I turned my boring bedroom into a princess haven by upcycling bargains from Gumtree and eBay
A SAVVY mum completely transformed her daughter's drab bedroom into a palatial pad fit for a princess, by upcycling second-hand bargains from eBay and Gumtree.
Sharnene Jewell, 45, a housekeeper and Cardiff mum-of-four, wanted to give her daughter Amaya the Disney princess bedroom of her dreams.
The doting parent shared her DIY transformations on , where she explained that she upcycled the secondhand furniture by applying paint to get it a stone effect.
She also used accessories from Facebook Marketplace, boot sales, Next and Matalan.
Speaking to money-saving Facebook group , Sharnene said: "Amaya originally had the smallest bedroom in the house, but when her middle sister flew the nest Amaya was able to upgrade to the larger bedroom.
"Amaya loves dressing up as a princess, so we were thrilled to find a real Disney princess bed for sale secondhand for £100 on Gumtree.
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"I thought it would be a nice idea to base the room around the bed and Disney princesses normally live in castles, so it just made sense to do a castle theme.
"I started by doing the bed. It was white originally, but I thought it would be amazing if it looked like it was made from stone, so that’s where I started.
"I did the bed and bedside unit first. To create the effect was super easy, I just bought Rustoleum graphite paint to do all the corners and crevices and then went over the whole bed with Farrow & Ball Worsted.
"I applied both paints with a brush and wiped away excess with a cloth.
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"Then I did the wardrobe. I bought the wardrobe for just £10 on eBay, which was amazing and I’m so happy I found it.
"I decided to do a stone effect again, but this time I wanted texture. I crumpled up tissue and stuck it on with PVA glue and then painted it.
"I started with the graphite grey again, then I applied white just to the high points with a foam roller, leaving the low areas dark and finally I went over all of it randomly with watered down Worsted.
"Then for the walls, it was basically the same, but the walls were cream to start with and I left that colour on the edges of the room to add even more of a shadow effect.
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"I wanted the wardrobe door to have an iron effect, so I used the original light background as a base and added black and light brown randomly applied with a sponge.
"I liked the effect so much I ended up doing the handles on the wardrobe, bed drawer and bedside table drawer, the curtain pole, radiator, unicorn head, mirror and mouse door.
"The tree painting was mostly created with poster paints. I did the trunk of the tree with a paint brush and the leaves with a bath puff and sponge cut into the shape of a leaf.
"I decided to add lights to the tree, but didn’t want them too bright, so I bought solar lights from Wilko and the solar panel is hanging outside the top corner of the window, which means they come on by themselves as soon as it gets dark and they are nice and safe.
"I stuck them up with command strips.
"I kept the white curtains my other daughter had in the room which went perfectly with Amaya’s own bedding.
“The only things I bought were the faux fur throw, matching cushion and beanbag from Next and the hanging plant from Matalan. I also bought a light fitting for £3 from a boot sale, the mirror for £2 from a boot sale, the flooring from Gumtree for £35 and the rug for £10 from Facebook Marketplace.
"I enjoyed the whole process!
“The walls were by far the hardest part, my arms did ache a bit, but it was so worth it.
"I did think once or twice perhaps I was going a bit far with the theme, I had to keep telling myself to trust the process and I’m so pleased I did, because Amaya’s little face was worth all the effort!
“It cost me about £450 altogether. The most expensive things really were the £50 throw, £99 beanbag and £24 cushion from Next, but I went all out for them because I just knew they would finish the room off perfectly.
"I love the challenge of working on a budget and the satisfaction is far greater when you’ve had to work to fit it all together and get the room to look like it was always meant to match!”
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Tom Church, co-founder of , comments: “I can only imagine how excited Amaya must have felt when she saw this room for the first time!
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“This looks like it’s been taken straight from a Disney set - and done on a budget too? Even better!
“Sharnene has really cleverly shown that by using your imagination, you can repurpose secondhand buys to do incredible things without breaking the bank."
