Have you ever seen a picture of a bedroom on Pinterest and thought - WOW! That is exactly what happened to me when I saw Mandy Moore's velvet green upholstered headboard designed by Sarah Sherman Samuel. At the time, Gavin and I were living in our flat when we first moved back to Scotland. It was a modern flat with huge floor to ceiling windows, light wood flooring throughout and bright white walls. We couldn't be bothered doing much to the decor in the flat as it was rented, but a custom built headboard on the other hand... we could take it with us wherever we would settle down!
What I loved about this look was it was modern but still felt warm and cozy with the gold light fixtures and soft green velvet. I also loved the oversized width of it so the headboard extended beyond the bed and the bedside tables. This was my inspiration for our bedroom at the flat which so desperately needed some style added. Here's a before picture of our bedroom:
The first thing I did to try and achieve this look was take some measurements of the room and bed. We have a super king sized bed and two bedside tables that were still en route from our brief stint in Canada at the time of taking that first picture. I had heard about this amazing upholstery fabric store in Glasgow called Cotton Print Factory, so I headed there to see if I could find some of the materials I was after. The initial visit was just to see what they had and lucky for me, they had the emerald green velvet I was after! I took note of the price per metre and also the width of the fabric and the wadding so I could go home and finalise my design and begin to price it out.
I liked the look of the upholstered headboard panels in Sarah Sherman Samuel's design, and after seeing the width of the fabric rolls I realised the panels were likely necessary because it would be difficult to get a single piece of material big enough to cover such a large surface! I decided for my headboard I would have three panels approximately 100 x 140cm. This would give around 60cm on either side of the headboard for a bedside table. While I loved the hanging pendant lights floating above the bedside table in the inspiration photo, Gavin and I wanted to have a wall light integrated into the headboard since we were renting the flat, it didn't make sense to wire in the hanging pendant lights above the bed. Then I was ready to start buying materials to bring this project to life. I picked up some timber panels from Bothwell Building and Timber Supply, two brass wall lights with a white frosted shade from Lights.co.uk, around five metres of wadding and green velvet fabric from Cotton print, and three pieces of foam from E-foam.co.uk. Using wadding alone on top of the wood was not enough cushion for a comfortable headboard to lean up against.
Once all three pieces of wood were cut to size, it was time to construct the framework. We decided the best way to secure the headboard to the wall was with a French cleat. We felt the back of the panel needed extra support so it would sit flush up against the wall. After the structure was completed on the back, we were able to glue the foam onto the other side of the wood using a spray adhesive.
At this stage we knew that the wall lights were going to need to be screwed into the wood rather than the foam, so we decided on the positioning of them first and proceeded to cut holes out of the foam. Originally we thought it would be ok to have them fixed onto the wood panels but I didn't really like how it would really sink them into the upholstery. We problem solved by fitting in a wood block that was the same thickness as the foam so it would appear flush.
When I had ordered the foam, I added approximately 10cm onto the length and width of the panels. Originally I thought I would trim it down to fit the panels but when it came time to fix the wadding around each panel, I realised the extra foam gave a lovely roundness to the edges instead of a sharp look from the wood. I wrapped each panel up in the wadding like a present and used a staple gun to fix it all together.
I followed the same process to staple the velvet material to the headboard. The trickiest part to figure out was how to do the corners, but you just have to start in the middle and work your way out, twisting the fabric over and in place as you go.
Once all three panels were upholstered, it was time to install them! Lucky for me, Gavin and his dad are very handy and took care of the installation for me. Gavin's dad was kind enough to let me use his wood working workshop to put together the framework for the headboard as well. Not to mention the tips and tricks he showed me along the way. You can check out his website Gerald Spence Cabinets here.
The last step was to fit the wall lights. As I mentioned earlier, we didn't want to wire anything up in a rented flat, so we fit the wall lights with sockets so we could simply plug them into the wall. The panels hung up very easily using the French cleats and a spirit level. Et voila! That is our DIY upholstered headboard complete.
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