Forget the stresses and strains of modern life and escape to a pretty vintage bedroom with tons of retro appeal. Feminine and completely charming, a vintage bedroom is also easy and surprisingly inexpensive to create.
Our decorating tips will make light work of recreating a traditional vintage bedroom through classic colour schemes, delicate accessories and homemade extras that will give your bedroom a personal and unique touch.
Vintage style isn’t about having the latest trend or must-have technology, so why not consider making some of your accessories and soft furnishings yourself? This can also be a fun way to decorate a room, with greater satisfaction at the end. Start by making a lace blind. Hanging a single lace panel over your window is such a simple but effective way of achieving that sort-after vintage look.
Once you are feeling more confident in your creative skills, you can try something a bit trickier, such as stenciling a wall panel behind a dressing table or chest of drawers. This is a great way of creating a focal point in the bedroom and will double as a great place to hang jewellery and trinkets. You could even try making a decorative headboard out of card – so much more affordable than the real thing and just as pretty!
Don’t forget bedroom lighting – it can be a key ingredient in creating a cosy atmosphere in the bedroom and should be one of the first things you plan into your scheme.
Finish off your vintage haven with some classic French-style furniture, which you can paint white to match the rest of your room. Don’t forget to consider traditional extras such as painted floorboards, worn rugs and dainty soft furnishings.
After more bedroom designs? Take a look at these beach themed bedrooms and small bedroom ideas for inspiration.
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Use vintage textures and patterns
Creating a vintage look in your bedroom doesn't have to cost the earth. Soft colours, delicate patterns and textured fabrics bring instant vintage style to a bedroom.
Hang your favourite pictures in vintage style frames from Next or add a vintage clock from Not on the High Street.
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Create a cosy bedroom in caramel and vanilla
Make your bedroom a relaxing retreat with a warming colour scheme of caramel and vanilla to cosy up the mood. Make space for display with a shelving area around the bed to show off favourite finds and treasured trinkets. Then layer up the bed with lots of cosy woollens, knits and furs.
Cole & Son Cow Parsley wallpaper
Wallpaper Direct
Riley bed
Feather & Black
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Create a classic blue and white bedroom
Bring some vintage country style to your bedroom with the simplest of schemes in soft blue and white. A floral wallpaper makes a subtle backdrop for lots of mismatched vintage furniture, rustic-style accessories and weathered floorboards.
Sandberg Irma wallpaper
Wallpaper Direct
Coco bed
Loaf
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Create a French country-style bedroom
Turn your bedroom into a boudoir with a French-inspired scheme. A dramatic wrought-iron canopy bed sets the mood, outlined against the grey geometric wallpaper. Add visual interest with a painted console to bring in a splash of colour and pattern, teamed with co-ordinating bedlinen. An oversized wall clock adds a quirky finishing touch.
Sandberg Elton wallpaper
Wallpaper Direct
Canopy bed
Anthropologie
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Make your own headboard
Don't go with convention when it comes to your headboard - instead, create the illusion of one using card.
To do so, take a length of card and fold it in half to make it double thickness. Sketch half the headboard shape ? from edge to centre ? so that the middle point is at the fold. Cut it out and unfold to reveal a whole, symmetrical headboard shape. Use this as a template to cut a shape out of a length of wallpaper. Coat the back of the paper shape with spray adhesive and smooth onto the wall behind the bed.
If you want to splash out on some new vintage-style bedding, Debenhams has lots of pretty styles.
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Create a grown-up vintage bedroom
Go for a modern, French-country scheme with a daffodil-yellow floral wallpaper teamed with elegant furniture painted in soft grey. Tone the look down with a neutral carpet on the floor and add clear glass and metallic details around the room to keep the scheme easy on the eye.
Vintage Fleurette wallpaper
B&Q
Upholstered headboard
The Dormy House
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Create a cottage bedroom
Dress the shallow windows of a country bedroom with short floral-stripe curtains, making up a bedcover and cushions to match. Walls in pretty pastel pink contrast with the iron bed.
Similar fabric
Cath Kidston
Similar paint colour
Earthborn
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Create a farmhouse-style bedroom
Choose an antique-style bronze-finish bed and dress for a French farmhouse feel with a fitted ticking sheet and striped pillowcases and throws, in a palette of calming neutral shades.
Similar bed
Feather & Black
Similar bedlinen
Loaf
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Add ornate storage
Make a decorative French-style console table the star of a vintage bedroom with a lick of paint. Look for an old mahogany one in junk shops, then paint it white or pale grey and change the handles for a feminine touch. Add glamour with mirrored storage boxes like these ones from Laura Ashley, or try John Lewis for picture frames with a floral or decorative motif.
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Create a classic country bedroom
Update a classic country bedroom with a vintage twist. The traditional white metal bed is the focal point of the scheme, dressed with a colourful patchwork quilt and layered with cushions in a mix of retro vintage fabrics. The quirky budgie wallpaper adds a touch of fun, with painted furniture in shades of yellow and blue taken from the colourful pattern.
Chirpy Wallpaper
Blendworth
Oliver Bed
Feather & Black
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Create a blue bedroom with a modern vintage twist
Combine a painterly floral backdrop with zesty accents for a modern twist on vintage style. Use a large-scale floral wallpaper as your starting point, layered up with plain cushions and throws in the same colour palette. White bedlinen and furniture will tie the scheme together, and a couple of pops of zesty lime will add a contemporary feel.
Arabella wallpaper
Feature Wallpaper
Camden bed
Sofas & Stuff
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Paint your floorboards
Paint floorboards white for a quick, inexpensive start to a shabby chic decorating scheme. Don't worry about scuffs, as this will only add to the worn, vintage feel. Complete the look with a faded rug in a traditional pattern and soft, neutral tone. Laura Ashley's Malmaison rug would work perfectly or Wayfair has a range of traditional rugs that won't blow the budget.
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Create a bedroom in country creams and faded florals
Create an ultra-feminine look in your bedroom with classic country creams and faded roses. Keep the colour palette simple with parchment-coloured walls and cream-painted furniture. Dress the bed with a mix of washed linens, lace-trimmed pillows and crochet-edged cushions.
Florence bed
Dunelm
Similar floral cushions
Laura Ashley
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Create a vintage glam bedroom
Go for a touch of vintage glam, with a bedroom in a shimmering metallic colour palette. Start with a feature wallpaper as your focal point, then focus attention on the bed, adding different textures in pale gold and cream, with a crochet-effect bedspread, satin-sheen linens and lacy or leaf-print cushions.
January Magpie mural
Surface View
Broughton Ivory bed
Laura Ashley
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Create a luxury vintage boudoir
Make your bedroom a restful retreat with this soothing soft blue colour scheme. The pretty Chinoiserie-style wallpaper is the starting point, teamed with a luxurious wingback bed in a plush teal blue velvet. Accessorise with bedlinen in co-ordinating shades of blue, teamed with matching teal blue painted chests on either side of the bed.
Similar wallpaper
Wallpaper Direct
Angelica bed
Sofa.com
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Create a Boho bedroom
Create a colourful girl's room that's full of character with a bright mix of chintzy florals. Team a classic floral wallpaper with simple white-painted furniture. Then have some fun by adding a mix of colourful accessories, from ditsy prints, stripes and folksy patterns to bright primary plains.
Antique Rose wallpaper
Cath Kidston
Devon bed
Laura Ashley
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Create a dotty bedroom
We love the look of polka dots. Bring this fun 1950s pattern up to date with primary reds and mid-tone blues against a clean backdrop of white. Vintage-style trunks make a great bedside table.
Similar bedlinen
Marquis & Dawe
Similar trunks
Toast
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Stencil a wall panel
Use a wall stencil to create a focal point in your bedroom where jewellery can be hung. Pretty white, gold and brass hooks, all with a common floral theme but in different styles, will add an antique feel. Graham and Green has a good selection of hooks, as does Not on the High Street.
When painting onto the wall, roll lightly and unevenly to create a faded vintage effect.
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Create a bedroom with floral wallpaper
Add beautiful blooms in vintage style to a bedroom wall then dress the bed in delicate tones of lavender and sharpen it all up with green painted furniture and a throw.
Similar wallpaper
BorasTapeter
Similar bedlinen
The Linen Works
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Go for a bright headboard
Revamp an old headboard with a rose-swag decorative moulding, then paint it in a cheerful turquoise shade. Add retro-style bedlinen for a feminine feel.
Similar mouldings
Chic Mouldings
Similar turquoise paint
Dulux
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Create flowery furniture
Put your own stamp on a country bedroom by decorating a classic white chest with stencils of cottage-garden favourites. Top the chest of drawers with a pot of fresh flowers and you have the perfect focal point for a room.
Similar chest of drawers
Scumble Goosie
Similar stencil
The Stencil Library
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Introduce a sleigh bed
Evoke the craftsmanship of the past with a polished sleigh bed in rich-toned cherry wood. Complement understated natural flooring with an antique rug and kilim cushions for a touch of Eastern colour and pattern.
Similar bed
Browns of Henley
Similar flooring
Crucial Trading
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Create a pastel bedroom
Soothing pastel shades are ideal for a vintage-style bedroom. Paint the bed in a soft blue/grey tone, and dress with a pristine white bedcover, adding pink cushions as an accent.
Similar paint colour
Laura Ashley
Similar bedcover
Cologne & Cotton
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Add a bed canopy
Draping a white four-poster bed with a fresh spring fabric is an effective way to bring pattern to a country bedroom. Dress the bed with broderie anglaise sheets and scatter cushions in favourite fabrics.
Similar bed
Homes in Heaven
Similar canopy fabric
Clarke & Clarke
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Hang a lace curtain
Hang a single lace panel at the window to diffuse light and provide privacy. Try Country Curtains for some ideas.
The delicate nature of the material will reflect the look of the rest of the room, particularly if you source the fabric from a vintage market or charity shop. For black-out, fit a plain white or neutral roller blind behind it.
