Not sure why this thread is starting to make me fell kind of sad.
@Sue22 " dangerously high lofted beds" Iâll say! Those âuniversity approvedâ beds should have had rails! Shame on all of them!
My s had a similar set up as the today show. Meaning just the lofted beds with desks underneath. The furniture was set up that way. They werenât too high and gave the kids room for their desks.
Everything else about the room, wow! Bless their hearts.
That âbeforeâ shot of a dorm room - yikes! How depressing. No wonder people want to do some decorating.
It all still seems low key compared to one of my daughters neighbors at her university issued apartment ( where most sophomores live). The parents had a moving van move out and put in storage every stitch of the ( admittedly cruddy) university issued furniture and move in all new furniture! The mom reportedly had a designer plan it and told those who commented with a " wow" the furniture was " cheap and appropriate for a student" It was all from West Elm and Room and Board!!! (At the end of the year they switched out the universoty furniture again. )
I always wonder how many of the families setting their kids up with designer rooms re the same ones who are complaining about being in the college donut hole for FA. OTOH, maybe these are all full pay families with money to burn.
I think families like to underplay how much this all costs.
âWe refinished the desk for free and it only cost $40 at an antique shop!â (Plus the $80 in sandpaper, spray paint, safety masks, new knobs, gas and rental changes for the van, summer storage feesâŠ)
The average empty dorm room does look depressing, but as soon as you add a couple of colorful comforters and some photos from home it warms up pretty quickly.
I canât imagine spending move-in day shelf papering my kidâs desk and wastepaper basket.
ââWe refinished the desk for free and it only cost $40 at an antique shop!â (Plus the $80 in sandpaper, spray paint, safety masks, new knobs, gas and rental changes for the van, summer storage feesâŠ)â
A-ha-ha-ha!! So true. 
I wouldnât mind some of these over the top designer moms to come over and take care of my houseâŠ
Did anybody else notice the huge amount of makeup brushes on the desk on the Today Show article? I know the mom is a makeup artist so the daughter comes by it naturally, but seriously, I donât have enough face to use those all nor would I know what do do with them!
@CottonTales â thatâs the first my daughter spotted. She said there are more brushes there than in her high school theatre programâs make-up room.
@Sue22, the article I read about that room said it actually cost $2400!
The article I read also mentioned that the D is a pageant girl, so it stands to reason that she probably is into makeup, especially given that mom is a makeup artist. That article dug up other photos of the D in her pageant garb and in a bikini; people commenting seemed to think she purposely submitted the photos for attention, but Iâm thinking the magazine got them off her social media somehow.
A full 8 years ago this guy did up his dorm room at Drew in a way that puts the matchy-matchy monogram bedding to shame 
@OHMomof2 Iâve seen that room before and love it. The guy has gone on to a very nice career in the design industry. http://o-and-s.com/
And there was a spread on his studio apt in NYC.
http://www.housebeautiful.com/home-remodeling/interior-designers/a3976/max-sinsteden-apartment-interview/
Unless Drew is a school that requires on campus housing, wouldnât someone like this prefer an apartment? It sounds like money is not an issue, so I would think an apartment would be more to his liking!
My kids, I believe, did the typical dorm decorating; my son was only concerned about his playstation and a tv; my daughter was excited about her bedding! Of course some of my daughterâs friends had more decorated rooms than others, but I donât remember any being over the top. While some girls had Target or BBB bedding, there were some with designer names, but again, nothing too extravagant.
I also forgot to mention, what school allows alcohol in the dorm rooms 
At least when my kids were in college, alcohol was not allowed in the rooms. Of course there were plenty of rooms that were stocked, but it was not âallowedâ in the rooms.
There are advantages to staying on campus - community and ease of access to campus amenities - even if your school doesnât require you to do so. If a school is primarily residential, living off campus can be pretty isolating.
I wonder whether I am the only person who finds matching furniture and decor awfully old-fashioned and outdated (nothing personal, but I would not be able to live with it). Love the studio spread in housebeuatiful! (Note 8 pillows on his bed 
) The dorm room - not so much. It looks like Max has developed much more mature and sophisticated taste over time, which is not at all surprising.
I worked with a decorator to freshen up my living room and several other areas. It is amazing how much difference one can make by changing and repositioning furniture and accessories, and adding some textures and colors. All we have really done was replacing several rugs and light fixtures, adding custom window panels and hardware, and some wall art. I kept old furniture, although we moved several pieces between rooms.
Remember the great Modern Family episode where Haley gets kicked out of college and they have packed up and are leaving the dormâŠ
Phil says, âWhere are my keys?â
Haley replies, âTheyâre right there on the make up tableâ and walks toward the doorâŠ
Claire says outloud to herself, âOh honey, thatâs a desk.â
One of my favorite lines ever.
Speaking of Modern Family, we actually saw a family at D move in with matching T shirts that said âSusie Jones Moving Companyâ just like the Dunphys had when moving Haley in.
Not really sure what to make if that.
Many colleges mandate students live on-campus for at least the first year or two. Some residential colleges like my LAC officially require students to live on campus all 4 years unless they have a documented medical condition which couldnât be accommodated by dorms/dining hall/dining co-ops though in practice, a few seniors without such conditions are also sometimes allowed to live off-campus.
And living off-campus isnât necessarily more costly than dorm-livingâŠespecially if board/dining-co-op costs are accounted for and depending on the rental market near the campus area.
At my LAC, if I had been permitted to live off-campus in a 1 bedroom apartment off-campus just a block away from the main campus buildings/library, I have saved more than 2/3s the price of my room alone at the time. Add to it the board costs and the savings are more apparent. Since my near-full-ride FA/scholarship package did cover room and board along with the tuition, I didnât feel it as heavily as the full-pay students.
When an older friend attended NEU in the early '90s before the real estate boom, he recounted living off-campus was so much cheaper that even the 25% discount the university provided to upperclassmen to stay on campus wasnât considered worthwhileâŠespecially given the abysmal quality of the dormfood back then.
Since the 2000âs onwards, however, the real estate boom in the Boston area is such that nowadays, NEU has had to build more dorms and refurbish old ones to meet rising demand from upperclassmen who find they canât move off-campus because off-campus rentalsâŠespecially nearby ones are now too expensive for all except the well-off or those who are financially foolhardy. One younger friendâs educational debt a decade plus out from graduation is partially due to his decision to opt to live off-campus after sophomore year in a city with a sky high rental market.