Make a Plan for Your Project
Ready to give a room a total makeover? Start with a plan! It’ll help you make good decisions, feel confident in your purchases, and keep you on track as you pull it all together. There are a lot of moving parts when it comes to decorating a home, but I’m going to guide you through putting together a step-by-step action plan so you can truly create the space you’ve been imagining.
The process you’ll see here is similar to the process I use with my e-design clients and is based on decorating a full room from scratch, but you can definitely apply the framework to any size project.
This lesson is all about the BIG PICTURE. As you go through it, you’ll find links to other lessons resources in Design School 101 and that’ll help you get all the details worked out. I’d suggest reading through this framework in its entirety first and then following the links to the more detailed lessons and tutorials after that.
1. Fill out a project planning worksheet.
Download a copy of my general project planning worksheet. It’ll help you collect your thoughts, think through your priorities for the space, determine a budget, and more. I modeled this after the questionnaire that goes out to all of my e-design clients!
2. Pull together the inspiration for the room.
I love using Pinterest for this. It’s so easy to put together a collection of images that have the look and feel of what you’d like your room to look like. Since it’s digital, you’ll be able to reference it anywhere you go and add to it when you find something new you love.
Another place I like to collect inspiration from is Instagram. It’s not really searchable like Pinterest is, but when you see an image you love, you can save it for later (create a folder specific for home inspo to make it easy to reference in the future!).
3. Measure and create a space plan.
Floor planning is SO important here. Making sure the furniture fits and is properly scaled is a key to designing well. To start, draw out a simple floor plan by hand with all the important measurements like wall lengths, ceiling heights, window dimensions, and doorway widths. Then, you can enter that information into a digital floor planning software to start playing around with furniture arrangements. Here in Design School 101, I’ve got a full tutorial for Homestyler - my favorite cloud-based, free floor planning software that’s easy to learn. Click the button below to head to that when you’re ready.
Going through this exercise will help you know what you should look for in terms of size and scale as you shop. If you find you want to experience the floor plan in a more tactile way before you commit to your purchases, “draw” it out to scale in your room using painter’s tape. Marking out the main pieces out like this will help you get a grasp on how the room will feel once it’s furnished.
4. Start sourcing!
Now we’ll get into the fun part - shopping for the perfect pieces for your space.
As you find items you like, keep track of them in this Budget and Item Tracker spreadsheet I talk about in this lesson. List out all of the items you want for the space first, then as you find the specific pieces, add in their prices and links to the source. There’s also a column for additional notes - this is where you can add details like the size, finish, etc. Using a spreadsheet keeps you organized and on budget as you shop. Trust me - the last thing you want to do is lose track of where you found that perfect piece or be surprised that you’re over budget!
P.S. Here’s a list of some of my go-to retailers to get you started:
5. Create a design board to see how it’s all coming together.
Creating a design board (also known as a mood board) goes hand-in-hand with adding pieces to the Budget and Item Tracker spreadsheet. The design board gives you the ability to see how everything is coming together before making any purchases. When you find a piece that works, add it to your spreadsheet! It’s all a process - you’ll probably find yourself adding and subtracting pieces as you “build” your room in this digital format. Have fun with it and enjoy the design phase!
There are a TON of ways you can create digital design boards, but an easy and free option is to use Google Slides or Keynote (Mac)/PowerPoint (PC) if you have one of those on your computer. Want to try making one using Google Slides? Follow along with the video tutorial in this lesson:
Once you’re totally in love with the look and feel of the space you’ve created and double checked to make sure those pieces work with the floor plan you mapped out earlier, then you can move onto step 6!
6. Make your purchases.
Use the links in your Budget and Item Tracker spreadsheet to head to the websites and hit “buy” (or go in-store if applicable). If you’re making a lot of purchases at once, I’d suggest filling in the purchase date and expected arrival date columns so that you can keep track of your items as they’re shipped to your home.
7. Set up the space and bask in its beauty!
The most rewarding part of this whole process? Seeing the room you designed come to life! As you receive your pieces of furniture and decor, be sure to take a look at my handy installation guide to help you get everything set up perfectly.
