Jourdan Fairchild — Joining the One Room Challenge: Week 1!

We are just weeks away from finishing The Pivot House (if you’re new here, here’s a synopsis on the whole house we’ve been renovating). I’m THRILLED. I’ve been creatively ready to move for practically a year, and now I have the perfect excuse: The One Room Challenge! If you haven’t heard of it, the One Room Challenge is a twice-yearly design challenge hosted by Better Homes and Garden magazine. Anyone can participate and the goal is to makeover a space in your home within 8 weeks, sharing your progress in weekly installments. I’ve been a follower of the contest for years, and can’t wait to finally participate.

The Playroom

Our home is a 1946 brick colonial and half of our attic was finished out as a playroom decades ago. The footprint works and honestly can’t change much (which, thank GOD, means no electrical, plumbing, etc changes), but it totally lacks personality. Plain white walls, scratchy blue carpet. It does have a sweet window that overlooks the neighborhood and decently sized built-in bookshelves. You enter the room from our oldest daughter’s closet, which obviously makes her room the coolest in the house. So in order to tackle the playroom, it only feels natural to tack on Sloane’s closet too. I say this but with a huge caveat. If we don’t get to the closet during these 8 weeks, no biggie. As a recovering participant in hustle culture (and a recovering renovator of an entire house over the last 6 months), I’m relearning healthy boundaries. And so if we have time/energy to tackle the closet, we will. Here are a few photos of the playroom:

The Challenges

The ceiling is pitched, which means laying out the wallpaper so the pattern doesn’t look wonky will be crucial. Luckily we’ll be hiring a professional to to hang it (PRAISE).

Another challenge is the lack of air circulation in this space. There’s one vent hidden in the built-in, and we had an HVAC pro come out to assess it. He said there’s little we can do to circulate air better beyond putting in a mini split (he quoted us $5k). But maybe we could add a vent extender so it extends to the front of the built-ins? Idk how this will resolve itself. Might just have to add a cute wall fan somewhere and call it a day.

Given that the playroom is accessed through my daughter’s room, we won’t be able to work in the space at night (which is how we do much of what we do given my husband’s job). I can work during the school day, but then evenings we’ll need to build things in the basement and then drill/hammer/nail them in place on the weekends. It’ll have to be a creative set-up for sure.

The Playroom Design

Walls/ceiling: This room only has one small window and I want it to feel bright and happy. So I focused my wallpaper search on patterns with white/light backgrounds. I fell in love with this William Morris pattern and knew it’d look lovely with with some of our existing pieces (the girls’ kitchen, baskets we already own).

Carpet: If you don’t already know this truth, let me be the first to tell you: carpet is coming back y’all. Not in the same way, of course, but solid color carpet can legit look cool and be extremely comfy. And in this space where children are rolling around, it’s just necessary. My goal is to find a solid color blue-green carpet that’s kid/pet/eco-friendly and affordable to cover the playroom floor and run down the stairs too.

Built-ins: We’ll be keeping the built-ins and making them feel more custom with trim. And the end of the existing built-ins, we’ll be building out a custom costume closet, complete with pegs and other storage. Our plan is to cover the front doors with caning and put the doors on sliding tracks.

Lighting: Recessed lighting is so boring and often excessive, but it is helpful in here. To give it a little more visual interest, I’m interested in replacing the covers or painting them. I’m also planning install a plug-in wall sconce the reading zone for ambient light.

Flower box: Several months ago, I spotted a flower box on the wooden playhouse at our local children’s museum. That sparked the idea of building one in the girls’ playroom so they could arrange it with faux flowers (this is a game they regularly play anyway). Rather than buy a window box, I think it’d be fun to build one inspired by a sweet metal table I spotted at a flea market in Portugal. It features scallops and balls and I think we’ll put the scallops along the top of the flower box and add decorative balls along the four bottom corners.

Other decor: The rooms I love most never start totally from scratch. Instead they’re a reflection of lived experiences, of people or places or times in our life that matter to us. For example, I’m planning to incorporate a kid-size rocker I thrifted years ago that my oldest still loves rocking in. We’ll make space for our other favorite play items too: games, magna-tiles, Octonauts HQ (all of our toys aren’t wood, I promise!) and our Nugget.

Inspiration Photos

The Closet

The current wire shelves in the closet are literally falling off the walls and it’s becoming a problem keeping Sloane’s clothes organized and easy to access. She dresses herself and generally waits until 5 minutes before we need to walk out of the door, so we need to keep this space as organized as possible for quick dressing. Just like the playroom, the general layout can’t be changed much, which is working to our benefit. Here are some before photos:

The Closet Design

The plan is to use the Ikea Pax system (inspired by this one and this one) to add a dresser to the space, substantial shelves for shoes, two racks for hanging clothes, and new lighting and a sweet rug. As for the stairs in between the spaces? We’re planning to paint the trim golden yellow (pulled from the wallpaper) and cover both sides in a playful gallery wall of art either made by or for the girls.

The Very Long To-Do List (if we tackle both spaces)

Measure and order wallpaper
Hire wallpaper installer
Measure and order carpet
Design, measure and order Pax system
Order mirror, lighting
Remove existing trim
Pull up carpet to start building out closet
Spackle holes in shelves before painting
Install hinged cubbies?
Design/build flower box
Design/build closet
Replace recessed lighting
Hang art, mirror, light
Paint trim in hallway
Find frames/art for gallery wall
Hang gallery wall
Remove closet door?
Paint doors, trim, shelves, window frame
Install frame, drawers, shelves, poles, trim pieces
Paint touch-ups
Install light
Paint ceiling?

OK. Ready, set, here we goooo!! I’ll be sharing updates every Wednesday with y’all. Thanks for being here!!