Hello World! Welcome Friends! A small living room makes your home or apartment look and feel claustrophobic. Given how many activities usually take place in this important room, the last thing you want is to feel closed in. However, you may not have it in your budget to move to a place with a bigger living room. That being the case, your best bet is to visually open up the small space you have so that it looks larger than it really is. Fortunately, there are many easy fool-the-eye tricks that will open up your living space. Here’s a look at six of them.
Source: Victor Demarchelier
1. Leave Some Wiggle Room
In a small space, it’s tempting to push everything you own against the walls in order to have more living space. However, this is counterintuitive. Rooms that have furniture pressed against every wall look smaller.
If you’ve arranged your furniture this way, it’s time to rethink your room’s layout. Apartment Therapy recommends that you leave a perimeter around the room. Lay down a lightly-colored laminate flooring in a wood pattern of your choice. Drop a large rug right in the middle of the floor. Situate the furniture around the rug, taking care to keep the perimeter exposed.
2. Mirror, Mirror on the Wall
Hanging large mirrors on the wall opens up a space in a couple of ways. First, they reflect the natural light in the room. A light-filled room looks larger than a dark one.
You can play this effect up even more by choosing lightly-colored flooring, furniture and drapes. White or yellow wall paint also makes a good option. The mirror will reflect the light that streams in the windows, as well as the light from the furniture.
Second, large mirrors reflect the whole room back to you. From a visual standpoint, this makes the room look double the size.
3. Try Furniture Without Arms
The Spruce offers small-space dwellers a clever fool-the-eye solution that makes a room look bigger: Buy furniture pieces without arms. Instead of big, fluffy couches and chairs with gigantic arms, consider buying furniture that has no arms and is a bit sleeker in structure. This make the room look bigger because the visual and physical space isn’t taken up by the bulk of the furniture.
4. Get Rid of Stuff
Knick knacks, books you haven’t read in years and small pieces of artwork may reflect the quirky parts of yourself. However, too many of these little items – or too many big items for that matter – make a room look cluttered. Clutter makes a space look small and crowded. You can open up the appearance of your space by taking down some of the extra artwork. Stash books in another room. Put the knick knacks away.
5. Double-Duty Furniture
Double-duty furniture gives small-space dwellers more options. These pieces perform more than one function, while at the same time, taking up less space. A couple of examples are ottomans that have storage cubbies inside or Murphy beds that become fold-down dining tables when the bed is stashed in the wall.
6. Take Down the Curtains
Anything that adds visual bulk to a room, including curtains and blinds, makes a room look and feel closed in. If you remove the curtains from your windows, you’ll open up the visuals of the space. If you can’t stand the thought of having completely bare windows, consider hanging up sheers. They offer some covering without closing down the space visually.
Final Thoughts
Small spaces don’t have to look and feel closed in if you know what tricks to use. The six ideas in this post will open up your space visually. They’re simple, yet effective ways to make your space look homier, more welcoming and bigger to boot.
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One Room Challenge: Teen Bedroom – Week Six
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