Molly Bell and Sam Heptonstall, a young couple from Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire, decorated the home with upcycled furniture and artwork they’ve created themselves

A young couple have transformed their first home and have added £80,000 on the property’s value by upcycling furniture and using artwork they’ve created themselves.

Molly Bell, 26, and Sam Heptonstall, 29, bought their home for £185,000 and were desperate to give it a makeover to better suit their tastes.

The house in Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire, was a typical 1930s property, painted in bright colours and had dated furnishings.

So the thrifty couple used clever DIY tricks and upcycling furniture to suit their tastes without splashing out on new items.

Molly, a marketing manager, gave their downstairs shower/utility room a makeover on a budget using some leftover Frenchic black paint and marble vinyl cover which cost £10. She painted the chrome shower doors, then painted the utility cupboards and covered the work surface in the marble sticky roll.

She also upcycled an old storage box using leftover paint from another project, giving the box a stunning makeover without spending a penny.

Molly also turned a £17 plain glass vase from IKEA into an on-trend neutral toned decorative pot using a sample pot of concrete-effect spray from B&Q which cost £5.50. She estimates a similar stone vase would have cost £40.

She even tried her hand at arts and crafts, creating her own abstract art piece for the lounge, spending £20 on paints and a canvas – as opposed to an estimated £300 that a similar art piece could have set them back.

The couple also did the panelling in their bedroom and the dining room themselves, following Instagram video tutorials and spending £150 on materials.

The couple finished the interior renovations in just under four months, moving in on December 19, 2020.

“We’re really pleased with the results – we’ve created our dream home, which we can see us living in forever,” Molly said today.

“We are completely finished now and it has completely transformed our home.”

The detached property is now worth £265,000 – a staggering 40% increase on the price they bought it for in August last year.

It has three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, dining room, lounge, and conservatory.

Molly added: “We wanted to put our own stamp on it and create something we could call our own, so we decided to go for it and do a complete renovation.

“It soon turned into a building site.”

Professionals carried out the larger jobs – including removing the wall, working on the conservatory and the electrics – but Molly and Sam took charge of the cosmetic work.

Molly said: “We had evenings and weekends where we could just crack on and get stuff finished – we would sometimes be here until 9 or 10pm at night finishing off bits.

“Me and Sam were useless going into this – I’d never even painted a room before and Sam hadn’t used a drill.

“You just kind of learn as you go.”