Nowadays, in our daily routine we end up performing many different tasks, sometimes even at the same time.
Our home spaces have to keep up to date and make our lives easier for us, especially in a busy city like London. Therefore luxury design not only needs beauty and decoration but also functionality and renovation according to the new life standards.
Home is the environment we work in, sometimes.
It is the space where we raise our children, and where we teach them.
It is the horizon of our thoughts and an intimate space for our dreams.
It is a time for rest, but also a time for friends.
Our homes are a big slice of our lives!
1. Surround the space with multi-functional furniture.
A place for everything, a place for everyone.
Smart and multifunctional furniture is a real revolution in the world of Interior Design. Multi-functional furniture is designed to perform one or more functions while optimising the use of available space. In these cases, the keyword is flexibility.
Designers, in fact, optimised their design with the aim to create furniture pieces that are not only aesthetically pleasing but also have more than one purpose. A typical example is the sofa bed, which offers a resting place during the day and transforms into a comfortable bed for the night. But the innovation doesn’t stop there: there are coffee tables that extend to transform into dining tables, armchairs that hide storage compartments and desks that fold down to become bookcases.
These furniture pieces can transform your room and make it much more operative, by also increasing the space available for you. The living room is the place where space-saving solutions find their best application.
An overcrowded environment can feel smaller and more chaotic. This is where the concept of “less is more” comes into play. Carefully selecting the best items, such as two pieces of furniture in one, can help create a more spacious and tidy environment, but also more comfortable. Technology has also accompanied and largely influenced this revolution.
2. Incorporate multipurpose areas
Due to the different needs — from smart working to the need to keep children at home — domestic spaces have become more fluid, open and multifunctional.
Think about everything you want to do, because every square meter counts. A multipurpose room can be a living room in which, in addition to resting, studying or watching television. You can also read a book, play an instrument, or play video games.
Likewise, it can be a day room and at night it can become a guest room. Or a space for sewing, knitting and ironing. You might want to add a workstation, or a small dining area for quick meals, or even an expositional space.
It is important to consider that everyone in a family has to have his own comfort zone, also pets!
In the case of an open space, for example, the living room could be visually divided into zones. It is necessary to create a fluid environment, characterised by mobile elements that give the possibility of managing the spaces according to our needs.
If your budget allows, bespoke solutions can also be effective. Custom wardrobes, for example, can be designed to fit your space perfectly, making use of every available centimeter. Bespoke solutions can also be designed to hide unwanted features or objects, such as a bed that folds into the wall during the day or a dining table that retracts into the kitchen.
The areas involved communicate with each other and must have a sense of continuity of style, but it is still important that they are differentiated, especially when the environment considered consists of a kitchen and living room combined. This is possible thanks to the use of small features such as low furniture, islands and dining tables, but also sliding glass doors, fireplaces and bookcases, which will be able to guarantee greater privacy.
These techniques adapt perfectly to a modern and frenetic lifestyle, thanks to easily adaptable multi-functional spaces, modifiable according to various needs. Consequently guaranteeing better live ability and usability of the environments.
3. Integrate greenery and lighting
Light becomes essential when trying to make a space more liveable and give it more scope.
Well-designed lighting can do wonders for an interior.
In addition to playing a practical role, lighting can influence the perception of space. Using soft lighting can create the illusion of a larger space, while directional lighting can highlight specific focal points or functional areas. Furthermore, the lighting can also be built into furniture or shelves to save space.
Open spaces are the most common option in our modern houses.
This openness makes the environment larger, more airy and brighter as there are no wall barriers. This can also lid to save energy for lighting and heating significantly. In fact, light can reach every corner of a space, especially if we are in a living room with large windows. It is more essential than ever to study the lighting system in detail. If the house has large windows maximises the diffusion of natural light, exploiting it for most of the day.
However, when evening falls, a single ceiling light is not enough, you need to focus on the number of light points, in order to illuminate every corner of the room. It will therefore be appropriate to choose diffused lights capable of creating an atmosphere throughout the area, but also detail lights where specific activities take place, near the seating area, the kitchen table and the reading corner.
Including greenery as well, should not be underestimated. Of plants, we know that they release oxygen, a vital element for our life. We smell their perfumes, see their colorful flowers and taste their fruits. We use them to decorate our homes, our balconies, the gardens or the streets of our cities.
Apart from being able to manipulate our spaces, like cooling down in the summer and heating up in the winter, plants can also help when we are doing a lot of activities at home. They teach us to relax, manage stress and work on issues such as memory and concentration, as well as reducing anxiety levels. They promote concentration in study and work, reducing noise and instilling calm, and reduce the presence of dust in the home, absorbing pollutants that are dispersed in the air. Plant care positively transforms all our energy and our environment: our mind, our home, our office and our relationships.
4. Add built-ins to maximize the space.
Built-in furniture allows to make use of a space that otherwise would stay unused. It comes in handy when you want to collect and occupy hollow or hidden spaces. They would be collected and placed in the arms of a composition made of wood, metal or other materials and given a function of their own.
Cabinets or shelving can be embedded up to the ceiling, on either side of a fireplace, and are great for keeping everything in place and organised. Other examples can be a drop leaf desk on one side that can be raised or lowered whenever you need it, and a walk-out bay window for seating increases comfort and warmth.
Without a doubt, apart from being a beautiful decoration for wasted spaces, built-ins are an effective way to increase the functionality of every single corner of a living room or any other type of room.
5. Make the most of your walls
When space at ground level is limited, one solution may be to take advantage of the height.
Finding solutions to recover space in the home by exploiting the height is the new must for creating functional environments, without neglecting aesthetics and quality.
Among the solutions adopted there are habitable and furnishing lofts: using loft beds can also free up valuable land space, allowing you to create a study area or relax under the bed. The higher the height, the more the mezzanine can be extended, greatly increasing the walkable surface area of the entire apartment. Also, full-wall bookcases are a great deal: even in the digital age, paper retains its charm. For those who have a passion for reading and want to recover space to dedicate to books, a bookcase that covers the entire wall is the ideal solution.
To exploit every centimeter of the wall you must use a custom-made bookcase which can also have some compartments closed by doors, creating a modern and impactful piece of furniture.
Moreover, shelves and cabinets that reach up to the ceiling can provide a large amount of storage space without taking up a lot of floor space. These vertical designs not only save space but also add an element of visual interest to the space.
All these strategies are studied and developed by designers at Oraanj Interior Design to help us in our daily activities and use as best the space around that unconsciously influences us.