 15 total. I leveled and nailed all of them to the wall.

Then it was finishing time, caulk, wood filler and sanding. I used wood filler and sanded the furring strips to make them look more finished and then caulked everywhere wood met wall. I then primed the furring strips and prepped everything for paint. I used 2 coats of Revere Pewter by Benjamin Moore and I'm obsessed.

Once the wallpaper came in, I hung that. I used peel and stick wallpaper from Love vs. Design. That took about 8 hours to hang, I wanted everything to be perfect and straight (even though there's still a couple corners that I notice aren't perfect). Once the wallpaper was hung it was time to hang the curtains and do some touch up paint!

Overall, I am SO happy with how his room turned out. I could tell Briar noticed all the color once he walked in because he looked all over the room. I haven't done a full room makeover before and I could live in this room, I'm so proud of it. I hope Briar is too :).

Links for products I used (feel free to message me for more):

Puck Lights: https://amzn.to/3SElanz

Montessori Floor Bed: https://amzn.to/4bBwqd2

Cove Molding: https://www.lowes.com/pd/Royal-Building-Products-Craftsman-3-4-in-x-8-ft-Finished-Vinyl-Cove-Moulding/5003553673?store_code=2371&cm_mmc=shp-_-c-_-prd-_-mlw-_-ggl-_-LIA_MLW_122_Mouldings-Specialty-Millwork-_-5003553673-_-local-_-0-_-0&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiA_aGuBhACEiwAly57MZ-SaYR5cq4PRlN1T68fBg5NKLgByQgxMw38wpZPfXzC_wHOebMttRoCBK0QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Paintable Outlet covers (you need to get special covers because paint has metal in it and you know electricity): https://amzn.to/3SyQeoN

Cord Cover: https://www.homedepot.com/p/Legrand-Wiremold-CordMate-Cord-Cover-5-ft-Channel-Cord-Hider-for-Home-or-Office-Holds-1-Cable-White-C10/202059078?source=shoppingads&locale=en-US&pla&mtc=SHOPPING-BF-APT-GGL-Multi-Multi-NA-NA-NA-PLALIA--PRT-NA-NA-NBR-NA-PRO-NEW-All_Pros_PRT&cm_mmc=SHOPPING-BF-APT-GGL-Multi-Multi-NA-NA-NA-PLALIA--PRT-NA-NA-NBR-NA-PRO-NEW-All_Pros_PRT-71700000117260846-58700008663499885-92700079396289227&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiA_aGuBhACEiwAly57Md1CHjp37R9yOioPXfwgT02UnkZYnejvYpkHFgy2HCl7YW6dGMXIWRoCjq8QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds