The Study Lounge

Our home is a 2 story colonial with the bedrooms all on the second floor. One of the bedrooms is pretty small at 9' x 9 1/2'. It has always served as a home office. We had a pretty large desk/wall unit in there that 3 people could easily work at. Instead it was a dumping room with piles of books and supplies on the desk...always a mess. And where did the kids (all 4 of them) end up doing their homework? They would work on the couch, kitchen table, dining room table or their bed! Which meant more backpacks and schoolwork spread all over the house. So, I had an idea to put the small couch from the playroom in the office and relocate the desk....creating a study lounge. They love it!
Come on in!

Since the room is so small I will rotate the photos around the room.  A lounge is not complete without a TV...only for when HW is done:)

I will show you inside the closet in a minute. I think my honey did a great job on the window molding! We may get around to changing the door molding too, but the window was new so we were working from scratch.  One of my favorite vintage folding chairs is a perfect extra seat. Also LOVE the color of the blinds. I will share all resources at the end of this post.

We went with a rustic theme in this room. There are tons of tutorials for plank walls. We used 1/4" plywood ripped into varying widths and lengths and just nailed them up. We did paint the wall behind the planks a much darker grey so any spaces between the boards would not be so visible. I used a combination of stains and paint to achieve the weathered finish.

Planning on a large clock for this blank wall on the right. It's on my long to-do list:)

Not enough room on either side of couch for an end table so we built a small shelf on each side made of pallet wood.

 Perfect for the phone, remote or a drink. And pumpkins too!

I had fun with the gallery wall. A combination of favorite vacation photos, and inspirational words (it is a "study" lounge).  But I also wanted it to be a room the kids could relax in. What's nice about it is that they can come up here, close the door and get their work done without being in the middle of the house during dinner prep and all the rest of the chaos going on downstairs. And for the ones working late at night, we can go to bed and feel better about the kids being upstairs while they finish up their work.

It took a while but we found the perfect picture for over the couch. There was a fine art photographer next to me at a recent art show I participated in. We had a view of this photo the entire weekend and couldn't stop looking at it. The one we saw was about 4ft x 4ft and $3600. We were happy to find a much smaller print of this peaceful shot of a crab farmer in China. My husband made the perfect frame for it and I think it helps to give that relaxed feeling in the study lounge.

I still felt it necessary to have a small desktop for when the kids wanted to work on a computer. The closet was a perfect spot for this and to store all of the supplies needed for getting homework done.

 Shelves above hold baskets of extra supplies and textbooks and study guides. The shelf below the desk holds each of their laptops. Everything has a place...yay!

A charging station is on the left...I never knew these USB outlets existed!

And a custom made shelf/pencil cup holder is perfect for keeping the desktop free of clutter.

This room has been amazing. We finished it just before school began and they've been enjoying it ever since! The couch also opens up to a bed so this room also serves as a guest room. Couldn't do that with the big desk in here before!


Resource list:

Wall and ceiling color: Sherwin Williams Light French Gray

Trim: Benjamin Moore Linen White

Sofa: Ikea

Throw pillows: H&M and Michael's

Gallery wall: Inspirational signs-Hydrangea Home, Industrial Metal number 6-Country Living Fair, Galvanized M-Michael's Craft Store

Photo over couch: John Deng Fine Art Photography

Baskets in closet: Michael's Craft Store

Lighting: Lowes Outdoor lighting department - Portfolio Ellicott Galvanized Outdoor Wall light

Blinds: Home Depot - Home Decorators Collection - Driftwood Flatweave Bamboo Roman Shade

See more of our home improvement projects HERE.