Dr. Seuss Baby Nursery

by Barbi Honeycutt
(Willow Spring, NC, USA)

I painted this nursery for my best friend when she was expecting her first baby. My best friend has always loved Dr. Seuss, and we based the nursery on the design of a lamp from the book "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish". I also took a trip to Seuss Landing at Universal Studios in Florida to see how they brought the book to life in a theme park.

We used American Tradition paints in primary colors: red, green, blue, and yellow, and we also used purple, white and black as needed.

I drew the top "wavy" border by hand using the design from the lamp. Then, we projected images of the book onto the wall and traced the designs using paint pens and filled the color with paint. My best friend's husband cut out the letters from wood (seen in the border) to give the wall more emphasis and to match the lamp.

For the mirror, my best friend drew it by freehand based on a picture I took from Seuss Landing in Florida. Then her husband cut it out to make it 3-dimensional. We also made the signs (this way, that way) from wood and painted it to match the room. My best friend's mom handmade the window treatment, and then we re-finished the rocking chair and armoire to match the new nursery theme. Closet doors were replaced with a curtain to give the room more of a whimsical feel.

We used primary colors for the bedding, so it was pieces from different sets.

It took about a month to finish the nursery room, working on the weekends. Overall, the room was fairly easy once we got over our fear of trying something totally outside of the box. I have never seen a Dr. Seuss baby nursery that included three dimensional handmade artwork. We adapted the images from Seuss Landing and the book and put our own spin on it to make it special. The hardest part was probably drawing the wave around the room to mimic the lamp.

It was fun and everyone in the family had a chance to have some part of the room that they helped create. Me, my best friend, my husband, my best friend's mom, and my best friend's husband all jumped in with ideas and projects.

I love the nursery because it is unique. It is not a typical nursery. I think we really brought the Seuss "world" to life for Emma (my best friend's little girl).