Help! Bedroom decor confusion!

[ScottishAJ]

I have a design / decor conundrum I'd love some help with as my head is about to explode with it!

So our current main bedroom has dark blue nearly black walls, with linen bedding in grey, pink, sage green and jewel toned accents like a teal throw. The bedroom furniture is antique all dark wood and I chose a few tiny gold accents around the room. I don't know if that colour scheme makes sense but I love it! It's a sort of luxe jewel toned bedroom theme, if I had to describe it.

Anyway we are now moving to a rental (long story) where the bedroom walls are white / off white and we are not allowed to paint. The linen bedding I'm thinking will work against the white walls and we could go with a sort of natural theme and include plants etc. the dressing table and chest of drawers however are a dark mahogany and the chair is an accent chair in plum. The jewel tone and the dark wood seem to jar against the white walls! What can I do about that?

Secondly, the new bedroom is tiny and there isn't really room for bedside tables comfortably. What can I do as i want somewhere to have our radio, phone, water, book etc. I looked at using peg boards as head boards which seem cool, but this look is very mid century / urban cool and totally jars against my mahogany furniture!

There isn't really room to bring the bed forward to install a shelf behind the headboard, and in any case how do people sit up in bead with those?

Basically on the look / colour scheme and on the bedside table issue I'm completely stuck!! Any designers out there with any ideas? 🙏

Are you allowed to drill into the walls? Probably you aren’t but I would do it anyway and factor in the price of polyfilla and white paint at the end of the tenancy…

Anyway, drill in:

Wall lamp/sconces that plug in, ie you’re not doing a rewire in a rental. You can get these from ikea and everywhere - have these above your headboard for reading.

Then you can also get tiny bedside shelves, some even have drawers, to fix on the wall. They’re usually smaller than normal bedside tables.

Or just get a sports water bottle and sleep with all your crap in your bed like me

Thanks, good idea about the lamps. Not sure if shelves at the side would work as there is literally no room to spare!

About the bedside tables: If you have literally no room on the sides of the bed, I would put a console table / short bookshelf behind your bed to use as a headboard, and use the top as a fairly convenient place to put your phone, etc.
You can find pretty skinny ones, which wouldn't push the bed too far forward but would give you enough room for a phone at least!

As for the colours: I'm surprised that there are still landlords that don't allow painting. Like stuntbubbles said, I'd just paint and then re-paint before moving out.
If that doesn't sit well with you, I'd try asking the landlord, on the promise that you will re-paint the room to the original colour on move out.
An alternative would be to cover the wall with a dark textured wall. You can get dark or painted wood panels (with different patterns) on Etsy. Or even cheaper, you can google "peel and stick vinyl wallpaper" and get something dark that would work with your current colour scheme.

Hope this helps!!

Thanks @MarthaDonne great idea about the console table. I will have a look at those.

Really don't think they'll let us paint especially not in the dark colours we would choose sadly. Plus I don't really have time anyway to be honest! So I'm hoping I can make a design around the white walls!

I think that your colour scheme will work with white walls. Just think of it as the summer version of your scheme and when/if you move, you can move back to the winter dark version. Perhaps pick one of the very pale colours for a bed throw which will lighten the scheme.

Can you clip a lamp onto the headboard. IKEA do very minimal/cheap ones which are good. There are phone/remote control pockets which are meant for sofas/desks which might work if there is no floor space at all. Not sure about water glass - maybe a bottle on the floor is the only option.