10 Tips to Find Extra Storage Space
There is space to be found even in the smallest home. And with a few tips and tricks, even a humble corner that you might have previously overlooked can provide useful storage space.
Most furniture is designed for rooms with straight walls of a certain height. If you have sloping ceilings in your home, you often have to leave the space underneath the ceiling unused, or go to the trouble of designing and building (or employing someone else to build) custom furniture. There is, however, a variety of flexible shelving systems available with adjustable shelves that you can adapt to suit sloping ceilings, letting you make better use of upstairs living areas and attics.
1. Knee walls in attics – short vertical walls below the sloping ceiling – can be furnished with shelves or low cupboards. This is also an ideal place to put plastic boxes with lids and rollers. These simple containers provide lots of storage space and are easy to pull out when needed.
2. Check out low-cost furniture stores as they often have storage solutions for top-floor living spaces with sloping ceilings that are well designed and look surprisingly good.
3. Don’t try and build something into every sloping space as this will make the room feel cramped. Avoid dark colors on the walls and ceilings as they will make the room seem smaller than it really is.
4. Don’t overlook staircases
In most houses, the potential to store things under staircases is generally wasted. But there is a wealth of possibilities in this area. Whether you want to make use of this potential will of course depend on the location and design of the stairs in your home – are they close to the front door, in the basement, or a feature in a duplex apartment?
5. Stackable drawer systems that follow the sloping line of a staircase can be stylish.
6. Wood staircases can be built to be like a set of drawers, with a drawer sliding out from under practically every step. The drawers provide an enormous amount of storage space without taking up floor space.
7. There is also a lot you can do underneath a flight of stairs – often considered a dead space – depending on what you want to store there. If you have an open-style staircase, bear in mind that a considerable amount of dirt and dust will fall through the stairs to the area below.
8. To convert the area beneath a closed staircase into a closet, enclose it with shutter doors you can buy from a hardware store. Hang long coats at the tall end, jackets in the middle, and leave the really short space for children’s clothes, or for bags, purses and umbrellas.
9. Book lovers seldom have enough library space. Under the stairs is a great spot for bookshelves. If your staircase is wide enough, you can also install shelving along the wall going up the stairs. The stairs themselves will provide easy access to your books – no library ladder required!
10. The great room divide
If you have a large room or open plan area, you may want to erect a partition wall with drywall and wood studs to divide some of the available space. The new room could be a walk-in closet or set it up as a study or guest room. Depending on how you plan on using the space, you can leave the entrance open or fit it with a door. If space is tight, a sliding door that recedes into the partition wall may be a good option.
