TREAT YOUR CHILD VERY SERIOUSLY

Children are wise, creative, and their imaginations exceed ours by a hundred times. Picasso once said, “All children are born artists. The trick is to remain an artist for the rest of your life.” Therefore, it is worth designing a children’s room taking into account the needs of the child, and I’m not just talking about basic needs, such as sleeping, doing homework and arranging toys. I mean the actual understanding of the young person. Taking into account their age, cognitive abilities and needs and anticipating certain dangers. For example, recently, climbing rocks mounted on the walls in a child’s room are fashionable .. ok if there is a mattress / pool underneath, and the child is more than 5 years old. Otherwise, I consider it reckless.

Children should be asked about their visual preferences. I would not underestimate the choices of children. Even if your little one likes the nightmare (in your opinion) bedding / lamp / wall color, do not criticize him and do not say that it is ugly, that mum / dad will buy a different one so that it is more consistent with their fashionable home. Think about what you have got to lose? In the worst case scenario, you will have one horrible room in the whole house. Think about what you can gain? Self-confidence of a child (future adult), who will feel good in their space, that’s first, and secondly, your child will gain self-confidence and a feeling that their opinion and taste have value. And that’s very important. I am not saying to immediately throw the child into IKEA, Castorama, Dekornik stores or catalogs, etc. and telling the child, “come on, son, choose now!” It is true that to some extent we have to plan the function of the room ourselves, but we should still let our children have their own opinion on the topic of decorations, colors and fabrics.

I have been a mother for 2.5 years, we are building our home and for some time now I have been planning our son’s room. I have always liked the forest atmosphere, nature motifs in a child’s room, linen canopies, pastel colors and light garlands with entwined plants near the ceiling… My son likes excavators, buses, leaf springs, drills and the color red. We are planning to move into our house in December next year, currently I am doing visualizations of my son’s room and you know what? Maybe it will not be a room that I will send to an interior design magazine, but it will certainly be my baby’s room, whose opinion matters to me.

CHILDREN GROW

Not a very insightful headline, but still 🙂 More than once I have met with clients who wanted to arrange their space and the children’s room. After visiting the “baby’s” room, I was expecting to meet a 6-year-old girl, because the room was pink everywhere and had princess stickers … imagine my surprise when I met a teenager dressed in grunge style.

There can be many reasons why the room does not change with the needs of the child. Starting from the lack of funds for a mini renovation in the child’s room and ending with the fact that our child often remains a baby for us and a sweetheart to cuddle even when he is already an adult (I know, because I have parents. 🙂

Without going into the cause too deeply, I will focus on solutions.

1. Proposition 1 – Dear reader, if you don’t plan to renovate your house too often and make big changes in the next 10 years, be precautionary, don’t paint the whole room pink because your princess loves ponies. Paint it in a neutral color and add pink curtains, a bedspread, a carpet … If you are planning a room for a child who is about to come, do not pick wallpaper in the style of a newborn’s room, the child is really only a baby for a moment. If you do not want to stick a new wallpaper on the old one in 3/4 years, choose a more universal theme, or simply hang a poster instead of the entire wallpaper.
2. Proposition 2 – For those who will conscientiously change the room along with the growth of their baby. I wrote about it before – asking and listening to your child is the key to a successful relationship with him / her, to a confident child, to a room where he / she will feel good.

What is worth exploring during a conversation with your child? 

In observing your child:

• What interests her / him? What games are fun?
• Do their friends sometimes sleep over? Maybe you should think about a fold-out bed?
• Knowing more or less the preferences of your child, you can choose several products and give them the opportunity to pick from those that you have already chosen. I know that it is a slight manipulation, but let’s face it, none of us likes it when a child sees a dream toy in a shop window and we cannot afford it.
• A good way to communicate with your child about the topic of their room design is Pinterest, I highly recommend it. Often showing inspiration “from there”, I simply ask my clients’ children, “what do you think about such a ladder, or maybe a slide from the bed, etc.”

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW AT EVERY STAGE OF CHILDREN’S DEVELOPMENT OR A FEW INTERESTING FACTS FROM THE LIFE OF FUTURE ADULTS.

1. Children in the first period of their lives do not see colors, they do not really see very clearly at all, what is attractive to their eyes is the sharp contrasts of black and white. In such an early period, it is worth showing the child books, e.g. with geometric figures, while the room should not be too contrasting for the child to rest in.
2. Children, or at least most of those I met, love the so-called “forts”. It is worth considering such a space in the room, a place for a child to hide in, feel cozy, for example under a high bed, a tent, teepee or canopy, of course if your child also likes such cubbyholes.
3. Children change their minds … a little more often than adults. Maybe your child is consistent and never changes their mind, in which case- you do not need to read the rest of this paragraph. However, if they happen to change their mind, because when they were at Adam’s they saw a dinosaur head on the ceiling and now they want one, instead of the planetary system you are just finishing painting… Don’t get frustrated. Next time, instead of making a huge wall mural, just hammer a nail and hang the dinosaur’s head. in 2 years you will change it for a music poster anyway.
4. Newborns do not care what room they are in, your presence is important to them, and in 90% of cases, they sleep in your bedroom and often in your own bed. So it is worth asking yourself- who are you planning the room for? For the neighbors who will come. and praise it or for the child that will start to notice its space over the age of about 1 year.
5. Children at the age 2-7 like to move. They love playgrounds, they love to have “something” in their room, which enables them to have unusual fun. At a certain age and, of course, taking into account health and safety;) It is worth introducing climbing ropes, a slide from a bunk bed, a bunk bed, etc.into the children’s room. Pinterest is bursting with this type of inspiration.
6. Children are shorter than us … seriously;) And therefore it is worth reminding that everything that happens in the room should always be adapted to their height. Shelves with toys, chairs, a mirror (and this is interesting, because the mirror is an important element in the child’s development. It can be plastic. It is important for the toddler to get to know himself. An average child starts to recognize that he or she is a separate individual around the age of 3 years old and a mirror in the room can help with this).

Let us respect the opinion of our children, their future self-assessment and the assessment of the world depends largely on the parents.

For those who were looking for style trends in a child’s room, I apologize for the text above. I did not touch the topic at all, because trends in a child’s room should be set by the child themself. 🙂