Joanna Gaines’s Renovation of This Dated Home Has Our Minds BLOWN
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If you’re staring at your tired-looking home and seeing drab walls, frightening fixtures, and dollar signs, you’re not wrong. According to the 2022 Houzz & Home report—a survey that tracks home renovation trends in the U.S.—the average median spend on a home makeover in 2021 was a whopping $18,000.
Celebrity renovator Joanna Gaines, however, is here to tell us that a budget renovation is—hallelujah—indeed possible. Recently, she came to the aid of a fellow Texan friend whose dated, wood-paneled home needed some much-needed TLC. The catch? Gaines had a budget of just under $5,000 to work with—a far cry from the epic castle transformation she completed with her husband and creative partner, Chip, on the latest season of their hit series, Fixer Upper.
“This house was your typical fixer in the sense that it had not been updated in 20 years,” Gaines tells ELLE DECOR. “Thankfully, styles tend to come back around so even the ‘offenders’ in this house had redeeming qualities.”
While the homeowner was away on her honeymoon, Gaines and her renovation team at Magnolia got to work on conducting what they call a mini reni, leveraging cost-effective-yet-stylish design hacks to create the cozy abode her friend always dreamed of. With such a small budget, Gaines and her team had to make some tough design calls. But the refresh ultimately paid off, proving you can go for broke without actually going broke. See below for how Gaines and the Magnolia team pulled off the dramatic transformations of the living and dining rooms. Did we mention it took them only eight days?
Do: Work with What You’ve Got (Budget Included)
If your home has “character” in all the wrong ways, never fear. Try to think of it as an asset. In the case of this house, for example, the wood paneling, tiled floors, and oddly textured drop ceilings could be interpreted as apparitions from a decorator’s worst nightmare. But Gaines chose to embrace them: “The biggest thing in the living room was its age,” she tells us. “The ceiling looked a little dingy, the wood paneling felt outdated, and the tile was bland. The client wanted this to be a den, so my biggest goal was to make it feel cozy and to create a space they would love to hang out in.”
As she saw it, the $5,000 budget gave the Magnolia team two options: they could either obliterate the budget on new wood floors, or stretch it out with a fresh paint job, new lighting, and new furniture. “I knew the latter could go a long way,” Gaines says.
Don’t: Be Afraid to Adjust the Game Plan When Necessary
After giving the dingy walls and ceilings in the living room a good clean and a coat of primer, Gaines decided to paint the room a soothing shade of deep green and leave the textured ceiling white. But when she stepped back to inspect the final result, “it created this odd, white-green-white sandwich so we decided to paint the ceiling green as well, which created that cozy, tucked-in den feeling we were going for,” Gaines shares. Lesson learned? Don’t be afraid to reach for Plan B when necessary—especially when living room sandwiches are involved.
Do: Leverage Color
“Color is the biggest extension of our personality and style, and I’ve loved letting myself evolve in this area as a designer over the years,” Gaines tells us. To achieve a cozy feel in the living room, she selected a shadowy shade of green (Look familiar? It’s the same hue Chip and Joanna used in their castle restoration). In the dining room, however, she accentuated the natural light that flooded the space by selecting a cool dove gray.
Gaines’s top advice when it comes to color? You do you. “If you’re intimidated by using color in your space, here’s my take: When you find yourself drawn to bolder tones or colors—it could be time to just go for it in your home,” she says. In other words, take it as a sign. “If you’re feeling a pull to go beyond grays and whites, go for it! If it seems a little scary, start small,” she says.
Don’t: Forget About Balance
If you’re still flummoxed when it comes to color, try both bolds and neutrals. But let the space—its light, size, and function—be your guide. “To balance the darker, moody feel of the living room, we created a light and airy feel in the dining room. Doing an accent wall didn’t feel right for the space, so we went with an accent ceiling with a dimensional design,” Gaines says.
Do: Embrace the Transformational Power of Rugs
Short on time and cash? A rug can cover a multitude of design sins, per Gaines. “We knew we wanted to hide the living room’s dated tile, and investing in a large area rug was a lot cheaper than installing new hardwood floors,” she says. “If you don’t have the budget for a rug or a larger piece of new furniture, just ask yourself: ‘What’s the simplest thing I can do?’ and build from there.”
Don’t: Forget About Your Ceilings
Amid hand-wringing about color choices, furniture, and rugs, it’s easy to forget that your biggest design asset might possibly be hovering just overhead. For the mini home makeover, Gaines made the previously humdrum ceilings into the home’s showpieces. In the living room, for instance, she maintained the odd panels but painted them green—a move that makes a design faux pas feel suddenly intentional, not to mention chic.
“The color in the living room highlights the vertical lines in the paneling and the diamond pattern on the ceiling, and that play on texture is just beautiful,” she says. And in the dining room, Gaines ditched the idea of an accent wall for an accent ceiling, complete with more decorative features like ceiling panels and moldings.
“The soft gray on the ceiling creates an unexpected statement that brings the whole space to life in an affordable and creative way,” she adds.
Do: Embrace Accents
If you’re super strapped for cash, use bright accent pieces to draw the eye across your room. “I’m a big believer that swapping in a few small things can make a big impact,” Gaines insists. “Think about how you can play around with dimension, color, and texture—like incorporating seasonal accent pillows or a new throw blanket, or simply adding a new vase with large, fresh-cut stems to your cocktail table. It’s often those small additions that become big shifts in how we feel about our homes.”
Don’t: Reinvent the Wheel
To save time and money, Gaines turned to two familiar sources of design inspiration: her own home and her own furniture line, Magnolia Market. “Since we had a tight deadline, I chose furnishings, rugs, and decor that I could easily grab from Magnolia Market—our shop here in Waco—I also have a few of these pieces in my own home,” Gaines shares. “It was basically a copy and paste from our home into the mini reni living room because I loved how it looked all together. The story is similar with the dining room—that table is in my craft room, and I felt like it’d be a great fit in this space because of the soft, rounded top and beautiful base.”
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