12 Savvy Ideas for Decorating a Boy's Room on a Budget

Create an inexpensive boy's bedroom to reflect his likes and personal tastes by using color, patterns, and themes. Make sure you add plenty of texture in fabrics and objects to add depth and interest in your design.

Paint is an inexpensive base for most decorating schemes. This great bedroom look is easy and cheap to recreate using a BEHR paint color palette of:

• Wall above chair rail: Oat Straw #740C-3
• Trim: Aged Parchment UL150-10
• Below chair rail: Macchiato UL170-2

A multi-colored brown and orange striped comforter, solid colored orange throw blanket, wall art in matching colors, and an orange pouff or ottoman can be purchased at low prices as you find good deals. Add brown draperies, a brown lamp shade, and a beige area rug to complete the room as your budget allows.

Give your boy's room character by creating a headboard out of unusual materials. Old doors, fences, wooden planks, and large hardwood boards are all perfect materials to turn into unique headboards.

Simply brush or spray paint with a bold color that complements the bedding and draperies. Go for a weathered or distressed look for greater design interest. Secure the headboard to the wall or attach directly to the bed frame.

Young boys might collect toy cars or trains, sports figurines, and other collectable items. They make great decorations that also show off your son's interests and personal style. As he gets older, replaced the toys with books, trophies, photos, and a television.

Add a few cubby wall shelves or repurpose standing display shelves. They will become part of the overall décor. Purchase cheap shelves at craft or big box stores. These can be painted to match the color palette of your room design if the current color isn't quite right.

Add a dynamic wall decal for an exciting update to a boy's bedroom. It's amazing how a simple sports wall decal can transform an entire bedroom. A blacked-out silhouette can grow with the child as he ages, making it a cost-effective investment. This allows you to change furniture, colors, and other details while still using the decal.

This decal features the extreme sport of dirt bike riding. You can place it over the bed, desk, or gaming area of the bedroom. Just make sure the placement is where your child can see it whenever he enters the room or falls asleep.

If you don't want to use decals or stickers and want a more artistic look for your son's room, consider painting objects or scenes of his hobbies and interests for an original mural. Create a mural of sports equipment for your sports fan or a series of racing cars for your car enthusiast.

If you aren't an adept artist, select a few stencils and personalize with details and colors used in the overall color scheme.

Let your son decorate his walls in chalk by creating a chalkboard wall. Chalkboard paint is available in both brush and spray forms. Apply paint to a clean wall for an instant and inexpensive art space.

• Frame it: Nail molding around painted wall space for illusion of hanging chalkboard.
• Young child: Add chair rail to one wall and paint below molding.
• Older child: Paint above the chair rail.

Decide on the size of the wall space you wish to devote to the blackboard. Place it low enough for your child to reach and watch him enjoy this great feature of his bedroom.

Use unfinished, wooden letters from your local craft store to create personalized word art. Spell out your son's name, hobby or sports, such as "Skater" or "Play Ball". Use paint, fabric or pages ripped from books and magazines to decorate the letters before hanging them on the wall. Choose solid colors for more decoratively shaped letters to keep the effect from being busy. Save fabrics and prints for plainer fonts for a more prominent effect.

Save time along with money by using framed word art or combine graphic and word art decals.

Transform existing bedroom furniture with a little sandpaper and paint. Sand off the finish of an existing dresser, headboard, bookcases or desk. Paint selected pieces, or all of it, in coordinating colors or bold fun ones. This is an inexpensive way to get a customized furniture look with little out of pocket expense.

You can use this design solution to turn mismatched furniture pieces into a cohesive design. Select colors from wallpaper, draperies, rug and comforter for a perfectly blended design.

One of the least expensive ways to decorate a room is to create it only once.

• Begin with a basic color scheme that your kid can enjoy for several years.
• Select furniture that will still be relevant when he's a teenager.

Then change out draperies, bedding, and wall decorations as your boy grows. By establishing this design framework you can opt for inexpensive changes sure to keep up with your child for an ageless design.

A themed bedroom doesn't have to be expensive if you do it yourself using cheap materials and repurposed supplies. The bed is typically the focus of the room, so begin with it. Turn a bed into a boat for a sailor or pirate theme room.

1. Start with an existing bed frame and add repurposed planks to create the frame. Paint in your choice of color scheme.
2. Add a mast using cheap PVC pipes. Paint as desired. Secure one long and two shorter ones to the bed frame and wall using clamps. Paint the clamps to match the pipe color for a seamless look.
3. The sails can be made out of fabric triangles from an old bed sheet or curtains. Cut to fit and attach using a hot glue gun.

Accessorize as your budget allows. For example, make a faux ship wheel from a Styrofoam wreath ring and craft rounds. Create spokes from plastic dowel rods and paint to finish the ship's wheel. You can also add a cheap round blue rug to the room.

If you have more than one boy and they share a bedroom, then this design is an easy solution. You can offer each boy their own individuality by using the same pattern comforter sets, but in different colors.

Paint a pair of twin beds a toasty brown, and add a floor lamp beside each bed. Cover the shades with matching fabric or go for a similar pattern with contact paper.

Give each boy a fun storage solution with a footlocker or trunk positioned at the end foot of the bed; these can be purchased cheaply on yard and garage sales. Don't forget to add a nightstand painted the same color as the beds; by placing it between the bed, the boys can share and you only have to buy one.

Cheaply reinvent a bedroom design for a growing boy to reflect his teenage maturity. Transform the bedroom into a cool pad with a simple bedframe. Shove the bed into a corner and create a couch effect by adding masculine pillow designs for day lounging.

• Select a basic bedspread that includes the colors he most enjoys.
• Add various sizes of matching pillows.
• Hang a school pendant or two streamers along windows or a wall to break up the space.
• Cover two storage boxes with removable lids in fabric. Stack by the bed for a nightstand and extra storage.

With a little ingenuity, smart shopping, and some repurposed DIY ideas, you can easily create a design that fits your son's personality and your pocket regardless of his age. Decorating a boy's room doesn't have to be an expensive undertaking.