Many dorm rooms on campus have an uncanny resemblance to a jail cell or hospital room. The blinding white walls and industrial floor tile or carpeting are not exactly comforting. Sustainable dorm decorations and personal items can go a long way toward making your room feel less like a prison and more like home.

Because many dorms have strict rules about decorating, it can take a bit more creativity. There are many quick and easy ways to sustainably decorate your room on a student budget, and without breaking any rules.

Sustainable Dorm Decorations

One of the fastest and easiest ways to make your room more colorful and homey is to cover the white walls.

1. Use colored paper or wrapping paper to create or cover bulletin boards to show off all of your pictures of friends and family.

2. You can also make your own art or simple prints to hang.

3. Magazine cutouts are another great way to add some personality and repurpose; make a collage or hang up pages that inspire you.

4. You can make curtains out of fabric if you know how to sew. But if needlework isn’t your strong point, you can buy used curtains to bring some life to your windows. Fabric shower curtains are usually cheap and they come in bright colors and patterns. Be sure to choose cotton or another natural fabric that will break down easily at the end of its life and avoid polyester because it is difficult to recycle and will outlive us all.

5. To increase your storage space and organization, reuse the boxes and bins you moved in with. You can use your less attractive boxes as storage for under you bed, while milk crates make great storage boxes and stacked shelving.

6. Cardboard boxes can be covered with wrapping paper, fabric, or colored paper to make them an interesting piece you don’t have to hide.

7. You can also use smaller items like a cereal box to make a magazine or paper holder.

8. Smaller boxes can be cut and reshaped into drawer dividers to keep your desk neat or covered in paper or fabric to be left out on your desk.

Remember to use materials that can be easily repurposed or recycled when you are done. Use recyclable materials like paper as much as possible and avoid plastic, which breaks easily and cannot be recycled.

My computer went to sleep, only to never wake up again.

Dorms seem to have an uncanny resemblance to jail cells (not that I have first hand experience of a jail). The walls are blindingly white and blank and the floor is either industrial tile or carpet. When I first move in I always feel overwhelmed by the oppressive, empty walls.

Today I finished “expertly” shoving all of my belongings into the back of the car (I pride myself in being an expert at car-Tetris). While packing I realized I am incredibly thankful this is my senior year, mostly because I am so tired of packing and unpacking two, almost three, times a year. It’s exhausting. I find myself incredibly tempted to pick one suitcase and my backpack and say forget it to the rest. Unfortunately that would be mean I would have very little to wear and my roommates and I would be eating cold food off the counter.

The good news is that with my moving comes more time for blogging and more ideas. I have a busy year ahead of me, and I can’t wait to share it with you.

First on my list (other than unpacking) is decorating my dorm. I can’t wait to share my new ideas.

Almost every day at work I get emails from PR groups that feature their clients’ latest samples and products. I get packages in the mail from companies that want us to review their products. I get to see a lot of yoga gear before it’s available for sale, especially clothing.

We all know the old adage that beauty is from the inside, but author of “Beauty Pure and Simple: the Ayurvedic approach to beautiful skin,” Kristen Ma, proves just how true this may be. Ma, an Ayurvedic practitioner and esthetician, breaks down complex Ayurvedic concepts and skin conditions into easily understandable chapters. Her solutions to problems like acne, dry skin, sensitive skin, and many other skin ailments are simple to understand and easy to follow.

Ma incorporates the whole body’s health in the belief that the skin reflects trouble brewing underneath. She also explains why conventional skin products and medication aggravate and can create many skin problems. The book details the best skincare routines for every problem or skin type without pushing products or turning into a TV “infomercial”.

This book is a must for anyone who struggles with acne, dry skin, sensitive skin, rosacea, eczema, aging, or who just want to make their skin as healthy and beautiful as possible. Ma guides readers to look internally and find what may be the true cause of their ailment and how to best reach whole body health and a healthy, radiant complexion.

Homemade Body Butter Ingredients:

This part always makes me hungry. The coconut oil smells great and it looks just like a piece of a yummy dessert.

Place your butter into an air tight container and store in a cool place away from sunlight. (If the oil gets too hot it will melt and harden as it cools, losing its whipped texture and making it much harder to use.)

Ads flash by me on the walls of the BART tunnels. The magazine I read on the train is at least 30 percent advertisement. As I walk out of the station and into the Financial District of San Francisco, I watch the people surge toward the street corners and take note of what they are wearing, driving, or riding. I get to work and I open boxes full of samples from companies who want them featured in the magazine and instantly decide if it’s something I like or not. 

On my lunch break I run the Embarcadero and wish I had a new running top for cold days and headphones that didn’t stop working as soon as I got sweaty. I like that girls shoes, I wish I had a bag like that, what if I had a bike like that guys. 

I’m bored while I eat lunch so I sneak online and I see what the best running headphones are, how much would a new shirt cost, wouldn’t it be great if I could own a shirt just like that sample sitting on my desk?

I know I’m not the only one to notice the advertisements and pretend like I don’t only to find myself thinking about the product later in the day. And it’s not just the ads, but also the people around us and what they have that make us want more things. 

This summer has been a constant struggle for me to balance these wild, and sometimes practical, consumer desires. In order to reduce just how many items I am buying to save not only money, but also the resources and environmental impact I have been:

1. Avoiding malls and stores. I only go when I have an absolute necessity and then I stick to my list.

2. I make a list of things that I absolutely “need” and things I would like. The items have to sit on that list for at least a week but ideally more than two. If after two weeks I realize I lived without it just fine I either delete it or move it to the want/like list. So far this summer I have added at least 20 items to my like/want list, and all except for one were deleted.

3. Look for another option. I have so many possessions already that I’m bound to already own the solution. I don’t need that bag because I have one that I can make work. I don’t need another running shirt if I do a load of laundry midweek. I don’t need a notepad because I can just divide the one I already own in half. It turns out I can fill my needs with what I already have for the majority of the things on my need list. 

4. Let it go. So what if I like something better than what I have? What I have works, and I liked it when I first bought it. It’s time to like what I have and realize that they are only objects, and if it’s not functional, I don’t need it.