So let me just start today’s post by saying I’m incredibly excited to be participating in the One Room Challengeβ„’! For those of you new to Swoon Worthy, I’m Kimberly, an American expat living in Manchester, England with Wayne, my English boyfriend of 6+ years as well as our two fur babies, Pablo and Meisha (both of the kitty persuasion). I describe my style as “Eclectic Boho Glam”, a mix of styles, bold colour and pattern and lots of gold and brass for a bit of a glamorous touch. Welcome to my little splodge here on the interwebs, Swoon Worthy! Β I hope you enjoy your visit and decide to stick around to see how this all pans out.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the One Room Challengeβ„’, Linda from Calling it Home chooses 20 different bloggers to all makeover aΒ space in 6 short weeks. This has been going for a few years now and while I’ve always loved watching from the sidelines, this is my first time joining in the fun so I’m really excited and really nervous. It’s so fab to see my logo there with so many great bloggers! Eeek!

SS15 ORC Full List Participants

So the room I’ve decided to makeover in 6 weeks is…. *drumroll!*… our 2nd bedroom! *cymbals crash!*

I took the plunge and quit my job at the end of last year and have been freelancing ever since. While I absolutely love working from home now and setting my own schedule, I do not love working from the dining room table! I need my own space! So priority number one is to turn this neglected space into my home office. For those of you who have been following me for a while, this is probably not a huge surprise but I promise there’s an update for you guys too so keep reading…

Over the last four and a half years that we’ve lived here, it’s gone from an office for Wayne to a barely-used guest bedroom, to a dumping ground whenever we were working on any other rooms Β in our house. It’s been on our list of things to do for some time andΒ whileΒ some of the ground work has been done (which I’m going to share with you in this post), I knew that this challenge was exactly what we needed to light the proverbial fireΒ and turn it into my future home office.

Here’s where we started…

There was a swirly patterned ceiling, a large cupboard which housed a no-longer-in-use boiler, a wall that was falling apart (you only needed to put two fingers on it and you could feel it move!), a stained and threadbare carpet and a lot of rubbish that needed to just go. It was also wear I ‘stored’ my paintings, hoarded old furniture and kept all our paperwork (which clearly wasn’t very well organised).

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And here’s what we’ve completed so far…

The old cupboard was an eyesore in the room, took up too much space and was falling apart and the boiler was not functioning (we have a newer one in the cellar) so that was the first thing to go (notice the very fetching holes in the wall left behind).

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The ceiling was the next to be demolished, quickly followed by the internal wall that needed to be rebuilt.

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Wayne covered both in new plasterboard…

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And then heΒ plastered both ceiling and wall to give it a smooth finish.Β Next step was scraping all the old lining paper off the walls right back to the original plaster to give us a completely bare slate.Β It was very very messy.

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It’s funny because every time I show old plaster walls, someone will say, ‘Oh it looks so pretty! You should leave it like that!’ and yes, it looks AMAZING – in pictures. The reality is really not so nice so please do trust me when I say that there’s no way we could leave it like that.

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Here’s where we’re going… Β 

It’s time for this chaos to be turned into something rather glamorous! There is still loads more to do before we can start on the pretty stuff but this is my moodboard showingΒ where we want to end up…

ORC Challenge Office Moodboard

A grown up sexy space with plenty of storage that’s an actual pleasure to be in rather than an ugly old dilapidated storage room! And I’m finally getting my blush pink room! Whoop! I can not wait to start turning my dreams into reality here and I’m so excited to really get this room turned around very quickly! Ready to join me on this one?

Want to see the rest of my home? Check out my House Tour.

And now, do you want to see what all the other 19 participants are up to? Of course you do! Check them all out below.

Jenna Sue Design
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Trademarked byΒ Calling it Home
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