The Before: Our Shared Guest Room-Turned-Nursery

With baby girl coming in December, it’s time to start making plans to shift our guest room around to accommodate a nursery!

As I mentioned in the Modern Cottage Nursery Inspiration post a few weeks ago, our third bedroom has acted as a guest bedroom since we bought our house. To keep this space flexible, we’re planning to keep that functionality while also having it serve the purpose of a nursery. We’ll also be reusing a lot of what we have, so I thought it would only be appropriate to take you on a little “before” tour of the guest room before we start making those changes!

This room has been a sort-of catchall for extra linens, furniture, and decor, so it has never really felt purposefully designed or finished. It was cute (enough) and comfortable bedroom for our guests though! I definitely wanted to capture it in photos before we start moving things around, so let’s go on a little tour, shall we?

A tour of our guest room ahead of it’s transition to accommodate a nursery

It’s a really nice size room and I’ve had it set up in a couple of different ways over the past few years. The current space plan has worked well as a true guest bedroom, but we’re about to try a third way! Can you guess where I’m planning to put the bed now so we can add a crib in here?

Spoiler alert - I’m sharing the draft floor plan at the end of the post if you’d like to see if you’re right. ;)

This bed has always been a little bit of a thorn in my side. I accidentally ordered an extra tall platform bed frame when we switch from a full to a queen bed in here, and while the storage underneath has been really nice to have, I never settled on a bed skirt to conceal it. Instead, I used a king size quilt I already had and its extra length has worked as a stop-gap to hide things like our luggage that we keep there. 🤫

The other downside of the extra tall bed frame is that our cute little antique, turned-wood headboard looks dwarfed against it! My plan is to figure out a way to attach it higher on the frame so that it’s a bit more visible and proportional once we shift the bed to its new spot.

We’ll also be keeping this vintage-style rug and pulling colors from it for the rest of the space. It’s such a pretty, affordable option if you like the look of antique or vintage rugs - just be sure to use a nice, thick rug pad underneath to add cushion. We have this felt one and it’s great for this type of thinner rug.

On the wall straight ahead, you’ll notice a set of three pieces of watercolor art that I love and will likely stay. These are actually postcards I framed! I picked them up on a trip to the French countryside when I was pregnant with our son and had planned to put them in his nursery somewhere, but they just weren’t quite right. I love the idea of having them in baby girl’s nursery and think they’ll work well with the design.

One piece that’s sadly going to go is the dresser. I inherited it from my grandparents so it definitely has sentimental value, but truth be told, it’s not in good shape and the drawers don’t function well. That’s fine for a guest room, but not so much in a nursery that needs good storage and will double as a changing table! I’m hopeful it’ll find a new home once we get the right dresser in here - maybe someone can breathe some new life into it.

Speaking of furniture that’s leaving…the cream chair and light wood bench will be relocated to other places to make room for our glider and ottoman in that corner. The cream chair will move to my office and I think the bench will go to the basement. Lots of shuffling will be happening in the next few months!

I hope this gives you some context for the future nursery + guest room! Now looking ahead…here’s a peek of the “working” floor plan I have in mind for this space:

The new floor plan for a shared guest room and nursery

Did you guess that we’d be moving the bed to be in front of the windows? Though it might seem like an unusual choice, I think it’s going to open up the room to balance both of its functions nicely! This gives us space to put the crib on the wall opposite the bed, tuck the glider into the corner, and place a new dresser along the wall with the entry door.

The only part I don’t love is that in order to center the bed on the off-center windows, it will sit fairly close to the closet doors, making them a little harder to access. Given that they’re bifold doors, I don’t think it’ll be a major problem. Everything else should work pretty nicely and offer good flow around the room!

Next up, I’ll be sharing the design plan. I’ve got a few more items to work through and finalize, then I’ll loop you in. Be sure to follow along on Instagram for little peeks and updates along the way!

*Note: this post contains affiliate links, which means Mix & Match Design Co. earns a small commission from your purchase at no cost to you.