A look inside Princeton cribs

Two 100-pound mirrors, a 1961 Manet painting, a map outlining the French colonies in Africa and four New Yorker covers are Pam Testani's answer to the typical dorm-room fare of band posters and plastic crates.

Steering clear of such supercenters as Bed Bath & Beyond, Marshalls and Target, the senior instead frequented The Annex and a New York flea market to furnish her room.

In doing so, Testani has tapped into a nationwide trend of students trying to design the perfect dorm room.

"I went during freshman week and left my room at about 7 a.m. Sunday morning in order to get to the flea market early," Testani, who lives in a single in 1901 Hall, said. "The earlier you arrive at the market, the better your options are."

Going to the flea market with the intention of finding a desk, Testani left with a car full of commodities — everything but a desk.

"The Africa map was just too good that they refused to bargain with me," Testani said. "I couldn't pass up the map, though, because the map matched perfectly with the curtains and color scheme of my room."

"I really managed to find things that make good, eclectic wall pieces for my room," Testani added. "The highlight of dorm shopping at flea markets is that you never know just what exactly you are going to find and what you are going to leave with in the end."

Approaches to a Witherspoon quad

Sophomores Dan O'Shea, Doorey Chung, Tyler Crosby and Felipe Martinez, living in a corner quad in Witherspoon this year, wanted to maximize the interior design while minimizing the cost. Buying plywood, screws and a stain wash at Home Depot, the students built, sanded and stained their own bar in one day.

From thrift stores they also bought a $1.50 "Happy Birthday" banner and a wooden pineapple emblem, which they mounted on their bar.

"The overriding theme of our room is the desire to be cheap," O'Shea said. "We didn't need the money because we really put all of our heart and all of our creativity into this room."

Nothing in the room, besides the refrigerator and the T.V., costs more than $50. Seeing a free couch on the side of the road by Wal-Mart one day, the students jumped on the chance to save even more.

"Tyler convinced me to go back later in a van to get the couch," Chung said. "There happened to be a little girl's jump rope in the trash on the side of the road, and so I tied the couch onto the van with the jump rope. If it wasn't for that little girl, we wouldn't have gotten this good deal of a couch."

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In contrast, Austin Chow '09, Cameron White '09, Mykel Kulkarni '09 and Dylan Cater '09 decided to make their room — a turret room in Witherspoon — high-tech. Among the furnishings are a 52-inch LCD High Definition television and a satellite 21-inch flat-screen T.V. The sophomores also set up a surround-sound speaker system and placed sub-woofers in their fireplace behind the sofa.

"We have it set up so that you can also watch the T.V. from sitting on the window seat in the turret," Cater said. "That way if you want to sit on the turret and get a nice cross-breeze and occasionally catch a glance of the game score while you read, you certainly can."

Decor tips

Amelia Rawls '07 offers an advice from her own experience in creating a attractive yet inexpensive interior design.

Curtains: "I never thought I'd be the person to do curtains, but otherwise you have industrial green blinds."

Wal-mart plastic frames: "It looks so much more decorative than tacking posters on the wall."

Damaged furniture: "It's not like your furniture won't get a knick in it by the end of the year anyway, so you might as well get the percentage off when you buy."