If you’re living in a share house, a one-bedroom flat or an urban area you probably inhabit a bedroom that’s little more than a glorified cupboard.
If not, you’ve hit the bedroom jackpot and you should probably live there forever.
If you’re not blessed with a decent sized bedroom, we’ve got a few tricks that will help make your shoebox bedroom feel like a spacious sanctuary.
1. Wall mount like a crazy person
The biggest mistake you can make in a tiny bedroom is to waste floor or surface space on items that can be wall-mounted.
Lights, lamps, shelving, hooks and racks can all be mounted to the walls and this will keep your limited floor space clear for essentials like a bed and bedside table.
2. Use mirrors
No matter how many times you rearrange the furniture it’s never going to increase the floor space.
Once you’ve decided on your furniture arrangement, you need to accent with mirrors. They create a wonderful illusion of space, tricking the eye into thinking that the room is far more spacious than it actually is.
A neat little trick is to place mirrors facing each other on opposite walls. It creates a window-like effect and adds a sneaky optical illusion of space in the room.
3. Draw your focus upwards
Buy or build shelving and cupboards that span from floor to ceiling. They’ll create a long vertical line which gives the illusion of space. You’ll also have the added bonus of ample storage with a full-length cupboard or shelf.
4. Choose lighter colours
Dark colours can be beautiful and luxurious when you have the space for them, but in a small room, they can be oppressive and enclosing.
Choose lighter colours like whites, creams and dove greys when it comes to decorating and be sensible about your use of colour. An acid yellow bedspread will look fantastic in a large, spacious loft but in a tiny bedroom, you might find the colour a bit aggressive.
5. Get your scale right
It’s sensible to choose the largest bed you can fit within the space but then if you put a teeny tiny bedside table next to it, it’s going to look silly. By all means choose smaller, more streamlined furniture to fit in your small bedroom, just make sure that they all fit together in terms of scale.
6. Remove all clutter
Don’t have anything unnecessary in your bedroom. If you can get by with just a bed and a bedside table, that’s ideal.
This is difficult if you live in a share house but try to minimise the number of items you store in your bedroom. You should avoid keeping things like computers, excess furniture, washing baskets, bookshelves and ironing boards in your bedroom if you can help it. Keep your bedroom simple and neat to avoid making it look like an oversized storage cupboard.
7. Never block a walkway
It can be tempting to move furniture into ‘free’ spaces like doorways and walkways but it’s never a good idea. If you have to turn sideways to slide past your bed every time you leave the room, it’s not an ideal arrangement for your furniture.
You need to make sure your bedroom is comfortable and functional and blocking off walkways is not the way to do that.