 One of my most requested video topics whenever I post a room makeover or a Transformation or just any form of design where there's a before and after element is how it kind of came to be I get so many comments being like Wow, I love how you painted that window trim black, but that's just too daring for me I'm too scared or wow I love how you added that bed But I would have never done that color because I'm just kind of out of my comfort zone and today I thought I would sit down and share with you guys my top tips for anyone that wants to do a room makeover It does not have to be hard you guys There are truly so many tips that I have learned myself over the years And I know when I first started kind of making over my spaces because as many of you guys know I am not a trained interior designer I am not someone who went to school for this. I never really had practice I actually worked at West Elm for about a year and I feel like that's where I got a lot of my kind of background I guess in interior decorating. I'm also extremely excited because today's video was made possible by Adobe Photoshop Express They are sponsoring today's video, which is honestly a dream because I've been using Photoshop since high school I use Photoshop every single day in my business So the first thing I want to touch on because this is kind of like the basis of why this room is going to be made over is Basically, why are you making over the space? Is there something that you saw that you liked? Was there an inspiration video that you saw? Maybe you watched one of my videos or maybe you watched one of McKinnon's videos or maybe you watched an Alexandra Gator video Or whatever it is What was your primary source of inspiration for this room design? Did you see a new dresser that you loved? Did you see a new bed you thought would look nice in your space? Did you want to change up the paint color? This is truly kind of your starting off point because you want to determine what things you want to change And what things you want to add to your space for example in my past bedroom I had like a peachy pink wall and I loved this. I thought it was so fun I got inspired by this primary inspiration photo as you guys probably saw in that video if you did watch it And this is what really sparked my creativity and design kind of direction for this space and so I went off this photo And I was able to create a room that I really loved but then about a year later The color green really started trending and interior design and I really wanted to add that green pop to my room I wanted to also feel a little bit more masculine because the peachy pink was kind of on the feminine side I loved it during the time I had it But I wanted to give it a little bit of a refresh and make it a bit more dark and moody And that's exactly what I did I actually opted for a green color for the wall and then from that green color I was able to basically redesign the rest of my space coordinating back to that green color And that was my primary source of inspiration being able to jot down a couple of notes as to what prompted you to kind of Want to do a room makeover is a great starting off point because those are key things that you need to change in your space From there we're going to move into step number two, which should help you out a little bit more Mapping out the features of a room will make your room design flow so much easier you guys I just want to make it as simple as I can for you So mapping out your room features is 100 percent something that everybody should do I actually do this for every single room design you guys see on my channel Even if I don't feature it within the video because a lot of times I don't just because it's more of a behind the scene Sort of a situation what I mean by mapping out your room design is actually going in And drawing out a layout of your room all of the walls all four of them all seven of them However, many you have in your space you're going to want to draw those out You're also going to want to make sure to draw any doorways or any windows And these can be indicated with little like boxes or little swinging open door sections This does not have to be anything crazy you guys But this is such a great visual indication of where you have space for furniture in your room and where you have space for decor And basically the overall size and you could bring this with you when you are shopping Whatever it might be this room layout truly should be the first start to your makeover Because it's just going to give you kind of a kicking off point and a roadmap for your design A room's features also give you a humongous humongous guideline as to where furniture should go For example, if there is a fireplace in your living room traditionally your furniture is supposed to be oriented towards the fireplace Now in my living room, I didn't do that because I broke the rules a little bit But that kind of gives you an idea But most times when you are starting out in room design or you want to transform a space Going with the room's features and using those as your kicking off point is a great way to decipher where pieces should be oriented I might get a lot of questions about room layouts or where I should put my sofa or where my tv should go Or where my bed should be oriented and just use your room's features to kind of guide you in a direction that just seems right Moving on to tip number three, this is all about creating a visual mood board for you to base your design off of I do this for absolutely every single room that you guys have ever seen me design on my channel Again, if I do not share it in the video, it has been done on the back end. I personally love creating mood boards I am a visual learner myself So being able to visualize what a color palette can look like or what decor elements I want to feature or what like accent color I want to add into the space and where I can add it elsewhere So I'm going to share with you guys how to easily use the adobe photoshop express app Which can be found on your phone I will link it below for you guys if you want to download it And this right here is what the app should look like once it is downloaded You're going to want to also gather all of your inspo photos So whether they be photos of completed rooms from Pinterest or pieces from online that you have found like lamps Rugs whatever it is gather your inspo photos and once you click into the app There are three main sections at the top you have edit collage and mix the two that I mainly use are collage and mix But if you do tap the edit feature, you can actually edit photos really nicely They have so many different features you can fine-tune edit. They have filters that are absolutely incredible But personally for the mood boards. I love using the collage and mix feature So if you tap the collage feature you can just select a whole bunch of images And it will actually kind of predetermine a collage for you and you could switch up the layout And you could switch the photo orientation and kind of mix it up a little bit This is totally for a simple quick mood board, but I personally love using the mix feature to customize my mood board So I start off with one photo. I go to the bottom I'm going to click aspect ratio Then I'm going to click print and I'm going to select the a5 option This will just make a large canvas for us to work on our mood board for You're also going to want to go ahead and change the background to white So tap background and click the white icon And then you're going to go on the right side to the layers and drag and drop that background Underneath your bed or whatever photo you have there and you can adjust any photo on top and add multiple layers as you'd like So I'm starting off with a couple of inspo pictures here Then I'm going in with a particular night stand, but as you could see the background is white I'm going to go to the bottom click cut out Let that load for a couple of seconds and once it has loaded select auto on the screen And it will actually cut out the entire white background and allow you to have a nice kind of cut out sticker shape That you can place wherever you want on your mood board And so from here what you're going to want to do is just add all of the images that you personally like I loved this rug here. So I added that to my mood board After five images make sure to save it and then re-import it so you can add more images So I saved it re-imported it. I'm adding this photo of a pillow here I cut it out as well using the cut out feature And if you have a photo with a very busy background, you can also manually cut out items as well Which I love so I just used my finger to trace around this item You can clean it up with the eraser tool if need be but I cut this one out manually And I was able to place it in my mood board once I finished it my mood board looked like this Which is a great starting off point to any makeover I love how simple and easy this is but I also thought I would share with you guys How you could take a photo of a blank space in your room Use the mix feature on the photoshop express app and I can literally drop in a nightstand that I might want to use My space so I found this one online Dropped it in cut it out placed it in my space and I'm actually able to get a visual Of what this nightstand might look like of course It's not going to be a hundred percent spot on but I added this lamp and nightstand And I kind of have an idea of what the space might look like and that's just a couple of ways I like to edit my photos and create mood boards on the go with the photoshop express app You could download it using the link in the description box below So if you're going to go ahead and paint your space whether it be all of the walls one of the walls Whatever it might be I suggest going out and getting the colors that you personally like getting a couple shades of each In swatch form which you can most likely do at a Lowe's or a home depot Whatever it might be coming back home and actually swatching these on large pieces of paper That way you can use them around your room Tape them up on the wall after they have dried and let them sit and resonate with you for about 48 hours or so I think that this really gives you the time that you need to see it throughout the day And as the color shifts with the lighting because that is a humongous factor Maybe at nighttime it's more warm tone in the morning time it might be more cool tone So select the color that you like the most over a couple of days And that's your new color for your space Like for example when I painted my little office nook that dark blue color during the daylight I quite liked it, but at nighttime it was so so so dark and just dreary in there I knew I needed to change it and that's exactly what I did the next day. I ended up painting it a lighter color So now we are going to talk about budget which a lot of you guys are like Why didn't you talk about this first drew and I have a reasoning behind this? I think that seeing a budget or seeing how much you spend on a space really stumps creativity because a lot of times For a lot of us um budget is not huge You know, we have a small budget to work on different projects or different spaces throughout our homes And a lot of times you can be like wow all I can afford is one accent chair But I personally think that you should map out and brainstorm your dream space and work towards that or Tailor that to what you have budget wise so that makes sense So let's just say for example in your bedroom you have a bed and a dresser and you really like them You don't mind them at all and you have $2,000 to spend on your room makeover Which can be a lot for some people or it could be a little for some people and you realize to yourself You know, I need to spend money on a rug. I cannot make my own rug. So I'm going to go ahead and spend money on a rug I really like my dresser, but there's another dresser. I love, you know that maybe lienne ford came out with that cretin barrel And I love this dresser so much. It has these really cool knobs on it Well that dresser is $2,500 it's out of budget I can't purchase that but I can achieve a similar look if I purchase similar knobs So I'm going to allocate a hundred dollars in my budget towards dressing up my current dresser DIYing it a little bit and making it look similar to that lienne ford dresser without having to spend $2,500 on it and this is what I always always do I love being able to utilize my diy brain or like my creative brain I guess you could say and work towards larger goals with a smaller budget Tip number six is all about not rushing the process This is something that is fun a room makeover is really really fun and you do not need to rush it That is something I had to tell myself for a long time And it's something that really honestly made my rooms not end up how I wanted them to look I would rush the process just so I can upload a video on my channel or I was able to finish a project Whatever it might be let it things sit if you don't like a dresser that you bought it is totally fine to return it You guys do not ever think that you cannot do that either just go ahead and let it sit with you You know add a couple of decor pieces to it and always consider that decor elements change everything So there's been so many times I've done a makeover where I put a dresser here And a chair over there and I don't like the way that they look together But when I added a throw pillow to the chair And I added a piece of wall art that tied in colors from the chair and a couple of bases that also coordinated back to it It meshed very very well So you have to also keep in mind that decor elements can tie everything together and they're the finishing pieces to any room design Trusting your instinct is a humongous part about design and honestly interior design in specific is all about trial and error It is all about adding and taking away Let's just say for example, you know an interior designer that you love on instagram just posted a photo and they have a living room space There's a dark navy wall on it You think it is so beautiful and you want to put that dark navy wall in your living room as well But something that you might not realize is that their living room could have 87 windows in it Whereas yours has one and yours is already a little bit dark So something that you should opt for in your own space is more light and airy colors as opposed to a dark color um And a lot of people will just draw that inspiration right from that picture that they like and plop it there And then they're not going to end up liking it because they don't have the same exact kind of bones and structure That this uh inspiration photo started off as and a lot of times you guys as well You have to realize that photos are really really enhanced. You can actually enhance or change any color in a photo I've changed colors and pictures before to make them look a little bit better But most times you guys can see the real true tones here on my youtube videos because I actually cannot really change the colors On videos at all But in photos a lot of times inspiration pictures are altered a little bit and they do not look exactly like that in person And next time you're doing a space just really really trust your instinct if you are thinking to yourself You know this color might be too dark. I just applied a little bit of it I'm not a fan of it Sit with it for a little bit and change it if you need to never feel like something has to be stuck in Placed as is everything can always be changed and it's all again about trial and error And that's how the design process works and you're just going to build your own design brain off that Let's go ahead and talk about lighting now because lighting is a huge Mungus feature in any space. Um having a poorly lit space can honestly make a really well designed area Look bad if it's poorly lit. So I personally think kind of determining how much natural light do you get in my bedroom? For example, I get a ton of natural light and this is something that I kept in mind when I was renting apartments I knew that I needed a lot of natural light because I film youtube videos all the time And I do makeovers and I filmed diy projects So that's something that I kept into consideration when renting an apartment But a way that you can combat this is add lighting to a space So let's say in your bedroom you have one window and right around 3 p.m It starts getting really dark and kind of dreary in there Go ahead and make sure that you have a nice light source in there Whether it be a floor lamp a couple of table lamps A new chandelier a new pendant light and also make sure that the bulbs in there are also kind of like that daylight color Because all around I think a warm white or a daylight bulb just really enhances any space Always consider lighting as a very very key aspect to any room makeover And making sure that you're supplying enough light so that the room looks great throughout every moment of the day And last but not least you're gonna want to put everything together and start the process I cannot tell you guys this enough just start it start it Whether it be small whether it be large going in with painting a wall That's a larger commitment But then also going in and just painting a swatch and putting it up you are starting the process you guys There are so many people on my channel, um, which I love I love talking to you guys so much But there are so many people that will comment and be like, you know, I bought the paint But I just don't want to put it up. I don't know how to do it. I don't know where to start Just start the process. I swear to you once you start the process you are gonna feel so much more inspired I'm once you see that color on the wall and you like it too. You're like, wow I'm gonna start the next thing I wanted to do. I want to make the bed next I want to get a new rug that coordinates back to my new wall color I want to go out to home goods and buy a couple of decor pieces that correlate back to my wall color And I'm gonna bring my swatch with me So I know that they're gonna look nice just start the process and I swear to you You're gonna get going and you're gonna love it that finishes off today's video I hope that you enjoyed this one and I hope that it gives you just a little bit of a confidence boost to tackle your next room makeover I really want everyone to feel empowered and being able to do what they want with their spaces Whether it be rented or your home, um, you can really do a lot And if you guys have any tips of your own, please leave them in the comment section below We can really learn from each other. Honestly, there are so many times I have learned so much in the comment section of my videos like you guys are truly so talented and so smart So please leave any other design elements in the comment section below and we can have a little discussion down there Do not forget to also download the adobe photoshop express app I want to thank them so much for partnering with me on today's video They are truly your all-in-one photo editing solution and on top of that they really inspire creativity So I highly suggest downloading that app. It truly is amazing and I use it all the time So I think you guys need it as well