Do you love to travel? Whether you love to see the world from your armchair or whether you are actually out there, blazing new trails, you can use your passion to create a unique and beautiful bedroom. There are several things you can do to bring a little global mystique home:
Maps and antique maps.
You can find these easily at any bookstore, used bookstore, or estate sale. Even antique maps are sometimes quite affordable and look great in frames. Best of all, they give you a few great decorating options:
- Cover an entire wall with maps of places you have been or places where you would like to travel
- Use inexpensive maps as wallpaper or to cover furniture (a dresser covered in maps and varnished looks amazing, especially if you distress the finished piece to make it look antique)
- Put a huge world map on your wall and use decorative pushpins to indicate where you have traveled
- Frame antique or vintage maps and put them all over your walls
- Place maps under glass on tabletops
Globes.
Huge or tiny, globes look great and they are very inexpensive. They look terrific clustered together or you can use one large globe on the floor for a more dramatic look. If you can get your hands on a bunch of inexpensive globes, they are also great for DIY décor projects. You can cut them in half to make cute bowls or cover them in paint to create customized art. To get some more ideas, check out this Babble post.
Souvenirs and treasures.
If you travel, what do you do with all the items you bring back with you? A great option is to display them. Group postcards and other treasures on walls, on a dresser, or on a side table. There’s no need to hide them away or let them gather dust.
Suitcases.
Most of us tuck suitcases away in closets or under the bed, but suitcases can be a great way to decorate and even add a little storage space to your bedroom. Look for vintage suitcases or suitcases you really like and stack them high, from largest to smallest. They look terrific and can store quite a bit. You can also create a stack of suitcases to serve as a nightstand by the bed.
Furniture with a global feel.
If you want to create an exotic look, check out bamboo furniture or wicker pieces. For a Far East look, add a few statues, a water fountain and plenty of throw pillows and rugs in jewel tones. Or, put a huge canopy bed in your room (or even a hammock) and top it all off with a huge mosquito net for a very Isak Dinesen Out of Africa Look. You can see more about how to pull the look off at this blog. If European is more your style, local antique stores will usually have some older European pieces that can help you recreate the look of that Spanish hotel where you stayed last year or the Italian café you visited. The main thing with furniture is to stick with one theme and one look rather than mixing and matching styles too much. To get some more ideas for your room, check out this blog and this post.
A well-traveled style looks amazing and is quite easy to incorporate in the bedroom. If you want to be dreaming of globetrotting adventures, a few tweaks can have you looking forward to your next vacation even more.
