How To Decorate Your Room

I’m not going to suggest that judging books by their covers is the right philosophy to adopt in life, but it is nevertheless the healthy and correct way to go about Freshers Week. As a spring-lamb, babe-in-arms fresh(wo)man, you will inevitably be presented with a vast array of new books at University – can you see where this tiresome, clichéd metaphor is headed yet? – not just in terms of the rip-roaring roller-coaster of French gender theory available in the MML library, but also – here it comes (yurgh!) – new people and environments.

By no means will you have time between readjusting your name-sticker and downing your complimentary Vod-bull to engage anyone in an introductory interview earnest enough to arrive at the darkest depths of your target’s existential core, so don’t even try. Take a look, have a sniff, ask for a private tour of their bedroom, and then, senses contented and permitting, add them to your phonebook. Keep it superficial. Keep it snappy.

1.)    Invest in a rug

The Fresher of the savvier series will never underestimate the importance of sensuality in the living quarter. Whilst a well-chosen shag pile does indeed fulfil an aesthetic function, its true impact lies more in the realm of the kinetic. Whether a sheepskin pelt or straw weave, your mat of choice communicates to the passing guest that your room is to be encountered in a wholly different way; be on your knees for a coffee, lie nose-deep in shag for a drunken miss-Mummy sob, or sprawl yourself seductively in front of the Eastenders omnibus on iPlayer.

Your rug will also double as a memory sponge more potent – although not quite as destructive to your self-esteem – than your Facebook Timeline circa 2007. A rogue scent will escape as you sit beside your rug in the car at the end of term, simultaneously recalling not just the mushroom vomit of Christmas Superhall past, or indeed the gory horror of last weekend’s essay nosebleed, but the time you drunkenly consummated your college marriage across a half-finished Indian takeaway. The brown masala smears on the then-virginal white fluff not only represent a lack of gratitude for your food, but the eternal condemnation of your impure soul. As I said: memory sponge.

What does your rug say about you?

2.)    Gap Year Paraphenalia

To not demonstrate in an in-your-face and vibrant way how travelled and interesting you are would be a travesty akin to Jonah Falcon entirely boycotting lycra cycling shorts. For the sake of our Good Lord, work that priceless (yet bargain) fertility statue into your suitcase and douse your walls in death masks. I’m sure that anybody unlucky enough to end up staring at the ceiling during an after-hours Meet-n-Greet would be only too grateful for something to look at whilst you flummox your way to completion, so hang that cotton tapestry from above. Which one? The one depicting the woman in traditional Malian dress grounding flour, of course! Although not technically authentic, nip down to town for some Nag Champa while you’re at it. This will fill your den of ‘curios’ (your word not mine) with a musk fit for the royalist of nostrils and one which, in its hypnotising smoke vortex, alludes to some of your more contemplative moments in Thaibiza. You are a beguiling mystery of a person, so don’t fall prey to that Keep Calm And Study On poster that Dad bought you.

3.)    Atmospheric lighting

Now that your room is beginning to feel like Tutankhamen’s digs pre Howard Carter, it would be fatal to neglect the lighting. Most colleges will provide you with a default, energy efficient strip; something not far from the sort currently illuminating Addenbrooke’s A&E unit. This, unfortunately, will wash you out, highlight the ever present motifs of a recent puberty and bring out urine and ‘lassi’ stains on your knock-off CKs more effectively than any ultra-violet; a lucent tricolon of despair which will prevent you from looking your horniest when it really matters. For a pulsating glimmer that will put you back in the running, look no further than Ikea’s beloved ‘tea light’; a trusty stalwart of domestic enlightenment. Show interior taste beyond your years by mounting one on a floating leaf, and then placing it in a recycled fish bowl alongside a colourful assortment of pebbles and maybe a few cameo appearances from your mom’s potpourri.

Don’t be left in the dark

4.)    Leisure books collection

No matter how hard you try to convince yourself – or your personal statement – that you are the sort of person who reads the Communist Manifesto for fun (in the shower with one arm extended away from the jet), this is not the case. Indeed, if it is the case, The Tab would like to gently suggest that you make it not the case. There is no need for your bedroom book collection to be comprised entirely of Judith Butler or Marco Polo. In fact, should Marco Polo have ever been an undergraduate with access to a Heffers, I’m sure he wouldn’t have opted for Marco Polo either. He’d have opted for Stormbreaker (now a major motion picture!) or indeed Mr Tickle. So nurture your bookshelf as a beacon of your playful side in adorning it with something altogether more Mildred Hubble than your supervisor put on your reading list.

“…cast our spells with zest…”

5.)    Novalty pet

They don’t do shared bedrooms at Cambridge. This is the reason why the majority of us are painfully introverted, average-to-poor at spooning and masturbate furiously enough to warrant a repetitive strain injury. You’re going to have to think outside the box then, and populate your room with, if not human or even superhuman, a subhuman cohabiter. Invest one to two hours of your mid-lecture, mid-really-hard-work time to stalking either the Fitzwilliam squirrel sanctuary or Emma frog pond. Then simply capture your creature of choice, assign it a margarine tub appropriate to its size, and install on your desk inbetween your OED and your purely-for-show pack of Durex. Cut a nice hole at the front so that visitors can ogle at their own leisure, or even add a tiny pair of velvet curtains that you can draw back for that “Surprise it’s a rodent!” factor.

Heed the above counsels, and your room will give you the reputation that you really deserve. You know, the kind which precedes you. In fact, invite us round for tea sometime. We’ll sit on your rug (See! We’ve heard all about it!) and have a tickle of whatever you found in the bulrushes.