8 Things You Probably Had In Your Room As A Preteen That You'll Totally Covet Now

During our adolescent years, our bedrooms (or personal corners of shared bedrooms, for those of us who bunked with siblings), were our sanctuary — a much-needed escape from pressures like parents, homework, middle school cliques, and youth sports leagues. Hey, this stuff may sound trivial now, but in retrospect, there was no concern more all-consuming than whether or not you-know-who from homeroom was going to chat you on AIM that night. And while we certainly put plenty of time and money into cultivating our apartments and homes now — even if they’re sometimes less-than-spotless — nothing compares to the effort that went into decorating our childhood bedrooms. Because when you only have a tiny sliver of space in the world to call your own, you deck. It. Out.

These obsessively decorated spaces both gave us room to develop our burgeoning aesthetic sensibilities, and at the same time, often had a suspicious amount in common with the bedrooms of our friends and favorite fictional characters. (Come on, we can’t be the only ones who coveted Melissa Joan Hart’s room on Clarissa Explains It All or tried to copy Regina George’s canopy bed from Mean Girls.) Just as there are trends in decor now, there were trends in decor then, and our preteen selves subscribed to pretty much every single one of them at once. While we’re certainly not suggesting anyone revert back to the full Limited Too lifestyle, there are some throwback bedroom accessories that could integrate surprisingly well into our grown-up homes. Hey, maybe your parents even still have some of it packed away in a box somewhere.