A Look Inside Luca and Sienna’s New Room

Some of my fondest memories as a child were days of fun my elder brother and I had sharing a room together. We had a 2 year gap between us and were practically inseparable. I still remember the room we shared, my parents had installed a Peter Pan wallpaper which we were absolutely entranced by; spending hours upon hours just daydreaming and discussing endless plots for our favorite characters, mine was Wendy; obviously… I loved our room, it was ridiculously spacious for one thing, they made them big in the 80’s, at least in Abu Dhabi they did. We didn’t have a playroom and honestly we didn’t need one, our room was big enough to to play, eat, study in, and even have more friends over for sleepovers.

And today, as both my children have eventually grown out of each of their nurseries (I’m still trying to wrap my head around this), I had to start thinking about their new room, which by the way I get asked about A LOT surprisingly. The thing is, since I have a 3 year old boy and a 2 year old girl with a one year and 5 months gap in between, I was super keen on having them share a room together. “They’re going to share a room?” so many have inquired curiously like its some sort of alien concept or as though I’m the only parent with a boy and a girl that would room them together. “Of course!” For me there was no discussion there, my assumption is anyone with a sibling, boy or girl that have shared a room would know what an amazing experience it can be for those early years, I would never want them to miss out on the fun, the character-building, the sharing, the compromising, the competition and most of all the bonding. This will be my gift to them. Of course until they turn I don’t know 9 or 10? And decide they need their space and privacy. Give or take…

So before I really delve off topic and this turns into a (gasp) parenting post rather than a lifestyle one let me get back to my initial point; Luca and Sienna’s room. Of course it had to be uni-sex NOT gender neutral ( because my boy likes blue and green and my daughter likes pink and purple) so not much I can do there. I had two requirements, for the room, it had to be peaceful, calm and relaxing so that the kids would actually have LOTS of sleep in it and it had to create the perfect setting for their favorite activity- story time! I don’t know if I post enough about this but we are huge on books here, we read multiple books a day for the kids since they were only months old and its been a habit ever since. We go booking shopping on a weekly basis, so I really needed to create the perfect environment to nurture both this reading habit and their little imaginations. That’s why I wanted the setting to resemble a picture right out of a storybook.

Luca has been obsessing over tree houses and so I set off looking for the perfect tree house bed. I was close to actually getting one customized at some point until I fell across the perfect one at Home Centre. I loved everything about it, especially the adorable little windows it has where they have been spending hours pretending to play shop and theatre and all sort of games.

For Sienna, I really wanted her to sleep on the low mattress sort of bed, the same way Luca did, it was the Montessori sleep method via a floor bed, it promotes independence, freedom and exploration. So the teepee bed I found was ideal. I’m not going to lie, I find her rolling off sleeping on the wooden floors most of the time, but its a transition and I’m hoping at some point she will finally settle and stop sleeping like a pet. I also love the fact that we all get to cuddle every night before bedtime and read on that tepee/tent bed.

To bring it all together I needed the perfect wallpaper and for someone who has wallpaper in practically every room in the house, believe me I really was yearning for something different this time. The perfect opportunity presented itself when I learned that Fabric Ville, will actually customize and design ANY wallpaper you want. I was so excited. I really wanted something original yet classic, something that wouldn’t be too loud or noisy in the room, that wouldn’t stand out too much yet create the perfect environment, a wall paper that they too would look back at one day and remember some precious moments and perhaps even stories from their childhood like we do. A wallpaper unique to us. I love every character we settled on, from the Flamingo drinking juice, or sometimes “milky” according to Sienna to the “birdy in the puddle” and the made to measure giraffe sticking his head out of the book shelf. The kids love him. And I have to say I was really impressed with Fabric Ville’s ease of service and quality of the actual wallpaper. I would totally recommend them if you are in the process of designing your children’s room or any room in the house. Their services extend beyond just custom wall paper but also curtains and upholstery fabrics as well as installation.

So we’ve come a long way from the nursery’s I’ve shared with you here. I haven’t really put up any art or shelves on the wall yet or found the perfect rug, so I’m not done accessorizing, but I hope you like and get inspired with what we’ve done so far!