Our Fifth Wheel Bedroom Makeover
Keystone does an excellent job with the interior style of their newest fifth wheel models, so when we bought a brand new RV for full time living, we knew we wouldn’t have to do much to remodel the spaces.
That said, of course we had to make the space our own! And there were a few things in our master bedroom especially that just had to go!
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One of our absolute favorite areas of our Montana High Country is our bedroom.
We comment all of the time how cozy and comfortable it is, and we honestly just love it!
So what did we do to our space to level it up?
1. Replaced our RV mattress
This was a HUGE deal for us. We knew going into it, that it doesn’t matter how great they say the mattress is… it’s still an RV mattress, and it’s still GOT TO GO.
Plan on replacing your mattress as an upfront expense. We went a whole month sleeping on the rig’s mattress before replacing it (what were we thinking?). We replaced the mattress with a 12 inch thick Nectar mattress, king size (what our rig could accommodate), and it’s been fantastic (we’re still saying 2 years later).
Given our bed is in our rig’s slide, it DOES put our heads a few inches closer to the ceiling, and closer to the bright lights over our bed. But we got used to it quickly – it was worth it for us to have a 12 inch mattress.
2. Got Beddy’s bed covers
Every RVer might do it… but we all do it because THEY ARE AWESOME (and no, we’re not being paid to say that).
Making our beds was awful. You get the usual dishevel of things, then the headache of making it all straight again as you and your mattress are shoved up against the wall. Near impossible.
Enter Beddy’s… the zippable bedding that makes making your bed daily in an RV a reality. We don’t fight over the covers anymore, they are extremely warm, easy to wash at the laundromat, and a breeze to make daily (our little secret to starting the day right).
This is our set (not affiliated), and we went all out with the minky (because that cozy goodness shouldn’t be just for babies).
3. Replaced the headboard and sidetables
We knew the moment we saw the silly little plywood headboard with a not-so-great pattern we’d be replacing it.
But at first we weren’t sure with what.
Weight in the RV is always a top concern, so Melody decided to go with paint. She’d always wanted to try painting an ombre wall, and wanted only a subtle hint of color (and green is her color).
So she picked up a sponge, and lots of little quarts of paint, and we love how it turned out!
Note: we used mold resistant paint as a base layer since this wall sees a LOT of moisture. Just a little added security on top of the aesthetics.
Take a look at those original side tables (really just side shelves). They’re metal, bulky, and dangerous (Melody cut her head open on the corner of it). So we replaced those with little wicker basket shelves and they’ve been great!
4. Ripped out the closet and put in a more functional storage option
This was one of our biggest projects, and to be honest – it’s still not complete!
There were a few things wrong with our closet setup:
There was one big rod across the width of the closet, and the brackets kept falling out that supported it.
The closet wasn’t deep enough to allow regular size hangers to hang straight.
The closet was so short, the bottoms of clothes sat on the bottom of it, causing wrinkles.
The shelf above the rod wasn’t super functional, and it was starting to fall apart.
As much as we liked the mirrors on the doors… the closet had to go.
We wanted to put in a small dresser so that each of us had nice large drawers for the majority of our clothes, and move the rod up higher and towards the front of the closet so that it fit regular hangers.
We ended up getting four IKEA dressers that we stacked and mounted to the walls. We have to velcro them for travel days, but it’s been a sufficient (and good looking enough) solution to organize all of our clothes in our RV.
What’s not finished? (honest moment)
The doors. Right now it’s a curtain, and it honestly works well. But someday we’ll have a nice little sliding barn door.
The shelf above the rod. We really want to put a few small shelves up towards the top, but we honestly haven’t even needed the storage there yet so we keep forgetting about it.
Custom shelf to the right of the dresser. I do have a basket there, and we could really use shelves. But it’s a custom job, and we just haven’t gotten around to it!
5. Replaced our dresser
This was a interesting decision because our dresser was fine enough. Especially with the closet remodel, we didn’t need much from our dresser.
But that was the point. It was awfully deep, yet the drawers mostly unusable, for something we didn’t even feel like we really needed.
So we ripped it out and replaced it with an IKEA shoe dresser.
This is more shallow (by a few inches), giving us a wider walk space at the end of the bed. The shoe compartments are also more practical for storage than the shallow and short drawers of the original dresser.
Our son has the majority of his clothes in it so he can reach everything and choose his clothes daily. We have some pants rolled and placed in two of the drawers. It works great for us, and though it’s more shallow, is still adequate for a quick work call when one of us needs to be behind closed doors!
Note: adding a more shallow dresser means revealing the holes in the FLOOR from the previous dresser. UGH! But we solved this by simply putting a rug over those holes. No one even knows…
6. Installed our washer dryer combo unit
We knew we’d want a washer and dryer in our RV. Having the hookups in our bedroom made sense, and we thought it was nice it was tucked away in a little closet.
Well, it wasn’t an ideal install, to say the least. We had been warned to get our rig with the washer and dryer already in it. But it was at the bottom of our list for fifth wheel “must haves.”
The unit is HEAVY and unruly, and getting it lifted up into the cupboard space WITH the bed frame super close… looking back, we’re not sure how we even did it.
But it’s in now, and we only have to tip it outside of the space to drain the filter from time to time.
We love this washer/dryer combo unit so far!
It’s a “smart washer” so it ties to our phone and alerts us of wash cycles, drying time, errors, etc.
Is it small? YES.
But we can honestly get more laundry done at a time than we thought we would be able to originally. We still have to visit the laundromat to wash our blankets, and other bulky items (our Sand Cloud towels thankfully fit), but all in all, it tackles even the dirtiest washes!
While we decided to keep the doors off of the cabinet space so that it wouldn’t interfere with the washer door, it isn’t an eye sore at all.
7. Added organization solution
Coats. Where do we put all of our coats??
It’s been one of the hardest things for us to organize, but having a small rack behind the bedroom door made the most sense for lighter weight coats and jackets that were easy to stow and grab. Our big bulky coats are only brought into the RV for the season, and we store them at the top of our closet rod.
Hats.
We have SO many hats, and we were only adding to our collection on our travels! While this is probably NOT the best solution for going down the road, our hat holders on the wall keep our hats stored in a nice place, out of the way, and are convenient to grab. Usually only one or two fall on travel days.
Jewelry.
Organizing my (Melody’s) jewelry has been a challenge, so I found a great wall hanging solution that the majority of my jewelry can go on. I also bought a small jewelry container for my earrings that I move to the bed on travel days.
I downsized a MASSIVE amount of my jewelry before moving into the RV – but somehow what’s left still tends to seem like a lot! I suggest storing as much of your jewelry as possible, unless you really do intend to hike Glacier with those big hoop earrings…
Shoes.
So. Many. Shoes for a family of four! While the majority of our shoes reside by the front door in a cubby, our nicer shoes and slippers go in these IKEA shoe cabinets that hang on the end of our bed.
8. Added decor
This is how you make your space really personal! From the wall colors to the hanging plants and artwork, we added a little bit of personalization to make it feel like ours. We still need to hang a wedding photo… but for now the little touches suffice.
Check out a walk through of our master bedroom (and entire rig!) over on YouTube! 11:42 is our master bedroom tour.
We’ve had SO much fun renovating our Montana High Country Fifth Wheel for our full time rving family! The master bedroom was a priority for us, and we’re so happy with how comfy and functional our space is. It’s relaxing, inviting, cozy, and we sleep really, REALLY well in our king size bed. No skimping on any luxuries over here!
What’d we miss? Anything else we should add to our master bedroom?