Whether you don’t want to know your baby’s gender ahead of time or you just want to get started on decorating the nursery, you can design a unisex room for baby that will be as charming and adorable as one with a gender-specific theme. Instead of gender, the emphasis will be on combining elements of fun, color and shape to create a nursery that will be a safe and welcoming place for your little boy or girl.

Don’t Pink or Blue.

The first thing to do in designing and decorating your unisex nursery is to pick any color but pink or blue. While blue is fast becoming a fashionable color for a female teen’s room, in a baby’s room old habits die hard. It’s best to skip blue altogether. Yellows and greens are popular color choices for the unisex nursery. However, there aren’t your only options. Go bright or bold with oranges, reds and purples. If you like the idea of bolder colors but they feel too intense to you, paint only one or two walls in the bright color as an accent in the room, and choose a complementary color for the other walls. For a more traditional nursery décor, pick a neutral palette such as beige, black and white, taupe or navy.

Choosing Nursery Furniture

Although some manufacturers offer crib sets in a particular gender specific theme, most don’t. Nevertheless, when choosing furniture for your baby’s unisex nursery, here are some things to avoid. 

• Again, associations come into play: white furniture is mostly associated with baby girls while black is a popular color for cribs in baby boys’ rooms.
• You don’t have to stick to contemporary or modern styles, but choose a crib, changing table or dresser that has decorative detail that can’t be construed as “girlie.”

Nursery furniture in light to medium wood finishes is the best choice.
 
Choosing a Nursery Theme

You don’t have to pick a specific theme for your unisex nursery if you don’t want to, but a theme will pull the different elements of the room together while adding your own unique stamp to the place where you baby will sleep and grow. Here are a small handful of unisex themes to get you started.

• Ocean / Seashore / Sea creatures
• Stars / Moon / Sun
• Farm animals / Jungle animals / Pets (skip cats as they tend to be linked to girl-themed rooms)
• Nursery rhymes
• Teddy bears
• Cartoon characters
• Characters from children’s books like Winnie the Pooh and The Wind in the Willows

 
Pulling it All Together

Purchase crib bedding to match the unisex theme you have chosen.

Because babies will be looking up for much of the first few months, hang a mobile above the crib or buy one that attaches to the crib’s side rails.
 
Layering decorative elements will give your unisex nursery visual interest. For example, you’ve painted the walls – now add a colorful border; it will introduce an element of fun into the décor.

Hang art poster or pictures to warm up the walls. Don’t forget to avoid gender-specific images.

Choose nursery accessories like a lamp, rug, pillows and blankets in a unisex theme.