Welcome back.  Recently I’ve begun sharing the progress on our renovations to an upstairs bedroom at The Shack.  This bedroom is being designed for my teen son, Grady.  Before, it was pretty ugly with lavender walls and an 80’s wallpaper border.

BEFORE: Lavender walls, floral wallpaper border and Berber carpeting don’t do much for this upstairs bedroom at The Shack.

Last time I shared the floor plan with you and promised I’d talk more about Grady’s reclining chair.

After shuffling all the furniture around, here’s the floor plan we ended up settling with. Normally, I like for the bed to be across from you as you enter the room, but in this case, putting the bed in front of the window would have occupied the majority of the floor space and left no room for other furniture.

I’m sure you noticed that huge black recliner in the right top corner of the floor plan.  Normally, I’m not a huge fan of recliners.  I don’t think any designer is really in favor of these big, clunky chairs that are often an eyesore.  But there are some instances where they are called for, and I can certainly understand the need for comfort.

You see, last summer my son Grady had back surgery.  It was a very serious back surgery with two rods and 16 giant screws inserted into his spine.  Now, just like for so many of you out there with painful back problems, comfort is a top priority.  Just after his surgery this past summer, we bought Grady a really great recliner for his bedroom in our primary home. He uses that chair all the time, and we’re so happy we made that purchase.

Here’s a favorite photo of my son Grady and I taken last spring, just a few weeks before his surgery. You can see he’s quite a bit taller than me (although that’s not saying much, since I’m fairly short). Finding the right reclining chair had proven a bit difficult for him, since Grady is long in the torso.  Also, we found it really helps for him to have an adjustable head rest and there are very few recliners out there which offer that option.

Of course, we thought, “We can just purchase a duplicate of the chair we already have at home.  It perfectly meets his needs!”  But when we went to purchase a second, identical chair, just 6 months later, we found it had been discontinued by the manufacturer.  Ugh!  So out we went…furniture shopping again for recliners.

Grady and I ended up finding exactly what he needed at Raymour & Flanigan, a large furniture chain with a location very near our home.  The chair we found hit all the right notes for Grady:  the back is tall enough to support his head, it has an adjustable headrest, it has a relatively simple design, and it functions quite well for him.  Of course, it’s bigger than I would have liked, and not the first style I would have chosen, but we were limited to the options at hand.  I’m sure I can work it into the decor, by adding some simple black accents.

This is the chair we ended up selecting for Grady’s room at The Shack.  It’s the Stylus Power Recliner from Raymour & Flanigan. The arms contain large, covered storage compartments and there are two cup holders at the front of each arm, which is a handy feature. The chair was obviously designed for media rooms and that’s great, since Grady is a gamer.  Perhaps the most important feature is that it is tall enough to support Grady’s head (44″ tall overall) and the headrest is fully adjustable with the push of a button. Everything is motorized, so it’s very easy to operate. When fully extended, the chair is 66″ deep, so it does take up a lot of room in the bedroom floor plan.

You can visit the Raymour & Flanigan website for more details on this chair by clicking here:  Stylus Power Recliner

So now that we have our chair selected, and we know exactly where the furniture will be placed within the space, we can get on with designing the fun, decorative parts of our teen boy’s bedroom.  I’m very excited to share colors and fabrics with you next time on my blog!

Thanks for joining me today, for the latest installment on our renovations at The Shack.
There’s still a lot more to share with you, so I hope you’ll stick around as I post the before and afters in our little Poconos mountain house. Until then, make sure to like Robinson Interiors on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and Twitter, and DO stay tuned for future updates on The Shack!

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