Modern Cottage Navy & Gold Guest Bedroom Mood Board

Before we tackled the renovation of our guest bedroom, I pulled together a sampling of fabrics and paint colors to create a mood board. The look I’m going for is a modern cottage; a bold navy paint color softened with touches of “cottage decor” such as antique quilts. Sherwin Williams sponsors this post.

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

Today I’m going to share with you some Guest Bedroom Decorating Ideas. Check out this post for the Navy and Gold Guest Room decor reveal. If you like this post, you may also want to see how the room turned out! 

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

Shall we talk about the current state of my guest bedroom? Sigh, I don’t know if I’ve got the energy to address its current “state” right now. First, let me back up a bit. Living a good three days’ drive from most of my immediate family has taught me one thing over the years, visitors are always welcomed and hopefully arriving at regular intervals.  

For this reason, we’ve always tried to have a guest bedroom or a guest “area” of our home.  Our last house was just two extremely comfortable sofas in the basement and a separate bath.  Before that, it was a “my kid’s room is now our guest room,”… but we always managed to find space for everyone.

This photo is my current guest room.  I cleaned it up for this picture. The space doubles as my blog photo studio; there’s a bunch of crap behind the camera you can’t see.  It’s got a lot going for it, great light (even though it’s in a basement), and even though it’s a bit oddly sized, it’s nice and big. It also has two twin mattresses leaning up against the wall- what’s up with that, you ask? Well, in January, we decided that it was finally time to move my almost 13-year-old son out of his kiddie boat trundle bed.  

Yes, I had a 12 yr old in a boat bed- it seemed like a good idea to buy it at the time (tip: buy furniture that grows with your kids). Anyway, it was ZERO degrees outside, and I had been trapped in the house for DAYS and was itching to DO SOMETHING- I got the idea that we could move the queen-sized bed in our guest room into his room.

After a weekend of moving things around, we were done rearranging the furniture! In our guest room, we were left with a day bed (that had always been in our guest room) and two twin mattresses. A queen bed to kids’ room- check!

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

No big deal, right? Well, until summer hits and the visitors start flowing in. Think they’d LOVE to sleep in my blog photo studio/junk room? Well, they are friendly people and would probably be okay with it, but I’d be mortified.

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

Time to develop a plan and enough time to execute it before the first guests show up. We’ve got several things to think about in that room with all of its odd soffits and nooks.

Before we moved out of the bed it was never really “decorated,” just the room that all of the “extra” stuff went into. When we finished the basement, we painted it a nice neutral color, bought a bed, and said it was “good.” Now that we need a new mattress, it’s time for a redo and a PLAN this time. Not just a room to hold all of our hand-me-down furniture.

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

Since it’s in our basement, there are several soffits to worry about: strange angles and such. One of them we fixed when we built the room, by adding night lights to the bottom.

Even with the lights, the soffits are an eyesore (but must stay). I wasn’t sure how to deal with them, then I saw this photo on the HGTV HOME™ by Sherwin-Williams Traditional Twist color brochure and went “aha”!!

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

That dark color is so elegant, and I LOVE IT. Dramatic and elegant, but with a bit of whimsy. The color is an opaque charcoal gray…not exactly right,  then I noticed in the same color collection a dark navy blue, Indigo Batik. Perfect!

I’ve decided to paint an accent wall on the wall with all of the weird soffits.  The dark color will help the wall look less choppy, blending all of the angles- dark colors are great that way. Going with that same color collection, HGTV HOME™ by Sherwin-Williams Traditional Twist, I zeroed in on a white for the rest of the room and a gray for a few accents (accessories).

With “blue” stuck in my head, I remembered my favorite antique quilt. It’s the one in the first photo- and I decided to pull the rest of the color scheme from there. Not wanting to go as marigold as the yellow in the quilt, I got a bit stuck.

I knew I wasn’t about to paint a wall orange but wanted to have a good shade of mustard yellow as inspiration as I picked out other bedding and accessories for the room.

Then I discovered the COOLEST THING EVER!  The Chip It!® color selection tool by Sherwin-Williams. I’m seriously addicted to this thing-  Have you guys ever seen a photo of a room online on a magazine website, blog, or Pinterest and loved it, wanted to use it as an inspiration piece, but then didn’t know what to do next?

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Well, Chip It!® solves that for you. All you do is install the Chip It!® button on your browser (like the Pinterest pin it button), then when you see a photo you like, you click the button, hover over your image, and VOILA, a perfectly coordinated paint color scheme! After playing with that bit of Chip It!® tool for days, a trend emerged. I was able to pick out a few colors from some of my favorite chips, and get an idea going.  

I took a quick trip to the fabric store and FINALLY a PLAN for our guest bedroom.  You can even upload your photo to Chip It!®, which is what I did after I pulled together my inspiration fabrics. Even though I didn’t pick those exact colors on the chip, it helped reinforce my idea for the room’s color scheme.

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

People, let me tell you, I have months to pick a paint color in the past. When it comes to color, I AM PICKY! The fact that I picked TWO for one room in a matter of days is a miracle! I even repainted my daughter’s room three times because the pink had too much blue in it.

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

My idea for the room is to use the antique quilt on the foot of the bed with a plain white duvet. Then mix in some more modern and sophisticated pieces for a “Modern Country” style room.  The dark blue accent wall and clean-lined furniture will help keep the room from feeling too “country” but still give it a warm and inviting feeling. I don’t want anything overly modern for the room.  

I want our guests to come and feel like they are in Kentucky, not a hotel room in a big city. Since it is a guest room, and my guests are essentially on vacation here,  I’ll be adding in some local Kentucky art, and decorative elements, along with hiding as many horse-themed elements in the room as I can.

Guest Bedroom Inspiration & Paint Colors

To save money, I’m also figuring out how to make a king-size bed out of two twin mattresses. I have no idea how to do that yet, but I’m sure it will involve a memory foam topper and some platform. I’ll be sure to share what I figure out.  

My youngest brother is autistic and in his 30s; he lives with my parents and comes with them when they visit. For this reason, I’ll also be keeping the current day bed in the room. That way, there is room for 3 to sleep comfortably. If you’d like to follow my progress with gathering ideas for the room,  follow my Guest Room Pinterest board. 

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44 Comments

  1. I have a silver grey bedroom with accent master bath
    I used sherman williams cashmere paint and I love the color and finish

  2. I need to repaint our family room. I love the other, but after living with it for a few years it just feels too cold. I love the batik blue for your room, stunning.

  3. It’s a toss up between a sad guest room and a sad mud room /entryway. Both are 70s fabulous and in desperate need of a makeover.

  4. The Collonade Gray! Who knew I would find the bedroom paint color I have been pondering for over 8 months on your blog post! Thank you so much! I guess it would be obvious, that if I won the gift certificate, I’d be buying a gallon of the above mentioned color and finally have a calming bedroom for peaceful dreams!!

  5. We are renovating our master bedroom this summer, so this would be perfect! Thank you for this giveaway!

  6. I would love to makeover my living room. I just moved into a new apartment and the walls are bare and I have no paint on the walls. I need some new furniture too!

  7. I would LOVE to paint my bedroom! I’ve been pulling old wallpaper off, that had been painted over. This leaves behind a layer of paper that is very old and not very pretty. I would love to create a space that my husband can relax in. Thank you for the chance!

  8. I am trying to pick a new color for our dining/living room wall. It currently has SW Halycon Green, but I’ve repainted other walls in the room and it needs something else. I also take my time in picking out colors. The natural lighting in our house is odd and the colors never looks as they do in the store when on my walls.

  9. I would love to paint our master bedroom. I kind of want a dark color, but the room itself is pretty dark so I need to figure that out.

  10. I’m not commenting to win, but commenting to beg you to do a quilt along to teach me how to recreate that quilt!

  11. My Dad’s room, he died three years ago and besides moving some of the furniture out it’s just sitting there becoming the catchall eyesore room!

  12. I would love to make over my children’s playroom, its a very bland color and just not an inviting space for them to play in!

  13. I have a LR/DR and all I want is to make it more airy, open and tropical. Needs a total makeover. The only thing I like in that room is an old poster from the Coconut Grove art festival.
    Love how you have a plan.

  14. I promised daughter I would paint her room. I would go ahead and do that for her as long as she doesnt pick a crazy color! neyabenz(at)gmail(dot)com

  15. So many projects – where to start?? I would probably start by painting my oldest son’s room. I can’t wait to see your finished guest room!

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