Four Space-saving Tips for Furnishing a Condo
Are you looking for condo furnishing options? Living in a condo has a long list of benefits. You never have to mow the lawn. Your condo association probably keeps up with much or all of your maintenance. Your condo probably has amenities like a gym or swimming pool (that — once again — you have no responsibility to maintain).
However, your condo is likely going to be smaller than your house was, and you might need to get creative while planning out your condo furnishing options. Fortunately, if you’ve ever done any furniture shopping in furniture stores like Ikea, you know that there are condo furnishing options that provide both the function and storage you need, regardless of the size of your condo.
We want your transition from a house to a condo to be seamless, so we’ve put together a guide to condo furnishing options that help you get the most out of every inch of space you have.
Space-saving Tips for Furnishing a Condo
- Be a Man With a Plan
When you’re downsizing on square-footage, you cannot afford to get furniture willy-nilly and plan as you go. In order to maximize the value of every inch of your home, you must have an idea of how every inch of your home will be spent, before you move a single thing in. Get a floor plan of your condo, and map out where your furniture will go, and what will be used as storage. When you have a plan before you purchase any furniture for your condo, you are far more likely to end up with the best design and functionality for your space. - Be Clever with Kitchen Storage
Unless you exclusively order takeout, you will likely find that your kitchen is the place that has the greatest storage needs (perhaps short of your closet… but we’ll get to that in a moment.)
The trick to storing all of your goods in your kitchen is making sure that every item has a home, to avoid a cluttered look and feel. You might have noticed that open shelves are very popular right now in kitchen scapes. The downside to this is you don’t have the option of hiding junk away. Perhaps consider a few beautiful and airy open shelves for displaying the dishware that you love the most, and then get creative with other storage options. For example, instead of using kitchen table that takes up a lot of space and doesn’t provide much function, build an island for additional counter space and cabinet storage. This can also double as your kitchen table for non-formal meals. - Create an Office Nook
You probably need some kind of office space in your condo, but dedicating an entire room to your office is likely a spacial impossibility. However, if you use a little creativity, you can create your own functional office space out of any nook and cranny that would otherwise go to waste in your condo. You really only need a few square feet of surface area for a desk, with a few drawers for office essentials. If you need more space than that, simply install a few shelves above your head — a single spare closet will likely do the trick for you. Additionally, if you use a closet for your office nook, add a backless chair that can be tucked in, so that the entire thing can be tucked away when you need it to be! - Build in Bathroom Storage
The bathroom is another room that has a ton of pesky odds and ends that need to be stored, but this shouldn’t be a deal breaker in your quest to downside. Unlike every other room in the home, the bathroom essentials are pretty small in size. You can build a few shallow shelves that are narrow enough to not take up any space in your bathroom, but give you a place to tastefully store cotton balls, Q-tips, lotions, and odds and ends. For the items that you don’t want as visible (toilet paper for example), get yourself some wicker baskets to hide them away in. The bathroom still looks great, while providing all of the storage you need.
Do you have any tips or tricks? Please add them in the comment section below!