Most of us have a least some kind of complaint about our homes. After all, it’s pretty much impossible to create any home that’s completely perfect. Whether it’s feeling as though it doesn’t have as much personality as you would like, or wishing that it had more of a distinct style, it can be frustrating to feel as though you’re just not getting as much as you would like out of your home. However, there’s one issue that more people have with their home than just about any other. That is the issue of space. It should hardly come as a surprise that most of us would love to have more space at home. For one thing, we’re all taught that having a giant house is one of the truest markers of success. But not only that but living in a home that feels cramped and small can take the place that was supposed to be the most comfortable place in your life, and turn it into somewhere in which it’s completely impossible to actually relax. Luckily, you don’t need a huge house in order to give yourself more space and make your home more comfortable. With that in mind, here are some things that you can do in order to create more space in your home.
Light it up!
If we’re going to look at how to make a smaller space feel bigger without actually having to make any real changes to the size of it, the best place to start is almost certainly the simplest. If you want to bring a sense of space into your home then nothing is more important than light. It might not seem like an especially significant thing but light can utterly change the way that a room feels, even if you don’t fully realize why at the time. The first and most obvious way to bring more light into your home is through natural sunlight. Bringing in as much natural light as possible into a room can make even the smallest space feel open and spacious in an instant. By the same token, a large room that’s poorly lit is often going to end up feeling dingy and cramped no matter what you do. The key is to try and maximize the amount of light that you’re getting out of any space. There’s the old cliche that mirrors make a room feel larger and that actually turns out to be true. Not only does it create the optical illusion of space but it also allows you to reflect more light around a room than you would ever have been able to otherwise. Again, these are incredibly small and simple changes but they really can make a huge difference to the way that a home feels. Of course, that doesn’t mean that you can’t have a more subtle, comforting lighting scheme in a room as well, just keep in mind how that’s going to affect the feel of the room as a whole.
Rearrange
One of the other things that you should look at if you feel as though as space in your home simply isn’t large enough is whether or not you’re using that space as efficiently as possible. Considering how much of a concern interior design is for a lot of people, far too few of them actually give much thought to the fact that the way in which a room is arranged. The truth is that the way that you arrange a room can have a huge impact on how it feels. After all, if you have furniture jutting out into the room and you end up having climb over just about everything in order to get anywhere, then your home is never going to feel anything close to spacious. Even the largest room can end up feeling cramped and uncomfortable if it’s badly arranged. Make sure that you’re thinking carefully about any given room in your home is laid out so that you don’t end up cutting it in half and taking away room that you could use much more efficiently. A lot of the time there can seem to only really be one option when it comes to arranging a room, so it’s a good idea to think about different options. The nice thing about this is that if you try something out and it doesn’t work, you can always try something else. Don’t be afraid to experiment.
Create flow
This is connected to the previous point but isn’t exactly the same. One of the most commonly ignored parts of any home is the way in which the different rooms flow into one another. Most people tend to think about each room in their home in isolation but when you do that, you could end up with rooms that simply don’t flow into each other properly. Think about the ways in which you move through your home. If there are things like furniture sticking out everywhere or walkways obstructed, then that’s going to end up making your home as a whole feel just, sort of, wrong. This might seem like a really minor thing but if you’re not paying attention to both how each room feels on its own and how they all fit into your home as a whole, your home is never going to feel nearly as spacious, comfortable and pleasant as it otherwise could.
Get rid of the junk
Here’s a harsh truth that a lot of people really don’t want to accept. Most of us simply have too much junk in our home. Human beings naturally end up accumulating a lot of stuff throughout their lives and it can be hard trying to figure out what to keep. This leads people to just hold on to everything “just in case” or because it has some tiny amount of sentimental value. Sure, there’s nothing wrong with holding onto things that are really important to you, but if you never throw anything away, then you’re going to end up with rubbish piling up in your home making it feel crowded and messy, no matter what you do. What you do with the rubbish in your home is up to you, you can either use a company like dirtcheaprubbishremoval.com.au to take it away, or you can put some stuff into storage if you’re sure that you can’t bear to throw it away. Either way, you’re going to have to start being brutal with exactly what you keep and what you get rid of.
Embrace minimalism
Of course, if you wanted to take this idea even further then it might be a good idea to embrace a more minimalist approach to your interior design. Minimalism is based on the idea of only really holding onto the things that you really need and using large amounts of empty space to really highlight what there is in your home. Not only can this help you to clear out junk you don’t need, but it can make any room feel incredibly spacious simply by virtue of not having huge amounts of stuff in it. Embracing a more minimalist lifestyle can often be a pretty big challenge for some people. Luckily, there are plenty of resources online that you can use to start trying to take on this kind of lifestyle.
Do something drastic
Then again, you might just find that the issue really is that you don’t have the space that you need. If that’s the case then drastic measures might be called for. If you’ve got a pair of rooms next to each other that each feels cramped, why not knock down the wall between them and turn them into one much larger room? Or why not look into turning your loft into a usable space. Or you could even look into getting an extension put onto your home. Of course, none of these are simple tasks so you’re almost certainly going to want to get in touch with professionals before you make any serious commitments.
Of course, one thing to remember is that space isn’t the only thing that matters when it comes to making your home a more pleasant and enjoyable space to be in. The truth is that there are actually a lot of advantages to living in a smaller home. For one thing, there’s a certain charm that smaller homes have that larger properties simply can’t match. Not only that but there’s the convenience of not having to clean and tidy lots of large rooms that you actually don’t end up using to their full potential. A smaller home that you’re actually using can often be a lot more of a pleasant space than a home that’s just full of empty and useless areas. The key is not to focus on how much space you actually have, but to try and focus on creating the feeling of space as much as possible. Things like light, clearing out rubbish that you don’t need, and arranging your rooms properly might seem light incredibly small changes but the truth is that they can make a huge difference without sacrificing so much of what often makes a smaller home so appealing.
