Gothic Bedroom Design

My love of the old Dracula movies inspired me to design my own Gothic bedroom. I so much admired the medieval looking decor that I started really looking at how those castle bedrooms were decorated.

The first thing I noticed was the candelabras. Before electricity that was their only form of lighting. For a proper Gothic bedroom you definitely need a great candelabra.

Color scheme is a bit difficult to detect in the old black and white movies but I've found that rich reds, royal purples, deep blacks,satiny golds, and all of the gem colors, work very well. Your bedding pattern must be of a regal design, stripes or crests, or simply solid colors with lots of velvet, lace, and fringe work. The large 4 post bed should be topped with a lacy canopy, or fringy drapes and have an assortment of billowy pillows on it.

Wrought Iron adds a touch of the ancient. Crosses and over door decorations should all be made of wrought iron, or look like it is.

Of course you will still want the modern conveniences of electricity but be sure that it doesn't stand out too much. You can find Gothic looking lamps with scroll work on the bases and even in the upper lighted areas. You can even find lamps and ightbulbs that resemble candles.

Your pictures and accessories should not have a modern look. Think Medieval paintings - swords, dragons, crests, Kings, and Queens. Since my room is based on Dracula, I have a great picture of a vampire, ready to sink his teeth in, at the side of my bed.

The most important thing to remember is to have fun designing your Gothic bedroom. Watch the old movies, study the medieval designs in books and start designing your own castle hideaway!

Your Gothic bedroom should have an old look and feel to it. Think dark and dusty without it actually being dirty and filled with cobwebs. Believe it or not, you can acquire this look with a new coat of paint.

To get started you need to choose a paint color that compliments your bedding and taste. While a Gothic bedroom should be dark, black paint on the walls isn't neccessary. I'd try to go with tones of a dusty white, sepia, or gray. Stay away from anything bright or flourescent.

I chose to use a nuetral color with a slight golden tone to it as the back color in my bedroom, to match the gold in my bedding and curtains, and a brownish colored paint for the accent, but I believe this technique will work with any color you like.

Once you've chosen your wall color, you'll need to choose an accent color. This color should be in the same family as your chosen wall color,but a shade or two darker. You can also go with a dark gray, or if you've chosen a fairly dark color for your walls, you might want to use black. Test the colors to see if they go together using the paint chip samples at your local paint store.

Once you've got your colors, paint the entire room with the lighter color. Depending on the type of paint you use, this usually takes two coats.

After the paint on your walls is completely dry, comes the fun part! Using a very thin artist's paint brush, or the edge of a folded piece of sturdy paper, paint thin, uneven lines to look like cracks onto your walls, running from the top corners (where two walls meet the ceiling) in varying lengths, no more than 1/4 of the way down the walls. In order to keep your cracks realistic looking, don't go all the way to the floor. If a real wall cracked like that, it would crumble and cave in.

As you paint the lines (cracks) down the walls, keep your paint brush on the dry side, and don't re-wet your brush until you start a new line. The lines should appear darker and fuller near the ceiling and fade away as they descend down the wall, just like actual cracks do.

Do this in all four corners of your room, but don't make the cracks look symetrical, and keep the lines thin. Each corner should have it's own unique look. If you like, you can paint a few "cracks" in the center of the walls, starting from the ceiling, but I don't recommend you do too many. Sometimes, less is more and in this case less cracking will look much more realistic.

Throughout this page there are pictures and descriptions of Gothic and Medeval Bedrooms to help you get a good idea of what a Gothic Bedroom should, or could, look like.

Although these pictures are limited to what the camera caught, your own Gothic bedroom ideas are limitless. Use these photos and your own imagination to create your unique interpretation of a proper Gothic bedroom.

Have fun with it!






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Your Gothic bedroom window treatments should be long, full, and billowy with sheer panels of lace peeking out through satiny, or velvet, curtains. They should flow and flutter with the breeze of an open window and yet look majestic when sitting still.

Your curtain colors should be the same rich colors as your bedding or something similar that will compliment them. Think ruby red, black, gold, or deep purples, and maroons.

I chose liquid gold curtains with black lace and a valance that matches my comforter with black jacquard stripes over gold. I'm very pleased with the color combination and the antique look of the lace curtains. (I got my lace curtains at Big Lots, believe it or not. It's like they say in their commercials, you never know!)

To add to the medieval look of your Gothic bedroom windows, you might look for scrolling, or crescent shaped, wrought iron door toppers and attach them to the walls just about your curtains. I found some great scrolling door toppers at Kirklands for my own room and placed them not only above the curtains but over each of the doors too. They give the walls a taller appearance and add to the mystique and majesty of the room.

(Lace image from www.costumes.org)

This is a wonderful depiction of a gothic bed.

The bed itself is made of wrought iron and is available through Thewroughtironco.com.

I love the way the canopy works as the crowning glory of this beautiful bedroom layout. In my opinion the drape behind the bed brings everything together.

The opposing colors of the pillows work well too.

The neatly squared canopy and the trunk at the end of this bed give it it's Gothic charm.

The traditional canopy bed, draped with an abundance of fabric adds a bit of romance to this medieval room.

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The simple styling of this understated bed and bedding are truly Gothic in nature.

You can see that to acheive a rustic medieval look you don't have to spend a fortune on trinkets and baubles.

The carved wooden bed gives this room it's Gothic taste and feel.

This Gothic bedroom is fit for a King, or Queen.

Candles, candlesticks and a simple wooden jewel box give this vanity a Gothic tone.

This room achieves the dark Gothic look by including medieval statues, Celtic crosses and some other dark objects.

Again we find that simplicity works well in a Gothic bedroom.

The quaint styling of this bed does all of the work to give this room a medieval look and feel.

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