Dorm Rooms 101

As summer winds down and school approaches, one of the primary concerns aside from what classes to email professors to get into is what to bring to your dorm room, how to make it your own space, and how to organize with your roommate beforehand.

There are a few steps to having a productive dorm-shaping experience:

1. Email your Roommate – email your roommate to set up sound ground expectations; what will you bring and what will they? do they hate a certain color and do you?

2. Set a Theme – rooms work best when organized around a theme, though not all roommates opt to coordinate this. How do you want the room to ‘feel’ overall? How do you want lighting to work? Do you just want to get your own things and have your own separate spaces or do you want to work together to help the room achieve a cohesive feel?

3. Start with the Essentials – work out things like lamps, bedding, room cleaning supplies, etc first. Additions, though at times more fun, can come later.

4. To the Window, To the Wall – What will go on the walls and how much will they be covered? Things like posters, prints, pictures and other things make a room in a strange or new place truly feel like home, invest a lot of thought in what you want to cover your walls in, it goes a long way to subliminally make you feel comfortable in your space.

5. Clothing – be careful with how much you bring, some rooms have more space and some rooms have less but a rule of thumb is to go slightly more spartan than overburdened by clothing that will eventually taking up so much space you won’t be able to move in your room. Contrary to popular belief, it is not necessary to bring so many clothes that you never once have to repeat an outfit, or so many that you can make it between every single break from school to do your laundry at home.

6. Space-Saving Devices – they help, invest in them. Though at times if everything is in a box under your bed you’re tempted to never use it. It all depends on personal preference.

7. AC Unit – does your room need it?

8. Refrigerator/Microwave/TV – discuss with your roommate what things you need. As a rule of thumb the refrigerator always tends to be useful – the others are on a personal basis.

9. Futon – do you need one? If so, who will bring it? If you’re the type of person who has a lot of people over to your room all the time you may not want to buy the most expensive futon in the world if people will just end up staining it. It’s all about lifestyle.

10. Rug – buy a rug, they add a warm feel to the room. At the beginning of the school year the Student Assembly has a giant rug sale for rugs on the cheap but you can also pick up rugs of sufficient size from places around campus like Lowe’s.

You can spend 10 hours a day or 2 hours a day in your room, but it’s always nice to have a place that is distinctly ‘you.’ A lot of things pertaining to your room can be picked up when you’re down on campus (like rugs) but the ‘little things’ go a long way in making all the difference and you should start giving them some thought! Rooms speak – what do you want yours to say?