Handling Space Issues

• Evaluate the shape of your room as square, rectangular or L-shape; your personality traits as Victorian, French, rustic, modernistic, high-tech, Oriental or Zen-like; room problems in terms of being narrow, having low ceiling, architecturally sterile or too long and room assets as having a focal point in terms of mirror or a fireplace, a window with beautiful views or delicate moldings before you start decorating it.
• Make a room plan beforehand including doors, windows and things attached permanently to the wall. You can use a scale of ¼" to 1'.
• Make cutouts of the furniture you want to put in the room using the same scale as of the room floor plan and try to visualize the room by placing them in the plan. 3-D virtual plans on computer can give you better idea about the personality and look of the room.
• Keep the pathways to move between the furniture pieces free.
• Match the type of furniture to the architectural elements of the room keeping in mind the focal point of the room.
• A bland room can be funked up with paneling, stenciling, using chair rails, shoji screens or even French doors.
• A room with low ceiling needs low furniture lines, tall dressers or armoires that go all the way to the ceiling and vertical stripes on wallpaper. You may also create the illusion of taller room by painting same shade of light and cool color on walls and ceiling delineation.
• For very narrow and long rooms, use warm dark and matte colors on shorter walls and light and cool colors on longer walls.
• Use versatile furniture with hidden storage space.
• Rooms with odd shapes and off-center focal point can be divided into smaller areas that can be managed better and allot a focal point for each. Area rugs, screens and dividers, subtle hints such as change in scale of patterns on wallpaper or slight difference in color of walls can be used to give more definition to these separate areas.