One of the biggest challenges of interior decoration is to make a small space look bigger, whether it’s just one room, or an entire apartment. Space is an expensive business in today’s property market but a cluttered living area can be frustrating and not the most comfortable of places to come home to.
Fortunately, there are plenty of simple tips that can create the illusion of extra space without having to get the builders in.
Utilise the Light
It’s generally well-known that paler colours can enlarge a room before your very eyes, so as a first step, always choose a light or neutral shade as the main colour for your walls. Light is also a key tool in making a space seem larger so make sure the windows let in as much as possible. Choose light-coloured blinds instead of curtains so that the sun sneaks in, even when closed.
Another visual trick is to balance your artificial light place lamps at the same level around the rooms and use the same type of bulb to make the look symmetrical. Energy-saving bulbs are best as then they can stay on for long periods, especially if your rooms don’t receive much light in the daytime. White light is generally better than yellow to give a clean, spacious effect.
Smart Furnishing
It makes sense to modify the size of your furniture if you have a small apartment so that the scale fits and you’re not constantly tripping over large armchairs or tables that just get in the way. This is also important to make sure you have clear gangways to move from room to room and use the space more efficiently.
Ideally, any furniture you do buy you should fit in with the colour scheme or be as pale as possible to reduce the feeling of clutter. For those on a budget, utilising services like Wirral Partnership Homes flats can be transformed. Or you could save by painting existing bulky furniture as an alternative or sell it online and hunt in second-hand stores for a better fit.
Smart furniture is about making the most of storage opportunities. So think coffee tables with built in drawers to tidy away mail or notepads. Beds with underside drawers can be really useful for spare sheets and towels. Make use of the whole wall-space by putting up high shelves above free-standing pieces like bookcases and get a wall-mounted unit for the TV and other electronic equipment.
Optical tricks like mirrors also work and using transparent features from glass tables to see-through shower curtains makes objects simply blend in with the surroundings.
Of course, there are exceptions to most rules and you don’t have to be strict when it comes to things like colour. A strong, deep colour can work if you use other shades of the same colour group in the room, getting gradually paler to create more depth.
The main thing to remember is to open up the floor space; whether this means pushing furniture to the wall or using storage to turn your clutter into a feature. More room to manoeuvre makes even the tiniest of households feel like a home.