Your dorm room shouldn’t just be your home away from home, it should be your real home. For the next four years, those four walls are going to be your support system. Throughout your college years, you’ll laugh with your friends, have midnight study sessions and maybe even a few overnight guests in your dorm room. Don’t create those memories in a dorm room that feels that a hospital room. By making these small changes you will be able to make your dorm room a home worth living your life in.
First off, crafting is an excellent stress reliever, so not only will this tip help you create a space that feels like home in your dorm room, but it can also help you deal with problems you might be having outside of the dorm room. Do it yourself crafts are super easy, lots of fun and even a monkey could make them look great. By creating decorations for your dorm room with your own hands you will feel a sense of ownership to those belongings and the dorm room space itself. Go onto Pinterest and find some cute and trendy crafts to try and re-create in your dorm room. It’ll be a fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon crafting in your dorm room and a great way to add a touch of yourself to the room.
Anyone frat boy can hang a Pulp fiction poster in their bedroom and call it day, shout out to what my boyfriend’s room used to look like, but a home doesn’t have sticky tack on the walls. Invest in your new home and yourself by buying some frames and hanging your photos. This is a great way to add a bit of an adult touch to your dorm room and keep things nice and organized. You don’t just have to frame photos either, you can start buying art now and framing those prints. By taking time to actually hang framed photos you are giving your dorm room a permanent feeling, no one creates holes in the walls unless they are planning on sticking around for a while.
They say you can’t have the responsibility of taking care of a pet until you can take care of a plant. This expression is so true it hurts. Plants are a big responsibility, you really can’t go one day without watering them or they will shrivel up and make your entire dorm room smell bad…Just trust me on that one. Create a home within your dorm room by giving it life, plants inside of a dorm room show that you’re around enough to take care of them. Having multiple healthy and living plants in your space will give you something to take care of and they look so pretty because of how colorful they are. If you’re really nervous about taking care of plants, then get one at a time and try getting only succulents, it is pretty much impossible to kill those things.
Your dorm room is likely to already come with some standard furniture. A bed, some bathroom supplies, and a kitchenette. That’s great, use those things, just because they aren’t the fanciest doesn’t mean you should just throw them out. Listen, you’re probably a little broke right now, so shop the sales and take whatever charity people will give you, you’re not better than a free mattress. However, because you’ll be saving some money by using the furniture that comes with your dorm room you can now invest in some additional furniture to make it feel more like home. Mirrors, desks, closet racks and chairs are the perfect way to make your space more of your own and if you buy furniture you really like then you will take care of it and can take it with you when you move in four years.
Yes, you shouldn’t buy a new whole new bed because that’s a waste of money and doesn’t really matter right now, but you should buy new sheets. Your superhero sheets are super cute but they scream little kids room. If you want to embrace your new space as your new home then you should invest in some grown-up bedding. Treat yourself to a new comforter and sheet set for the start of the school year and feel like the badass grown-up I already know you are.
So now that you have bought yourself the essentials, furniture, food, bedding, and toiletries, it is now time to have some fun with your dorm room decor. That’s right it is time to decorate your dorm room like it is a birthday party you’re going to be having all year round. Pick a theme or an aesthetic and run with it! Flamingo sculptures, lampshades, pineapple coasters, and more fun things can be found at your local target and can totally transform your dorm room for very little money.
Home’s are for free expression, not first impressions. Although that may be true it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t keep your home clean and organized. Your life is about to be very stressful and the last thing you’re going want to deal with is cleaning up after yourself. To prevent this from happening de-clutter your space so that there is less to clean up every day. Get rid of everything that doesn’t bring you joy and doesn’t have a purpose. By having a clean dorm room you will have a clear mind and a peaceful place to call home.
Once you have de-cluttered your home, you should now organize your dorm room. Everything should have a place, this is another great way to stay stress-free during exams. Take some time when you first move in to make sure that everything has a place where it belongs and that you feel organized and ready to accomplish any goal you set your mind to this year.
You will not have a lot of space in your dorm room, mostly because you’ll be sharing it with at least one other person. However, you need to try to find enough room in your dorm that is strictly dedicated to studying and doing school work, an office space. This way you can separate everything else from that, you don’t want to sleep where you work it’ll create a stressful environment that will not feel like home.
Small details can make your dorm room feel like home, so take some chances and try things out. Hang curtains, buy towels and a bath matt (even if you have to use a co-ed shower) and start adding touches that your mom has in her house to make your dorm room feel more like home.
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