Five Ways to Update a Bathroom on a Budget

I’m starting a series today about decorating your home on a budget. I’m going to go room by room, and today, for the first installment, I’m going to focus on how to update a bathroom on a budget.

Here are five ways to update a bathroom on a budget:

1.  Change the lightbulbs.

One of the easiest ways to update the look of your bathroom is by swapping out the regular bulbs and outdated shades for some vintage-style Edison bulbs.

Each bulb is about $10 – much cheaper than replacing the whole fixture. Plus you don’t need an electrician! To see how I did it, please see this post.

2. Add shelving.

Everyone needs storage in the bathroom – and it’s easy to make shelves.

I made these shelves from reclaimed wood – one from a salvage yard and one was the bottom of one of the doors I used when I built my daybed. The brackets are from a big-box hardware store. It’s an easy project you can complete in an afternoon – the instructions are here.

3. Made in the shades.

When we moved into the 1929 House, our bathroom didn’t have window coverings. This was a problem…as you can imagine!

Also, the bathroom and master bedroom have casement windows, which aren’t a size that lends itself to ready-made curtains or blinds.

I made no-sew “faux” Roman shades from shower curtains I found at Target! Find the tutorial here.

I love that these can be customized to your decor, color scheme, and shape and size of your windows. There are so many choices for colors and patterns for shower curtains now.

I did this project again for our guest bathroom:

Click on the photo for the full guest bathroom reveal!

4. Paint.

A gallon of paint costs between $25-50 (depending on brand) and can completely change the look and feel of a room.

Here’s what our guest bath looked like before:

And now, the after:

In our old house – the kids’ bathroom, before:

And the kids’ bathroom, after:

And neither project featured above used more than a gallon of paint! Seriously!

5. Accessorize.

Change the look of any room by changing out accessories. This is definitely true for a bathroom because there usually aren’t that many accessories in there! So that means that (a) you can change a few things for a whole new look and (b) it won’t cost a fortune!

For example, our guest bathroom in our first house looked like this:

And here’s the after:

Amazing how two shelves and some accessories balanced out that wall and provided some needed storage!

So, there are five ways to update a bathroom on a budget! What room should I tackle next week?

For more decorating ideas on a budget, click HERE.