If your parents say no, ask them why, rather than getting upset or angry. There are many reasons they might not want you to change your room, from money to concerns about what you want to do. This can make it easier to figure out how to compromise with them. Oftentimes, it’s easier to convince your parents to allow things like small and easily portable furniture, rather than large furniture or repainting the room. Small, portable furniture doesn’t require a lot of effort on behalf of your parents to get into the room and set up, and is usually less expensive.
While you’re welcome to think that anything is cute, “dark” themes (such as the color black or maroon, “scene” or “emo” styles, typically dark symbols such as a skull and crossbones, etc. ) are usually not considered cute. Cuteness is typically associated with innocence and cheerfulness, not a cynical or jaded outlook on life. Things like lighter shades of colors (such as blue, pink, yellow, or purple) or pastel colors, stuffed animals, fluffy things (like fluffy pillows, rugs, blankets, etc. ), fake flowers, and anything that’s often considered a toned-down version of “girly girl” themes are often considered cute.
Don’t go overboard - it’s one thing to have a few of your sports trophies up on a shelf and posters on the walls, but it’s another to have your room be completely dominated by sports to the point where there’s no variation at all. Mix it up a bit.
Budget your time, too - unless you’re on a school vacation, you’re most likely not going to be able to devote all of your waking hours to decorating your room (and neither can your parents or guardians). In addition, if you plan on decorating walls, keep in mind that it can take several hours for paint or wallpaper paste to dry, and even longer to get the smell of paint out of the room. Redecorating a room isn’t a task that can often be completed in under an hour.
DIYs can be expensive, depending on the materials you need, and are often time-consuming. In some cases, it may be better to buy something pre-made than to make it yourself, since some projects can become pricey and take a lot of time to complete.
If you can’t paint your walls a different color, change the bedspread to match it so it won’t look so bad. You could also consider placing decorations that cover a fair amount of the wall, such as a bulletin board or posters. Change up your existing furniture. Find stickers or paints and decorate your desk, throw a blanket over your desk chair, and decorate and hang up your old picture frames. If you’re the crafty type, you can find ways to repurpose what you already have with DIY, which can be quite cheap if you have all the supplies on hand.
Keep sales tax in mind - things often cost more than you think due to sales tax. Think about the necessity of something you want to buy. When you find yourself thinking that what you see is cute, think logistically about whether you have a need for it. If it’s a borderline case, such as buying a pillow when you’re going to make a pillow pile, take factors like price into account - you don’t need a 50-dollar pillow when there are far cheaper ones of the same quality right next to it. Try to aim for cheaper decorations rather than the more expensive ones. But be careful not to buy lower-quality decorations just because they’re cheaper - you don’t want to buy a beanbag chair and have it split open as soon as someone sits on it!
Oftentimes, things from generic stores can be just as good as brand-name products. There’s no need to go on a giant mall trip just to buy stuff for your room - unless you want to, of course.
Beanbag chairs or bungee chairs are easy to move and still look great. Pillows and fluffy blankets are fantastic for room decoration and can be quickly tossed aside or moved. Blankets can easily be folded up, too. A small table lamp is a good choice for your desk, and is movable. Lava lamps can also look quite cool when matched with the color theme of the room. Rugs are easy to move when rolled up, and are a nice way to put a touch of color on the floor of your room. Small bins are a cute choice for storage, and some can even be folded up. Canvas bins in particular can be sold in pretty patterns.
On a cheaper scale, you can also print some pictures or motivational quotes on paper and hang them on your wall.
While it’s not exactly storage, search for a small trash can. A trash bin can be stored somewhere like under a desk, which is convenient for rooms that aren’t the biggest in size, and can be found in many styles.
Take four bins or boxes and label them as Trash, Recycle, Donate, and Keep. Sort the things in your room into these bins. (Avoid just making piles and thinking that you’ll figure out which is which - aside from this just being harder to carry out of the room if you need to, it’s possible to forget which pile is what, or for the piles to mix together. ) Clean out objects and papers in your room first. These are often the easiest to find and decide what to do with. And chances are, you don’t need your year’s worth of assignments from sixth grade or your old collection of pizza tables, anyway. Go through your closet. Take out the clothes you don’t wear anymore or don’t fit you anymore and donate them, or throw them away if they’re in very poor condition. Be honest with yourself on if you ever wear it! Get all the places you usually don’t clean up, like under your bed or desk, in your drawers for storage, and so forth. If you can’t remember the last time you cleaned it out, it’s probably a good idea to go through it.
If you’re going to paint or put wallpaper on your walls, you’re going to have to remove the furniture from the room. It would be a good idea to do this now. Get an adult’s help to get heavier furniture out of the room.
It may take quite some time for paint to dry, as well as for the fumes to go away; be prepared to wait awhile before being able to proceed with decorating your room.
If you’re hanging curtains or heavy objects like a bulletin board, you may want to get an adult to help. When it comes to hanging any electronics on the wall, such as lights or a TV, you may want to get help to make sure you’re plugging in components right (and in the case of heavier things like a TV, ensure that it’s secure, so it won’t fall).
Place storage bins on or under your desk. This is often convenient for saving space.
