City-Themed Guest Suites

My husband and I love to travel and explore new cities. Since it's just the two of us, we try to plan around three trips each year. Recently, we ventured to San Francisco and New York City, and both cities did not disappoint with their distinctive charm and characteristics. And as I roam the streets of each city, I like to find home decor items to bring back and either give as gifts or display them in my home. This got me to thinking about two of our guest bedrooms that were lacking their own identity and for a lack of better word, style. Each room simply had a bed, miscellaneous furniture, and random wall art. Both rooms were the same size, and even faced one another on either side of the central hall. It wasn't until we were back home, sitting on the couch watching reruns, that I began scrolling through the photos from our trips, when I came up with the idea.

City-Themed Guest Suites

The design concept was slowly taking shape. Our guests would venture upstairs to the main hall, and at the top of the stairs, they would be faced with two decisions:

• Should I turn right and head East to the New York Suite; Or

• Should I turn left and head West to the San Francisco Suite?

Both suites would have a matching layout of furniture and wall art; but the details of each suite would be city specific.

The New York Suite

Tip #1: Keep your existing bedframes and mattresses. The goal is to focus primarily on upgrading the small accent furniture, decor, wall art, bedding, and all the miscellaneous details affiliated with the theme of the room: New York City.

For each suite, we carefully selected 5 photos to place around the bed because it was important to identify key characteristics of each city, as these would be the first images you see upon entering the New York Suite. The 3 images above the bed are of Brooklyn Bridge and the outer two images are of the New York skyline, as seen from the Empire State Building. If you're looking for a great place to print photos on canvas, we highly recommend Smallwoods Home. Everything can be customized and ordered online, and it ships quickly. And the best part, there's always a sale when you order in bulk!

• The Printed Photos you see in the images below were printed on canvas with an Almond color wood frame.

New York City is very industrial in its design and layout, so we made sure our furniture reflected this styling. We selected a medley of grays to be featured in the artwork, furniture, and bedding.

As you will see in both suites, we found handbags tailored to each city, and chose to hang them off the bedframes, just in case your guests need something to use when shopping in your city or town.

Each Suite had an accent wall that we chose to emphasize a key element of the city that had special meaning to us as a couple, and for New York, this was the Friends apartment building.

The San Francisco Suite

Similar to the New York Suite, we carefully selected 5 images to place around the bed. In similar fashion, the 3 images over the bed are of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the outer two images are of key streets in the city. We did not have a bedframe in this room, so we ordered one off Wayfair to reflect the structural cross-bracing we saw around the city. Several of our favorite eateries had cute bistro cafe tables that lined the sidewalks, and we thought it was be a great idea to incorporate that element into the nightstands for the San Francisco Suite.

• World Market had a great deal on bistro tables with a metal black base, and a white marble top.

San Francisco had a great selection of hand bags and totes, that we decided to fit as many as possible in our carry-on baggage, because you can't have too many totes, right?

Ikea sells a great 3-Pack of black Candle Holders, and the 8" LED tapered candles can be found on Amazon.

The Details:

• We found a red diecast car that reminded us of the Full House intro, and thought it would be a great decor item for one of the dressers.

• We also found a cute music box that was designed to mimic the infamous cable car of San Francisco.

Similar to the New York Suite, we selected an accent wall to emphasize a key element of the city that had special meaning to us as a couple, and for San Francisco, this was the Mrs. Doubtfire house.

Whenever our guests come over for a weekend getaway, the first question we ask them is:

Would you prefer the New York Suite or San Francisco Suite?