Apartments are different: large and small, comfortable and not so comfortable, but almost every one has a room that is very small in size. You can make a good nursery out of such a room, which is well suited for a small household, or you can make a living room, if the location allows it.
It is not always possible to combine rooms. The partition, which is load-bearing wall, can destroy everything. Sometimes it happens that the owners simply do not want or are afraid to change existing look your apartment. However, you can change the furniture, then you can expand the visible space.
The question arises: what needs to be removed first? You DO NOT need large closets, useless ottomans, bulky tables and other similar furniture that is not useful and takes up space. The wardrobe can be replaced with a sliding wardrobe, which will occupy the entire wall and the entire height. You can make it to order, having discussed all the details with the master in advance. This is convenient because you can think in advance about how many shelves, hangers, drawers and others you will need additional functions. All things can easily fit in it, and the space in the room will increase significantly. The depth of the cabinet plays a big role in this. You can also think of a set of furniture that will include a table, shelves, a pencil case, and all these things will be in one closet. After work you can simply put them away.
Upholstered furniture is a separate issue. The choice falls on transformable furniture, which may not take up much space in the room, and at the same time right time unfold and accept the required form. This could be a sofa bed, instead of just a bed, or a chair-bed on which you can sleep.
A sofa bed is also good, which is suitable for a small room. It easily turns into sleeping area. This will also save space.
However, you must keep in mind that each room has its own furniture. Whether it's the living room or the kitchen. An armchair-bed or a sofa bed would be suitable for the room, in the living room corner sofa. The main thing is not to make a mistake in choosing such furniture, otherwise you can achieve the opposite result. Despite the fact that the room is small, you need to choose quality furniture. Before purchasing, it is mandatory to check the padding, furniture upholstery, frame, etc.
It is best to choose a frame from natural solid wood. Beech is the best option. Chipboard and other lumber are too hard and short-lived, they can even aggravate health conditions. Metal parts, plywood and MDF elements can be combined well in the frame.
Padding is also important. Here you can consider a combination of springs and polyurethane foam or foam rubber. It is best to choose natural upholstery. Modern fabrics such as microfiber, etc. are not considered, but they are expensive. It is best to choose leather, tapestry or jacquard.
The new review collected practical examples of how you can take and transform your home. The suggestions collected here will be especially useful for those whose apartment is not very large. In any case, it is worth taking note of examples of work done by professional designers.
1. Dressing room in the corner
Small piece water pipe or railing will allow you to turn any empty corner of the bedroom into a modern open dressing room for your favorite things or outerwear.
2. Hanging bedside table
A hanging bedside table is a stylish and ergonomic alternative to a standard nightstand. A table like this will allow you to place the little things you need in the bed and save valuable space in a small bedroom. In addition, you can make such a piece of furniture yourself, thereby saving your own finances.
3. Hidden bookcase
Usually, an empty wall behind the door of a room is a great place to install a compact cabinet or shelf for books and other necessary little things. This idea will significantly save space. small room and make room for other equally necessary things.
4. Space zoning
Despite the crazy popularity of studio apartments, for living and relaxing a person needs a separate corner, hidden from prying eyes. Therefore, studio owners and one-room apartments, designers recommend zoning the space using curtains, which, unlike partitions, take up absolutely no space and will become a stylish touch of a modern interior.
5. Original dining area
If the size of the room does not allow you to install a classic dinner table- experiment. For example, get a wide table-shelf that can be hung by the window in the kitchen or on a free wall in the living room.
6. Bed with drawers
A bed, the frame and head of which is equipped with drawers and shelves, will allow you to accommodate a lot of necessary things and save you from buying an additional wardrobe or bedside table.
7. Storing products in the bathroom
A cheap tabletop wine holder is perfect for storing bottles of styling products and shower gels. This idea will allow you to restore order and significantly save space in your bathroom cabinet.
8. Organizer for household supplies
A metal bottle holder mounted on one of the walls of a pantry or kitchen cabinet is perfect for storing various household supplies, such as rags, household gloves and cleaning supplies.
9. Kitchen organizer
From the old louvered door, painted in a bright color, you will get not only a functional organizer for storing pots, pans and small kitchen accessories, but also unique item decor.
10. Shelf above the sink
The wall above the sink can be equipped with a stylish wooden shelf with high sides and compartments, which is ideal for storing all kinds of cosmetics, dental alkali and small cosmetics.
11. Transformable pouf
Transformable furniture is a real find for owners small apartments. For example, if possible, you can get a stylish coffee table-ottoman, which folds out and turns into a full-fledged bed.
12. Bath shelf
Shelves for bathtubs and sinks are not a whim, but a functional detail that will increase the capabilities of the side of the bathtub or sink and place all the necessary cosmetical tools, soap and washcloths.
13. Built-in shelves
You shouldn’t clutter up the already modest bathroom space with massive cabinets and a bunch of shelves. Instead, it is better to give preference to built-in shelves, which are perfect for storing a variety of things and will save a lot of space.
14. Open shelves in the office
An original system of interconnected shelves different sizes It will be an excellent alternative to the usual desktop, which takes up a lot of space, and an effective decoration for an empty wall.
15. Closer to the floor
To arrange a small living room with low ceiling It is better to choose low, compact furniture. This trick will allow you to visually enlarge the modest dimensions of the room and create a stylish, harmonious interior.
16. Second floor
Bed under the ceiling - stylish and fresh solution, which can not only significantly increase the capabilities of the room, but also make the interior unique. The freed up space under the bed can be used to create a mini-living room, wardrobe, workspace or play area.
Continuing the topic, without much difficulty.
We use space that is usually empty even in the smallest apartment: 
It is not easy to store a lot of things in a small apartment. Especially if you love shopping. Limited space needs to be used to maximum advantage. If your things don't fit in the closet, hang an extra hanger in the corner: this will help organize the space more efficiently.
If you love to cook, it's important to always have your favorite herbs and spices on hand. Use office tray organizers as shelves. Well, if you take magnets, then such a shelf can easily be placed directly on the refrigerator. Surely nothing will be lost!
Storage space for frying pans
If you don't have a lot of space in your kitchen, at least there are always walls! It may seem unrealistic, but every centimeter of the wall can and should be used! For example, it is convenient to place hooks for pans and utensils that you often use. 
Stand for jewelry
Limited space is a real torture for women who love accessories. Use a writing board and your jewelry will always be in order. Convenient hooks and pins will help you neatly place earrings, bracelets and beads on the board. 
Detergent storage space
Most of us store detergents and cleaning products under the sink. This often leads to confusion and the inability to find anything in the clutter. Place a bar between the cabinet walls and hang spray bottles on it. 
Hanging shelves
The highest demands are usually placed on the bathroom. But very often they are made too small in size. If you need more space, add shelves to your walls to provide extra flat space without taking up floor space. 
Towel stand
A towel is an important bathroom item that takes up too much space. Instead of storing them away in the closet, use a wine rack: roll up towels and place them in place of wine bottles. 
Pantry Organizer
Most conveniently packaged foods are very difficult to store. For convenience, use a shoe organizer in your closet. It's great for storing juice boxes, condiments, and other packaged foods. 
Additional bar in the bathroom
The crossbar is usually used to place the curtain on it. Place the second one next to it, and it will be very convenient to hang brushes, washcloths and various small items from it. 
Car door fuse
One of big problems small garages in the house - lack of space to open the car door. As a result, the wall is damaged and the door is scratched. To avoid this, attach a foam roller cut lengthwise to the wall. Both the car door and the garage wall will be safe. 
I love optimizing my living space. Considering that my apartment, although it is a three-room apartment, is quite small in area, optimization is also a necessity.
Don’t feed me bread, give me something to hang on the wall or attach to the ceiling. And with the advent of a screwdriver and drill in the house, the process became irreversible :)
The layout of my apartment is “helicopter”, who knows. That’s why there is such a room in it, formally a corridor. But its size is 120 by 180. And there is a door on each side. Four doors. And you think it’s idle for me? It turned out to be an excellent library, where all the books, about fifty of them, archives of magazines, folders, CDs and DVDs were stored. If you really ask, maybe I’ll film this miracle and post it. In general, I'm crazy about wall hung bathtubs, fireplaces, especially if they can be raised to the ceiling, are not needed yet. And also - from all sorts of drawers, shelves and other things. I would probably make a good interior designer for motorhomes or yachts
And so, once again entering the kitchen, in which, by the way, I can reach from wall to wall with my hands :), I see that my young ladies have again cluttered the top of the refrigerator. Although I warned them many times that it was impossible, that the compressor was overloaded and the refrigerator could be damaged. I was obviously boiling, but then I suddenly realized that there was room for an excellent shelf above it! Why I was stupid before - I don’t know. If there is a place, then there must be a shelf, it cannot be otherwise :)
By the way, the photo shows another of my know-how. Pots take up a lot of space, and curtains and curtains are not needed in a small kitchen. Therefore, we build such a structure on four fasteners, provide it with hooks, and hang pots and pans :)
We will hang the shelf on the wall to the right above the refrigerator.
As you can see from the photo, we don’t care much about beauty, we would rather be more functional.
Therefore, one long shelf was planned, in fact, the so-called suitable size is purchased. furniture panel and wall mountings for it.
So the last time I made a shelf above my computer. 80 cm long, it cost me, for everything about everything, about 300 UAH. in a construction supermarket. Out of habit, I decided to go to the nearest one, but then I remembered that I had recently seen a review of an online supermarket.
The name, like an old iPhone driver, I couldn’t help but remember - ibud.ua. Ok, let's see what they can offer us.
First of all, ibud.ua turned out to be not exactly an online store - it is a platform, or, more simply put, a platform where different companies from all over Ukraine place their products.
Just don’t confuse the site with a price list, which only contains prices and product names.
There is detailed descriptions and selection is possible based on them, as well as selection according to parameters, as in a regular online store.
At the same time, some products are available from several suppliers - go to the product card and choose where it is more profitable.
Let's go.
Initially, I planned one long shelf of one and a half meters, because the protruding part ceiling panel prevents you from placing high things.
But two meters is two meters. And you don’t have to stand on a stool to get something from the far edge. And 134 UAH. (The second seller had a price of 200). Option with furniture board and the fastenings disappeared immediately, I didn’t even bother looking :)
Ok, I'm placing an order. After some time, a representative of the supplier calls me back and we discuss the terms of delivery - everyone has their own, but if something doesn’t work, no one is stopping you from canceling the order and, if desired, re-ordering from another supplier.
Delivery costs 150 UAH - more expensive than a shelf, I don’t want it. You can wait until the car passes me and then they will deliver it for free, an option - because I’m not in a hurry. But it turned out that their pickup was not far from one of their regular routes. Ok, the next day I have the shelf.
Frankly speaking, for that kind of money I did not expect anything other than the panels themselves, but the kit included not only all the fasteners, but even a key and PVA glue. Production - Ukraine.
I won't bore you with the assembly details, there's nothing to do there. Ten minutes later the shelf was assembled. Then I had to wait for the screwdriver’s battery to charge, and it took another ten minutes to hang it. :)
So this is what happened - things moved onto the shelf not only from the refrigerator, but also from other places, where, in turn, large items from the shelf went.
As a result, there was more space than there was, and now there is nothing on the refrigerator. Great!
Choosing a shelf on the Internet is much more convenient. In an offline supermarket, you only have the dimensions of the free space with you, and if you see something non-standard - like I did this time - I planned it on one “floor”, but it turned out to be two, then you just try to imagine how it will fit . And at home, I went and looked, tried them on - for one shelf, for another - in the end it was more convenient, 100%. Not to mention the fact that such prices are simply not available in offline supermarkets.
Have you improved your home or dacha, preferably in a non-standard way?
How to optimize the living space at home? How to fit all your things into a limited space? How to make objects in the house not only occupy less space, but have they become more convenient to use? This article is about that.
I have opened a wonderful one for you new world micro-houses This is a completely different concept of approach to building and designing the space of a house. But last time I went through it in “broad strokes” and a little haphazardly. I would like to systematize, detail and specify the principles that we will use when planning our house.
1. Vertical space
I already wrote that people are too accustomed to thinking in planes square meters. But why not add to the horizontal planes vertical planes walls, as well as horizontal planes of ceilings or lower planes of shelves?
Almost all interior items can be hung rather than placed. This is especially true for the kitchen - after all, so much is concentrated in the kitchen. small items. These items do not have to be smeared on the bottom kitchen drawers- this way you won’t be able to stock up on any boxes. But almost anyone kitchen item you can hang it on a hook or a special railing, of which there are plenty on sale, and they cost pennies. This primarily applies to the largest objects - pots and pans. On the same rails you can hang glasses for storing spoons and forks. We also sell special magnetic holders for knives that not only save space, but are also very convenient. Special hooks for hanging mugs will also save several square meters.
But if you save big, then why not move the bed upstairs to the loft? As a rule, in micro-houses they place it above the kitchen, which lowers the ceiling level in it and allows this plane to be used for hanging anything and everything. And why do we need haute cuisine? I’m sure the space above your cabinets just gathers dust and disappears. Actually, like the top shelves of kitchen cabinets. You can’t reach them, and therefore you store all kinds of junk there that you practically never use.
True, a loft bed is also quite a big compromise. Katya and I, but using them was not very convenient. Although, we never got around to making a comfortable staircase, and this played a significant role. It’s also worth mentioning that loft owners complain that it often gets stuffy upstairs at night. So you need to pay attention Special attention organization of normal ventilation. And it’s not necessary to make a bedroom upstairs - you can use the loft to store rarely used items.
You also need to understand: there are never enough shelves. They can and should be placed absolutely everywhere. Let them be small. But from large quantity small shelves can result in an additional square meter of space, or even two, or even more. If the house has a loft, then shelves can also be made between the load-bearing joists of this loft - there will always be little things that can be shoved there. Especially if there is a kitchen under the loft. And if you store things not just on a shelf, but in a small basket or box (there are a lot of them on sale, and it’s easy to do it yourself) - then it will be very convenient.
2. Dual use of furniture
A staircase is usually an object that takes up a huge amount of space in a house. I already wrote about this. Therefore, in all micro-houses it is either attached or The stairs have shelves and drawers for storage.
The sofa can also have a dual purpose. Its insides can either be used as additional storage, or designed so that it can be folded into a bed for guests or even hosts. Or you can manage to do both. In any micro-house they do not stand idle and stools-ottomans - they can also be used to organize the storage of small items.
Another common solution is pull-out or pull-down furniture. In the previous article I already cited video of a house in which the bed pulls out from under the study — perfect solution, considering that the bed takes up about 3-4 square meters (including the space next to the bed to approach it).
There are scenarios where the same space can be used in different ways. A sofa can just be a sofa. And it can also become a workplace if there is a retractable, or lowering, or rising table next to it. This can be as basic workplace, and additional. You can provide shelves nearby, on which, when the table is folded, the items necessary for work will be located - a computer, stationery and so on.
Another trick used in some micro-houses involves doors. More often In general, doors are made not hinged, but retractable- this saves space. Sometimes curtains are used instead of doors- it’s much cheaper and sometimes even more convenient. By the way, curtains often have pockets for storing small items. Sometimes you can see that the lower kitchen cabinets of micro-houses are closed not with doors, but with curtains with pockets in which, for example, vegetables are stored. It seems to me that this not only saves space, but is also quite convenient! Following the same principle, sometimes they make shelves directly on sliding doors, especially if the door separates the kitchen and bathroom. Or the door covers the shelves in the kitchen, and when it moves, it closes the bathroom.
3. Optimization ideas
Certainly, the first thing you need to optimize is yourself. You can easily say goodbye to for the most part trash, which you keep like Gogol’s Plyushkin - just in case. You can start with the same kitchen. Practice has shown that Katya and I only need four flat and four deep plates to provide both ourselves and our guests with dishes. So having more is wasting valuable space. The same goes for our kitchen utensils- its minimum, so we don't need a lot of space to store everything. By the way, a small amount of dishes forces you to wash them more often, and I consider this more of a plus than a minus - there is no constant mountain of dishes in the sink.
Also you can say goodbye to most of your clothes, especially old ones that have served their purpose. How many times have I seen the picture of old jackets (or pants) being kept in case they are needed for “combat” purposes (for example, to go to nature, so that you don’t mind spoiling new clothes). Moreover, 2-3 jackets are stored at once. And this despite the fact that there is a specially purchased jacket for nature in the house. What to do? Right, throw away or donate to points that collect clothes for those in need.
I already said that every corner of the house can be optimized with shelves. But you can also use some hanging baskets or pockets. In the hallway they can store keys, a dog leash, a flashlight and other small items; in the work corner - pens, pencils, rulers and other stationery; in the workshop - tools, etc.
In economic and construction stores there are a lot of similar solutions now. But you can also find there other things that are useful for optimization, like drawer dividers. By inserting such a separator into drawer bedside table or chest of drawers, you can get many small compartments - like this necessary items it will be easier to find, and it will also be easier to fill the space vertically so that it does not disappear. Walk around the shops and a lot of ideas will come to your mind.
From theory to practice!
Perhaps I wrote somehow chaotically, abstractly and incomprehensibly. If you don't understand, go ahead and watch all the videos I mentioned in it. I got most of the ideas and solutions from there.
But I also found a video that shows the implementation of almost all the tips I mentioned. It's called "21 Space Saving Tips." The video, like all videos about micro-houses, is in English. But even if you don’t understand it, after reading the above, everything will be clear to you. But just in case, I will provide a list of tips mentioned in this video below, with my comments.
- Get a little girlfriend.
- A table that, when folded, serves as a chalk board.
- Hanging things on walls and ceilings.
- Loft for storing things.
- You can store stools or things under the sofa. These stools can be used to turn a sofa into a bed or add another row of seating at a table.
- Hanging baskets for small items in the hallway. The heroes of the video keep a flashlight, a dog leash, and the like there.
- Ladder with compartments and drawers for storage.
- Magnetic holder for knives and spice jars.
- Pockets on the curtains of the lower kitchen cabinets for storing vegetables and kitchen utensils.
- Wall pockets for growing herbs for seasoning or tea.
- A removable holder for disposable towels - you can take it with you if you are going to the restroom with serious intentions.
- Sink rack - increases the kitchen work space and makes washing vegetables easier.
- Heat-resistant serving mats - you can not only place dishes on them while eating, but also place a hot pot or frying pan.
- Curtains instead of doors not only save space, but are also significantly cheaper.
- Internal window blinds that fit into window hole, rather than hanging outside. You can make both curtains and blinds.
- A folding two-way mirror in the bathroom that can be used by two people at the same time, or separately, both in the shower (say, for cutting hair, so that the hair falls not on the floor, but in the shower), and outside it (say, for shaving the male half of the family or for brushing “war paint” by the female half).
- Swivel hangers in the bathroom - can be used both as towel racks and as drying racks.
- A shower curtain extending beyond the tray provides more room for shoulders and arms, which significantly increases the comfort and spaciousness of the shower. Interesting advice: if you attach several magnets to the curtain, and make a strip of metal on the wall (in this case, the walls are entirely metal), then using the shower will become even more convenient.
- Storage above places you obviously won't stand above, such as the toilet. More small shelves and baskets for storage. Tip: Clothes can be stored rolled up or vertically. So it can fit more.
- If you don't have a lot of clothes to wash, you don't have to have bulky and expensive ones. washing machine. You can get by with a special washing bag - it’s more convenient and saves water. Larger items like sheets can be washed in shower tray. Tip: Wear clothes made from natural materials(for example, from linen) - it will last much longer and can be washed without powders and other chemicals by regular boiling.
- The thinner the mattress, the greater the loft!
By the way, I re-read my old articles “Ideal house size” (
