When it comes to furniture, you can make a compact home feel spacious without compromising on comfort. Your home is simply a space placed on foundations, surrounded by walls, topped by a roof and filled with fixtures, furniture and possessions. The last two factors at least, are entirely within your control. In this post, I discuss tricks to make a compact home feel spacious and light.
How much space do you have?
When I visit the homes of clients for the first time, they often describe the house when they first moved in, when it was an empty blank canvas. The intention they had for this home hasn’t worked out quite as they planned. The empty house may have been impersonal but it had a feeling of space, light and potential. In contrast, their home may now feel dark, heavy and out of control.
When I see rooms crammed with furniture which is too large in number or size, I wince. In the UK, we still have a tendency aspire to large, bulky, long lasting furniture, particularly dining tables and chairs, sideboards and sofas. I
f we can afford the space then this isn’t so much of a problem. Certainly, this type of furniture almost certainly WILL last for a long time. But most of us don’t have lots of space – according to IKEA, Britain has the smallest homes in Europe. So it’s important to be realistic and aware of the square footage of your home. And even if we do have the space, should we cram it with furniture? It’s okay for space to be exactly that.
Happily, furniture can be smaller and more streamlined whilst still being comfortable. Small changes such as chairs which fit underneath a dining room table, desks which fold out and doors which slide open can make a huge difference in terms of the creation of space.
If furniture has multiple uses, we can get away with having less of it. Storage can be incorporated into areas which are already on display such as ottomans, beds, sofas and coffee tables. Instead of bulking out the floor level of a room, use the height as much as possible. Such as in the case of vertical storage e.g. shelves built around doors, floor to ceiling shelving, wall storage or even adding a mezzanine level.
Storage units can even be suspended from the ceiling so that they don’t take up any floor or wall space.
It’s time to stop focusing on the square footage of our homes and start ensuring each piece of furniture truly earns the space it occupies. These days we can benefit from the genius of the world’s most talented architects – their influence being evident in most retail stores today.
Thank you so much for reading! See this previous blog describing my favourite organising products, many of which are space saving. A professional organiser can take an objective look at your home and come up with suggestions you may not be aware existed. If this is what you need contact me at [email protected] or 07961770452