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Invisible Closets

Have you noticed that all the chicest home renovations seem to include hidden closets these days? The so-called “invisible closet” is a modern update to the European style closet, which is basically a built-in armoire packing tons of storage onto a wall instead of a walk-in closet space. The invisibility comes in when the seams of the doors and drawers are as tight as possible, and push magnets take the place of visible hardware.

Office Sugurufukuda took advantage of this technique for its 404 Apartment in Tokyo, making the space appear larger using a system of wall panels that conceal closets, cabinets, shelving, and even entire rooms. Interior designer Kate Polak created a similarly clean look for a UK apartment by spray-painting the front of lacquered birch plywood wardrobe doors and drawer fronts with a nearly seamless result.

Pleasing Pantries

It looks like we’re still on a major collective pantry organization kick, making it easier to keep track of all of our food in the process. TikTok remains a great way to somehow lose hours watching videos of pantry reorganizations and tutorials, so head to the #pantryorganization hashtag for inspiration. This is definitely one trend that’s worth following, considering that all those matching food containers will keep your stored goods fresher and more aesthetically pleasing.

Use clear containers with tight-fitting lids to store things like cereal, oats, flour, sugar, and other pantry basics. A matching set of baskets in the right size for your shelving can help corral items like bags of chips, root vegetables, and paper products. Use risers for canned goods and spices so you can see exactly what you have on hand at a glance. A label maker will also come in handy here, or you can get a little bougie with professional-looking custom sticker labels from Etsy.

Hidden Electronics

Electronic devices rarely add any aesthetic value to a space, yet we seem to need more and more of them with each passing year. It’s best not to store things like Wi-Fi routers, phone chargers, smart home hubs, and portable speakers in closed compartments to maintain airflow and signal strength, so you’ll need to come up with creative ways to hide them. If you’re up for a project, a DIY built-in media cabinet with decorative metal grille doors is one way to do that — check out a tutorial from Frugal Family Times.

Another possibility is something like this fun CovoBox available on Etsy. It’s a three-sided box that uses real reclaimed books to conceal a storage area for whatever you’d rather not display. You can even choose the color scheme of the books to match your decor.

Closed Kitchen Cabinets

Many people have spent the last decade ripping out all the upper cabinets in their kitchens and replacing them with open shelving. That can open up the space and make it feel less cluttered — but only if you’re highly disciplined at keeping the items on the shelves to a minimum. In reality, most of us can’t manage to do that, so it’s no surprise that open shelving is now on the outs.

Closed, opaque cabinetry is hip again in the kitchen, which is good news for people who never jumped on this trend to begin with. Keep your stuff corralled and out of view, or maybe limit the open shelving to just one small area of the kitchen, retaining the utility of upper cabinets elsewhere.

Vertical Home Office Storage

Remote work is here to stay, no matter what CEOs like Elon Musk might say. 25 percent of all professional jobs in North America are likely to be remote in 2023, and that means a lot more of us need comfortable places to work from home. One of the biggest downsides of remote work is the blurring of boundaries between work time and downtime, so it’s best to have a clearly defined workspace that’s not spilling out into adjacent domestic spaces.

Make it easy to stay organized, no matter how small your workspace might be, by taking advantage of the vertical wall space above your desk. If you just need to keep a handful of items handy, a mesh grid wall organizer like this one from Wayfair might do the trick. But if we’re talking about printers, paperwork, reference materials, and other bulky items, consider either closed cabinets or a track-style organizer unit to keep it all in check.

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Thankfully, retailers are starting to offer more small space solutions at affordable prices. Amazon just launched a collection of space-saving furniture that’ll help you make the most of your square footage, even if your budget is as small as your space.The pieces in this collection start at just $19, and most are under $500.

Here are six of our favorites:

Sleekform Folding Desk

Let’s be real, most folding tables are just plain ugly – but here’s one you won’t have to cover up with a dated tablecloth. The Sleekform Folding Desk is just the right size for working or dining, and it’s made of 100-percent real fir wood with stylish black metal hairpin-style legs. Best of all, it costs just $199.

Zinus Suzanne Twin Daybed and Trundle Frame Set

So you’d like to invite guests over, but you have no place for them to sleep. Pull-out couches are rarely comfortable, and forcing people to cram in together can be awkward. This $225 daybed sleeps two on their own comfy mattresses, and all you have to do to set it up is pull out the trundle. Tuck a comforter around the top mattress, throw on some pillows, and it functions like a couch in between visits.

Tiptiper Folding Dining Table with Storage Racks

This versatile piece of space-saving furniture offers three functionalities in one: a slim console table when it’s all folded up, a desk when it’s partially opened, and a dining table for up to four people when fully expanded. Two drop leafs pop up in seconds to give you extra surface area, and there’s space underneath for dishes, office supplies, and whatever else you need to tuck away. It comes in three colors, starting at just $122.

Velvet Three-Seat Sofa with Folding Back

If you want to offer a place to crash but aren’t willing to sacrifice style, maybe this cute $395 velvet three-seat sofa will fit the bill. Available in fun shades like pink, peach, mango, light blue, and teal, it’s a far cry from the boring gray folding sofas you’ll find at most stores. The back folds down into a flat surface for sleeping.

Fit Choice 5-in-1 Kitchen Island

Who says you can’t have a kitchen island in a small space? The Fit Choice 5-in-1 kitchen island is just $119, measures 38 inches wide when unfolded, and slides around on casters. Two leaves expand it to its full size, but when it’s folded up, it barely takes up any space at all. It also integrates three baskets and a drawer for extra storage.

Zenithen Hexagon Folding Chair

Folding chairs aren’t exactly known for their comfort, but this hexagon-shaped offering changes all that. Outfitted with padded wide-wale corduroy upholstery and roomily sized, it costs just $87 and comes in four colors.

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On first glance, the Giralot looks like a colorful, modern version of a standard storage cabinet. The customizable storage compartments come in a rainbow of lacquer colors and three different stains of wood, and you can get them in different sizes, too. So far, so good right? But check out what happens when you open each module. Mounted to a column that’s anchored to the wall and rests on the floor, the compartments swing out as far as 180 degrees. You can choose whether they open left or right according to the shape of the area where it’s installed.

With about 30 different configurations of shapes and modules, the Giralot can be a handy place to store small objects in any room. Available accessories include clothing hooks, an umbrella stand, shoe holders, containers, bottle stands, extra shelves, and anti-rollover barriers for things you want to stay in place while a module swings open. There’s also a pull-out laptop shelf, if you want to use the Giralot as a mini workstation. Imagine it holding your toiletries in the bathroom, spices and oils in the kitchen, gloves and shoes in the entryway or scarves, hats, and ties in the bedroom.

You can also get the Giralot in mini size. While the original stands either 77 or 81 inches tall depending on which configuration you choose, the mini is 54 inches tall with either two or three modules. A fixed shelf at the very top stays put while the storage modules swing open. The clean, minimalist look of both Giralot units is a great fit with space-saving furniture from other manufacturers like IKEA, but Resource Furniture has a lot more smart solutions where this one came from.

Transforming tables include the Cristallo, a low-slung coffee table that pops up into a dining table or work surface; the Intra, a slim console with folding leaves that becomes a dining table for up to six people on demand; the Giro, which pops out 90 degrees from the wall to transform from a console into a dining table for four; and the Wally, a wall storage unit that lowers into a functional surface (among others).

Resource Furniture is perhaps best known for their wall beds and sofas, which can help even the tiniest of studio apartments feel a lot more spacious and livable. They include sectionals, bunk beds, twin XL Murphy beds, and a variety of seating styles that can be surrounded with shelves, cubbies, and other storage opportunities.

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Among Japan’s most beautiful vernacular architecture, Shinto shrines are considered the dwellings of the kami, the Shinto gods. While the full-sized shrines draw visitors to marvel at their beauty, pay respects to the kami, and pray for good fortune, miniature versions called kamidana offer a way for individuals to invite the kami into their homes. Translating literally to “god/spirit-shelf” in English, kamidana are usually placed high up on a wall and used to display items related to Shinto-style ceremonies, like shintai, which are objects that house a chosen kami, giving it a physical representation to worship.

While traditional kamidana vary from small and simple shapes to more ornate shrine reproductions, architect Naohiko Shimoda has created a pair that are a bit more contemporary in style. For the latest one, Shimoda used incredibly narrow lengths of miniature lumber to construct a minimalist structure with a complex framework underneath it, almost as if a Shinto shrine were elevated on stilts to take advantage of a beautiful view.

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Presented on Instagram, the bespoke miniature shrine is just as fascinating in tightly-framed detail views as it is taken in as a whole. In some of Shimoda’s older Instagram posts, he shows off architectural models he’s built for his full-scale projects, and you can see a similarly complex structure underpinning his boxy modern designs.

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This is the second such miniature Shimoda has custom-designed for a client. In 2018, he created “Kamidana in the corner,” a shrine that fits an outer corner rather than an inner one. Both designs take on more of a symbolic and decorative role than the shelf-like type of traditional kamidana that’s capable of supporting objects, but there’s still something powerful about the delicacy of their construction. The almost toothpick-thin supports give them an appearance of transience, as if they might pick up and leave in the night of their own volition.

“In general, architecture is too large, so we design using the concept of ‘scale.’ However, there is no scale on the kamidana,” Shimoda says. “Although the figure looks like a miniature, it always appears at a scale of one-third. The purpose of the kamidana is to build a company in the house, and there is a practical aspect that it must be a small company for that purpose. However, because it is a small company and a company that humans cannot enter, there is a sense of scale that is a method (maniella) peculiar to kamidana that has escaped from the human scale.”

“As a result, the driving force that determines the design is purely the details that create the beauty and corporateness of the proportions. This time, the proportions of each part are based on the aspect ratio (1:10) at which the architecture reveals its commemoration, and the details incorporate elements of temples and shrines nationwide. This is because a certain sense of déjà vu is important for the kamidana (= company). When a person prays for something, he or she needs a yorishiro to accept that thought. At that time, yorishiro needs some kind of production that makes it easy for people to think about it. The déjà vu effect used this time is a receptor that accepts the thoughts of those who pray.”

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In the old days, it wasn’t uncommon to fill a home with huge, heavy furniture that remained in place until the owners passed away, but new times require new ways of thinking about the way we choose and organize our belongings. Even if you do intend to stay in your home forever, life happens, and tastes inevitably change. For those reasons, the furniture we buy should always be both stylish and easy to rearrange, dismantle, and move.

Adaptability might just be the single most important characteristic of modern furniture, and systems that do it well can pay for themselves many times over. The Julia Collection by Momocca is a prime example of beautiful, fully configurable furniture that makes the process of freshening up a room or transferring your life to a whole new space as effortless as stacking LEGOs. The Valencia, Spain-based brand debuted the system at this year’s Feria Hábitat Valencia furniture and lighting fair, embodying the exact opposite of stuffy with its airy open design and versatile palette of colors and materials.

“Julia” consists of modular elements that fit together in virtually unlimited ways, yet it’s minimalist, streamlined, and much more adult than the average configurable shelf set. A framework of nickel-plated steel supports either oak veneer or natural walnut shelves, as well as sliding panels covered in a range of upholstery fabrics. Once assembled, the system can stretch up to the ceiling or low across the floor, closed in some areas to hide clutter and wide open in others to accommodate couches, chairs, televisions, or works of art.

The shelves are available in a variety of widths, from small squares to ultra-long platforms that fit the scale of larger rooms. The freestanding system doesn’t even have to be attached to the wall (though it can be mounted if you like), giving it total freedom of movement and the ability to double as a room divider. Move it around, expand it, or contract it. Use it to build desks, coffee tables, media stands, nightstands, corner systems, or sculptural creations of your own design. Since it’s so modular, you can assemble it to perfectly frame windows and doorways for a custom result. Momocca describes the collection as a “big open canvas” just waiting for your creative touch.

Moving to a new home with an entirely different layout? Expecting a baby? Just sick of looking at your living room and craving something new? Adaptable systems like the Julia Collection allow you to rearrange and redecorate to your heart’s desire without requiring you to purchase all new furniture, and it all packs up flat for easy moving. That’s great news for wanderers, apartment dwellers, the aesthetically indecisive, and most importantly, the planet. Just imagine how much less furniture you would buy (and discard) over the course of your life if you had this kind of customization at your fingertips?

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In Barcelona’s Eixample district, architects Anna and Eugeni Bach turned a beautiful but highly challenging apartment into a cozy live/work residence where everything has its place. The corner flat has an unusual floor plan featuring four diagonally angled rooms, including a trapezoidal kitchen. There’s minimal square footage to work with, but the historic building features some absolutely stunning architectural details, like tray ceilings, a marble fireplace, and ornate wooden doors.

The owners want to use the apartment as a study for the next 15 years, at which point they’ll retire and live there. That means it has to be both multifunctional and comfortable to live in, while also offering the possibility of hosting their future grandchildren. The living room, entryway, and bedroom extend from the back wall at a 45-degree angle that’s known as “chamfered,” a layout that’s not uncommon in Barcelona’s older neighborhoods.

The biggest and most successful intervention is the plywood built-in cabinetry extending along the flat’s one straight exterior wall, from the kitchen into the living room. The architects envisioned it as a home for all of the apartment’s “services,” including the kitchen cabinets and appliances, bookcases, closets, bathroom, and even a set of built-in stairs leading up to the uppermost level of storage space. Made of smooth, pale plywood and devoid of most visible hardware, this cabinet brings a contemporary feel to the home and unifies its two main rooms.

At the same time, dynamic new flooring subtly separates each space from the next while maintaining a cohesive look. In the kitchen, marble tiles follow the angle of the built-in cabinet, butting up against the straight line of the patterned hallway flooring. The living room, bedroom, and entryway all have their own unique colors and patterns, too, contrasting the clean feeling of the white walls and wooden accents.

“The rest of the house is left practically intact,” say the architects. “The floors, ceilings, and carpentry that were kept in good condition are recovered to establish a careful contrast with the service furniture. A contrast that brings together both the two directions of the chamfer, and the two times of intervention in the history of the house.”

Even if the stairs of the cabinet don’t exactly lead anywhere, since there’s no loft, they still add an interesting graphic element to the design, as does their minimalist ceiling-mounted railing. The cabinet doesn’t just disguise all the little things that would otherwise create too much visual clutter, it anchors the whole apartment. Little design details like the leather pull on the bathroom door and ornate brackets on the mirror above the fireplace are just icing on the cake.

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The system consists of wall mounted boards with slots that vertical and horizontal shelves simply slide into. The shelves themselves are slotted, too, so you can put them together in all kinds of configurations, creating grids and other shapes as you go. The boards and panels come in a variety of colors and sizes, and one set can be expanded just by adding additional units, so you could potentially fill an entire wall with your own custom storage and display setup, if you felt so inclined.

No tools are required to change the layout of the shelves, so you can easily make changes whenever you want. The panels are thin but made of steel, which means they can still support heavy objects like books. All of the materials are moisture-resistant, too, so they can even be installed in bathrooms or above the stove in your kitchen.

They’re also perfect for collections, whether yours consist of art, found objects form nature, adorable cat figurines, or just bottles and bottles of spices. The slotted shelves and panels make it possible to create larger or smaller openings to frame different sized objects, and you can always move them around to accommodate new things.

The shelving system’s official Kickstarter page reads: “Originally developed as a modern day curiosity cabinet for wondrous things, KUR!O became a much more comprehensive shelving system. Individual applications may be as broad as a bookshelf, a bottle display, coat hanger, plant shelf, spice rack, art display…you name it. We all know that our entrance area actually requires more than a coat hanger. We have keys, sunglasses, scarves, a wallet, a watch, some jewelry, a USB stick, and what not…KUR!O offers an all-in-one solution to place your little everyday belongings in one stylish place. The sticks come in really handy here!”

“Lots of little bits and pieces gather in our bathrooms, often in undefined places. How about keeping them all in order and creating a beautiful arrangement of beauty products? Thanks to [its] moisture-resistant materials, KUR!O could be a stylish solution for your bathroom. Some of us love to collect things. Found objects from nature, or manmade pieces of art. The original idea for KUR!O was to create a modular shelf to display these wondrous things while being able to change them through over time. So if you collect stuff, KUR!O is a no-brainer!”

Winner of a prestigious Gold A’Design Award in 2019 in the furniture category, the KUR!O system is manufactured in Germany using a high-density wood fiber compound and powder coated steel. You can get the boards in black, blue, gray, chocolate, red, or ochre, and the shelves come in brighter shades like white, yellow, and turquoise. KUR!O is still in the process of crowdfunding and slated to go into production later this year.

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A new series by Italian furniture manufacturer LEMA offers pieces that almost never look exactly the same. Their new “LT40” system, designed by David Quincoces, aims to be versatile in both its aesthetics and functionality. The pieces come in four configurations: freestanding, cupboard, shelving, and “boiserie,” or wall paneling. Each of these elements can also include open “containers” for displaying objects, benches, drawers, cabinets, work surfaces, and more.

That means you can design pieces built to meet the unique requirements of every room in the house. Create a cabinet and shelves for the dining room that fits your collection of dishes and glassware, make a desk with just the right amount of drawers and open shelving in an office or nook of your home, build a custom closet, or place floating nightstands on either end of a section of wall paneling for use as a headboard.

Though the essential shapes and lines of the collection remain firmly in the streamlined contemporary zone no matter which options you choose, you do have a lot of control over the final look. Finishing choices include wood, lacquered surfaces, glass, clay, natural marble, faux marble, and velvet.

The company adds that “these four families, mixed freely together, characterize the architecture together with a series of additional elements which complete the LT40 design: double-faced containers, benches, and elements designed to house multi-media apparatus; shelves and paneling with structural frames in aluminum, adjustable and designed for wall mounting; trays and tops in marble or stone; container boxes in wood or glass, and built-in LED lamp systems.”

“The system is enhanced by the LT_FRAME containers, with a strong graphical and chromatic impact, in six predefined types of configuration. Six cornices in two-dimensional types enclose the “tesserae of a mosaic” made up of color, wood, and transparencies, framed in a perfect equilibrium of rigorous, subtle forms. [They’re] designed for hanging on the wall and supplemented by a discreet LED light which emphasizes the internal perimeter.”

It’s not clear whether you can continue to customize each piece after you’ve chosen and assembled it. Adaptability over the life cycle of a product definitely enhances its sustainability, though, so if you move to a new home, have children, or just plain change your mind, you don’t have to buy something new. In any case, the LT40 system is definitely a stylish way to outfit your home with high-quality furniture that’s made to last.

LEMA is known as one of the greatest contemporary ambassadors of the “Made in Italy” tag. The company released its LT40 modular storage system alongside other new designs at the London Design Festival, and they can also be seen at the company’s showroom on King’s Road in London and in dealers around the world. Check out LEMA’s website to find one near you.

The post Create Custom Furniture Configurations With LEMA’s Modular LT40 System first appeared on Dornob.

Is your house feeling painfully small? Don’t start packing up just yet. With just a few simple changes (don’t worry, no renovations necessary), you can visually expand each room and find space you didn’t even know you had in the first place.

Reach Higher

When square footage is limited, emphasizing vertical lines can make your home feel much bigger. That means taking advantage of the oft-disused space between your head and the ceiling. Hang full length floor-skimming curtains just under ceiling height, preferably in a color that’s close to that of your walls for the illusion of a larger, more open space. Build in full-height bookshelves to make your ceilings seem higher and multiply your storage space. Just remember to stick to books, decorative storage boxes, and a few carefully chosen display objects to keep things from feeling cluttered.

Sit Lower

By the same logic, choosing furniture with a relatively low profile will help stretch your rooms vertically. Midcentury modern pieces are often just the right size for this purpose.

Get Leggy

While platform beds and low-lying furniture create the illusion of more space, the opposite effect can occur if you use too many heavy, bulky items that take up all your available floor space. At least half of the furniture in your space should have legs to create a sense of airiness.

Go Bigger

It may seem counterintuitive, but fewer, larger objects in a room make a stronger visual impact and make the space feel more open than a whole lot of small items. A sofa is often a better choice than a grouping of individual chairs, for instance. By the same token, hanging a single piece of oversized art creates the perception that there’s room to spare. Plus, since you’re buying less, it allows you to focus on higher impact, higher quality pieces. Just make sure the scale doesn’t go so far in the wrong direction that the furniture feels crammed into the room.

Find Your Light

Arranging furniture around windows can make a room feel less claustrophobic, even if the view isn’t great. Hang sheer, breezy, light-colored curtains to allow maximum transmission of daylight without sacrificing privacy or accidentally gazing into your neighbor’s house. You should also avoid placing heavy objects right in front of the windows.

Clear Things Up

Materials like glass, acrylic, crystal, and lucite, like the base of this bed, allow the eye to travel through the room without interruption, which plays a major role in how we perceive the size of a space.

Check Your Reflection

Sure, we know logically that we can’t step through a mirror, but our brains don’t always register reflective surfaces that way, especially in passing. It’s an old trick, but using mirrors to visually expand a room really does work.

Do Double-Duty

Multifunctional furniture is a no-brainer when you’re trying to make the most of a small space. An ottoman that doubles as a coffee table, a coffee table that can be used as a bench for company, a bed with storage hidden underneath, a desk that pulls out into a dining table, and other convertible furniture designs can free up a lot of crucial floor space.

Control Your Colors

Just like too much clutter, an unrestrained color scheme feels chaotic in a small space. That doesn’t mean your home has to feel sterile or be devoid of color (not everyone wants a home that feels like a “minimalist monastery” a la Kanye West and Kim Kardashian, after all). Select a palette of complementary colors that includes a couple light hues for an airy feel, along with a couple accent ones, and mix up the textures and materials to optimize visual interest.

Keep It Simple

Use closed storage whenever possible to keep unnecessary distractions out of sight, avoid unnecessary ornamentation, and make sure there’s a clear path through each and every room. Simplicity doesn’t have to equate to minimalism or a lack of personality. The ultimate trick is learning how to tweak your own space so your uniqueness and character shine through.

The post 10 Ways to Make a Small Space Feel Much Bigger first appeared on Dornob.

Displaying trophies of taxidermied animal heads on your wall is passé – and pretty gross. Designer Andreas Scheiger has completely transformed the idea of wall trophies with his series of functional bike part wall hangings. Using old bike saddles and handlebars, he creates a fun but useful piece of art that bears a striking resemblance (shape-wise, anyway) to the far less friendly traditional wall trophy.

Each faux taxidermy “head” consists of a bike seat with handlebars mounted just above that, both on a wooden plaque. No two are alike as the designer uses found parts to make each trophy unique. From parts that look almost new with their funky colors and patterns to the grizzled, falling-apart, well-loved pieces, each wall art item easily reflects the personality of its owner.

The series, called Upcycle Fetish, also has a practical purpose as hanging storage. The handlebars on each piece hold everything from bikes to hats to umbrellas – whatever you need to keep up and off of the ground. Seeing the “trophies” in use makes them even more appealing since they are not only cruelty-free, but upcycled and useful. It makes for the perfect combination and a rather rad line of products.

“Drawing and painting, handicraft working and sculpting always has been his passion. Already in his early years his teachers asked him to illustrate the school´s newspaper. Later he was the leading illustrator of Austria´s biggest students´magazine, which in turn led to various assignments. Andreas Scheiger cultivated his technical skills when he worked as a graphic designer and later as an art director in advertising. Inspired by pop art, bauhaus and modernism and the inherent idea of combining graphic design with free art, he passionately experiments with materials and styles. In all his works he aspires to create a visual impact by simplifying a complex concept.”

“Andreas Scheiger´s primary works celebrate the craft of etching, engraving and letter design with a nod to both science and the graphic design of the Victorian era. The work of his “Graphic Laboratory” is surreal and yet steeped in craftmanship, rendered with the same care Victorian scientists once lavished on their instruments and instrument boxes. His ongoing project “Evolution of Type” is inspired by The Alphabet and Elements of Lettering, a book by the pioneering and vastly prolific American type designer Frederic W. Goudy. Goudy laid great stress on the revolutionary impact of the alphabetic system of writing. He believed that letters were themselves a record of man’s history and development, and that each possessed an essential and organic form. Inspired by these ideas, Andreas Scheiger has created typographic sculptures and instructional posters: letters preserved in amber like prehistoric insects, suspended in specimen tanks like budding embryos, or with their casings incised and retracted. Andreas Scheiger interpretes letters as organisms and typefaces as species, all classified similar to biological taxonomy. Each letter displays the anatomical features and evolutionary characteristics shared by so many living creatures.”

The post Upcycled Bike Seats Become Faux Taxidermy first appeared on Dornob.

There’s a popular idea among some design enthusiasts that we should all, at some point, outgrow IKEA.

Offering easily accessible, low-cost contemporary flat-pack furniture, the Swedish retailer meets certain needs that are common among young people. Theoretically, those of us who rely on IKEA to furnish our homes at a young age would eventually reach a point in our lives where we have more money to spend on higher-quality furniture and be ready to upgrade.

Of course, that’s not always true. IKEA is wildly popular among all sorts of demographics around the world for good reasons, not the least of which is its budget-friendliness. But furniture company FLOYD, which is often described as “furniture for the post-IKEA set,” actually does present a strong argument for taking basic IKEA concepts and elevating them to a new level. They do it for the sake of reducing waste.

“Floyd began because we were tired of disposable furniture,” the company explains. “So we set out to design products of lasting quality for how people live today. Furniture should be made for the home, not the landfill. Made with materials that last. It’s a different way of making furniture. We call it furniture for keeping.”

In that spirit, Floyd recently added a new product to its lineup of intelligently simple furniture. “The Shelf” is a modular minimalist system consisting of solid birch plywood and ash wood supports, a few fixed metal shelves, and additional adjustable metal shelves. It comes in three colors and three sizes: tall, short, and wardrobe.

Designing your own custom configuration is a breeze, as is snapping the powder-coated steel shelves into the supports and anchoring the unit to the wall with velcro. You can purchase a “base shelf” set and then get shelf add-ons to expand it, too. Even better, assembly takes twenty minutes or less.

“In order to ensure top safety and stability, we put our shelving system through stringent testing, and it passed flawlessly! For the shelving system, we even designed some of our own hardware, to make assembly and securing the shelf to the wall as easy as can be. Add-on a display shelf to show off some of your favorite books and records, or transform a shelf into some extra closet space with the wardrobe add-on.”

Other offerings from Floyd take a similar approach, including a sofa, bed, tables, and lighting. All of them are flat-pack, lightweight, and easy to put together, perfect for millennials or anyone else who has to move fairly frequently. But they don’t compromise on quality when it comes to materials and construction.

Naturally, the prices reflect that durability, generally ranging several times as much as similar-looking offerings by IKEA and other retailers. But disposability is a big problem, and if you’re able to invest in pieces that will last decades instead of just a few years, you’ll be doing the planet a big favor (and the furniture will essentially pay for itself over time).

If you aren’t yet familiar with Floyd and want to see their furniture up close, you should check out the company’s interesting partnership with AirBnB. They’ve chosen select rental homes and apartments in places like Palm Desert, Portland, Los Angeles, the Catskills, and Toronto and outfitted them entirely in Floyd furniture.

The post “Post-IKEA” Modern Modular Shelves Assemble in 20 Minutes first appeared on Dornob.

IKEA is beloved by people around the world for its affordability, unfussy modern designs, and the ease of loading and unloading its flat-pack furniture boxes. But the process of assembling your new IKEA bed frame, bookshelf, or wardrobe is notoriously confusing and time-consuming, and depending on how durable it is, you might have to repeat the process all over again every time you move.

A new collection of furniture and accessories aims to solve that problem by appealing directly to people who move often and tend to live in small spaces. RÅVAROR consists of more than 20 items that can quickly infuse small spaces with the comforts and convenience of home, including couches, a daybed, a mini kitchen, open storage solutions, lighting, textiles, and storage boxes.

Revealed at the company’s annual Democratic Design Days press event, RÅVAROR’s primary selling point is its adaptability. The set is minimalist and compact, and every element can be broken down into pieces that are easy for a single person to carry, even if you have to navigate flights of stairs. It’s scaled down significantly from your average living room furniture set, but for people living in spaces that measure under 250 square feet, that’s a good thing.

“More and more people are living and moving into cities. Approximately an extra 1.5 million people join the urban population every week. Living spaces are shrinking, and for many people the concept of home is no longer a geographical constant; it’s a space that’s here today, and maybe somewhere else tomorrow,” reads the company’s press release on the collection.

“Our starting point and creative idea was the reality of urban life. We asked ourselves; what is needed to turn a small space, such as 12 square meters [129 square feet], into a home? And what is needed to create that homely feeling even though you might be moving on to a new place soon?,” says Viveca Olsson, Creative leader, IKEA of Sweden.

“There is a rapidly growing urban population and people are living in smaller spaces as well as moving more often than before,” Olsson continues. “With RÅVAROR we wanted to create a few key items that have a new level of versatility, functionality, and simplicity. And when it is time to move, it should be easy to pack everything up, stack them together, and relocate to your next home.”

Obviously, RÅVAROR isn’t for everyone. People who like to spend a lot of time at home might find it worthwhile to place more of an emphasis on comfort than portability, even if it means hiring movers. But for many urbanites, home is just a place to crash and store belongings, with the city outside serving as their living rooms and kitchens.

The collection is also neutral enough that you could treat it like a blank canvas, using it as a backdrop for items that express your personality and tastes. And if it’s popular enough, maybe IKEA will eventually offer additional colors and styles that are just as easy to transport.

RÅVAROR will be available beginning in September 2020, so be sure to check back with us for updates on this exciting new collection.

The post New Packable Furniture from IKEA Makes Moving Easier Than Ever first appeared on Dornob.

That might seem like it’s simply not enough space to store all your possessions, let alone enjoy time in your home, but the secret here is all in how you use the limited square footage. Micro apartments utilizing clever space-saving tricks like lofts, built-in storage, and transforming elements can meet just about all of your needs — as long as you stay on top of keeping the place tidy, of course. 

The 22m2 Apartment by A Little Design demonstrates how this can work for a resident who’s a single busy urban professional. The owner of the flat commissioned the architects to renovate the old 236-square-foot space with roughly 11-foot-high ceilings to complement her lifestyle, comfortably fitting in everything she owns and accommodating her habits without breaking the bank.

Some architects would accomplish this by packing furniture and other items into every available square inch of floor space, but this client wanted to leave almost the entire living area open so she could exercise and freely rearrange the furniture. That left a window nook and minimal space along the walls for the designers to work with, but the results prove that they certainly were up to the challenge.

Unsurprisingly, A Little Design prioritized making full use of the ceiling height by adding in a sleeping loft above the kitchen and bathroom. Though there’s only enough room up there to crouch, sit, or lay down, it’s still plenty suitable for sleeping, accessing some of the storage spaces, and even using a desk built into the wall. The stairs contain two shoe storage cabinets, and also hide the television from view when it’s not in use.

Despite the space limitations, the client also wanted to find a way to fit in some crucial functions: lots of clothes storage, a washer and dryer, a kitchen you could actually cook in, a dining table that could accommodate a guest or two, and a bath tub. After traveling abroad for work, all she wanted to do was come home and have a hot bath before getting a good night’s sleep.

The architects explain: “Firstly, the shower was replaced with a bath, and the washer was moved to the kitchen. Because in Taiwan the gas can not be piped into a house without a balcony and a small electric heater can not provide sufficient hot water for a bath, we adjusted the layout of the toilet to make room for a storage water heater, and a sliding door with a mirror which not only makes the maintenance easy but also amplifies the space visually.”

“Fixed furniture such as the kitchen cabinet, the wardrobe, and the shelf are attached to the wall to fully utilize the height and avoid aisles. The wardrobe is below the shelf due to the higher frequency of use, but a part of the shelf still can be accessed conveniently from the mezzanine area.”

“The tatami area and cabinet alongside the window make full use of the alcove and also provide ample storage. There are two wooden tables alongside the wall in the living room that could [also] be a long bar table, which economizes the room and can be combined in the other direction to be a dining table. Therefore, the empty space is flexible for different needs, and makes the small flat less cramped.”

Lots of bright white paint, pale wood, and ample natural light from the windows visually enlarge the micro apartment, while clutter like clothing and electronic items are all kept behind the doors of the built-in wardrobe and cabinets. A swing-arm lamp and a library-style ladder are two small touches that make a big difference, too, taking up very little space but moving easily when needed. The overall result feels clean, orderly, and anything but cramped.

The post Tiny Transforming Taipei Apartment Measures Just 236 Square Feet first appeared on Dornob.