Cheap and Easy Headboard Idea

This is a photo of my guestroom. Like all of the rooms in my house, it is a work in progress. It has gone 3 years without a headboard even though I have had these shutters sitting in a closet since we moved in to this house. The original owner had these hanging in the kitchen and they were painted red. I wasn't really sure what I was going to do with them until a shopping trip to Anthropologie. They had some industrial lights on sale 1/2 off and I knew they would be perfect hanging in the alcove the bed sits in. The tall shutters would hide the plug and cords perfectly.

I used a ceiling hook and s hook to hang the lights centered above the bed.  I then attached the cords to the wall with these little thingies. I'm not sure what they're called but they have a nail on one end and a place for the cord to fit underneath on the other side. They will be hidden by the shutters.

I added an electrical strip for the three cords that has a switch to turn on and off the lights.

The strip is hidden behind the end shutter within reach to turn on and off.

The next step was painting the shutters. One side was red and the other side was stained. Having a base stain makes it easy to get a distressed finish with less work so I used that side. (If you buy these at the home improvement store, stain them first before painting.) The turquoise color that I used is Behr Gulf Winds. I painted leaving some of the stain showing through. I have found that this is much easier than painting the entire thing perfectly and then sanding it down to expose the wood. There was already some old white paint on them which wanted to show through too. To add an even more distressed look I used minwax aged oak gel stain sparingly on some of the boards to make them all a little different.

With the shutters all painted, it was time to install. Originally I had planned to attach them all together with hinges but I actually ended up liking the way they looked just leaning up against the wall. This also created more room for the electrical strip and cords in back.

The completed project. Since the shutters were very tall, I did not need to attach them to the wall or the bed but if you use small shutters that don't go down to the ground, you could attach them to the wall.

So, this side of the room is now complete. I have another project on the other side of the room which I will show you later on. Stay tuned...

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