Corners in rooms are something we must all contend with when deciding how best to layout our storage. For those of us with attic conversions or dormer-type properties, this can be compounded by awkwardly-shaped walls and ceilings that eat away at the available space that can be used for closets, wardrobes and cabinets.
Awkward spaces can be made even worse if your room is smaller anyway, making it vitally important to find ways to maximise the capacity of your closets.
Thankfully, bespoke fitted furniture suppliers are experts at extracting every last inch of storage space from rooms of all shapes and sizes. They will examine your property, take measurements, and learn about your storage needs to design the most efficient custom made bedroom furniture possible.
Here’s a rundown of some of the options that could help you to deal with corners and awkward spaces.
Corner shelves are a popular way to maximise storage capacity in your closet. There are several different styles available and your choice will depend on factors like what you intend to store on them and how frequently you’ll need access.
One of the cheapest and easiest options is to install an angled corner shelf. This is essentially a triangular-shaped shelf that’s installed onto two perpendicular walls. The shelves might be fixed to the walls or you might opt for an adjustable option that gives you a degree of flexibility to change the heights of your shelves to accommodate larger items you acquire in the future.
Another option is a shelf that wraps around the corner, starting on one wall and finishing on the other. These are usually bigger than stand-alone angled corner shelves and are built into a larger unit. You can choose either a curved or straight edge, depending on your taste and budget.
Corner shelves are great, but they can still be a bit awkward if you want to regularly get access to items stored near the back. One solution to this is to install a rotating shelf, which as its name suggests, spins on its axis. In doing so, you can always have the items you want to reach right in front.
There are some trade-offs with rotating shelves though. They’re typically more expensive than fixed and adjustable shelves and they can require a bit of extra maintenance to keep them running smoothly. Since you need clearance all the way around to allow the turning motion, a rotating shelf also loses a small amount of space compared to a static one, but this is offset by the convenience.
The problem with corners is that they create unusable space when you want to put two shelves next to each other. Fitted furniture suppliers often refer to this as “blind corners” as they’re an area you can’t see.
One solution to maximise your use of the space in your closet and remove these blind corners is to mix shelving and hanging storage together.
So instead of having two shelves interesting at a right angle in the corner, have one shelf, and one hanging rail. The latter can run flush to the wall, while the former can stop short of the corner, allowing you to use every single inch.
Since you can slide the garments hanging on the rail along, you won’t have any issues getting access to what you’ve stored there.
If you have two sets of hanging rails that run towards a corner, they will eventually overlap, creating an unusable section for at least one of them. This is because two straight rails that intersect at a right angle can’t be installed at the same height, forcing one to be positioned higher than the other.
This isn’t a solution though as it means one of the rails will block the other, preventing you from hanging anything from a portion of it.
There are several different solutions for this. Fitted bedroom furniture designers in London and elsewhere will be able to talk through the different options to you, but your main two choices are to either install a curved rail that bends around the corner or by staggering the rails with a vertical panel that stops short of the wall.
This second option means one of the rails will run flush to the wall and the other will stop 1-2 feet from it, removing any overlap.
If you have a reach-in wardrobe, you likely have space that is behind a wall. In such scenarios, it can often become easy to just organise the area in front of the door and not worry too much about the rest of it.
However, the “return”, which is the area behind the wall is often sizeable, giving you much more room for storage, provided you are smart about how you lay it out.
The narrow wall furthest away from the entrance to the reach-in space is a good place to install a hanging rail and/or shelves, provided you follow the steps above to minimise the creation of blind corners.
Doing this will force you to be more considerate when you place items in the reach-in space because you’ll block access to it if you just throw stuff behind the wall.
Another important step to optimising your reach-in space is to ensure it’s well lit. Without ample illumination, it’ll just become a dark crevice that’s of little use unless you carry a torch with you every time you want to retrieve something.
Of course, you can hire an electrician to wire up some new lights, but this can be costly and require the walls to be opened up. Thankfully, fitted furniture suppliers have plenty of LED closet lighting systems that don’t require any in-wall wiring. They’ll be able to advise you of the different options and make a recommendation based on your needs.
Looking to make better use of the awkward spaces in your home? Get in touch today to see how custom made bedroom furniture can help you declutter and be more organised.
Wherever you live, be it a large country estate, a townhouse, or a cosy studio apartment, storage is an important tool for helping to keep your life organised and your home looking clean and tidy.
Storage comes in all shapes and sizes, though our closets are some of the most important. Whether you have a small wardrobe, some bespoke fitted furniture, or a spacious walk-in closet, they help us keep our clothes in order. Custom-built cabinets in your kitchen can also help make cooking an easier task and more pleasant experience by removing the need to rummage and hunt for everything each time.
But we all have different tastes and interests. Some of us might need lots of room to keep our ever-growing shoe collection, while others may need a place to store our hats.
Yet, while we all have our own individual uses for our closets, we often just turn to mass-produced and flat-pack furniture options and try to make it work. That isn’t necessary, as custom made kitchen and bedroom furniture can help to maximise the use of your space and help you bring order to your closets.
One way that this can be achieved is by being smart with the types of shelves you use in. While on the surface, it may seem that all shelves are the same, that could not be further from the truth.
When you engage a fitted furniture supplier, they’ll work with you to understand your needs and the space you have to work with and then create a bespoke design that uses shelves designed specifically to your needs.
Here are some of the options that you might want to consider when looking to add shelves to your closets.
As the name suggests, fixed shelves are a shelf that is fixed in place, meaning it can’t be moved around to cater for different storage needs. If you’re buying fitted bedroom furniture in London or elsewhere, the top of the wardrobe or cupboard can act as a fixed shelf, providing space to store items you won’t need frequently so that they are out of the way.
Fixed shelves can also work well inside a closet, giving you additional space to store shoes, folded clothes like sweatshirts and T-shirts, and bags. Bespoke wardrobe interiors mean that you can have your fixed shelves in just about any size you like, though it is worth remembering that they can’t be (easily) moved once they’re installed, so think ahead as to whether your needs will change in the future.
While it is possible to have made to measure wardrobes without any internal fixed shelves, they’re usually necessary to provide structural rigidity. If you don’t want fixed shelves, then you’ll need to speak to your custom cabinet maker to find a solution that meets your needs.
Adjustable shelves are very similar to fixed ones as they serve many of the same purposes, however, they can be easily moved around to accommodate your changing storage requirements in the future.
The most common type of adjustable shelf looks identical to a fixed shelve in that it is installed horizontally across some or all of the structure. However, unlike a fixed option, it can be moved up or down, or removed entirely, in a matter of minutes.
This is because they are installed using a set of removable pins or screws. To change their position, it is simply a case of pulling out the pins or unscrewing the screws, and repositioning the shelf.
The standard type of adjustable shelf is one that lies flat, perpendicular to the vertical structure of the wardrobe or cabinet. But if you intend to store a lot of shoes, then your bespoke wardrobe designer may suggest that you include some slanted shelves.
These work like any other adjustable shelf but are raised slightly at the back, making it easier to see and access footwear stored on higher shelves.
Traditionally, corners have been problematic for storage as they become tricky for installing shelves, but that’s where corner options come in!
Corner shelves are a favourite among fitted furniture suppliers who are passionate about maximising the storage capacity from the space you have. They can also present a way for adding some style to your closets with a choice of either curved or straight edges.
Straight edges are usually the cheapest option, though the way they’re created means they’re best used in places where the insides aren’t likely to be seen. A curved or angled option can be a little more expensive but look better and provide a little extra capacity.
Installing a corner shelf can unlock a lot of room for storing large items, though you will want to think about how frequently you’ll need to access the contents because they can require a little extra effort to unload.
This issue with corner shelves can be solved by adding a rotating function. By being able to spin the shelves around, you get easy access to the items located at the back, making corner shelving more practical.
However, they are not without downsides. Naturally, a rotating shelf will cost more than a static corner shelf because it has more components. Additionally, the moving parts will require some maintenance over time, reducing the overall capacity slightly. For many, these are worthwhile trade-offs to make for the practicality of a rotating shelf.
Pull-out shelves work on a similar principle to rotating ones in that they move to give you easier access to their contents.
At first glance, a pull-out shelf will look just like a fixed or adjustable one, but on closer inspection, you’ll see that they have runners installed on their edges. These allow the surface of the draw to be slid out and then pushed back again.
They can work great in wardrobes where you have garments you want to keep flat, but they’re also ideal for kitchen cabinets and pantries where you might have lots of small containers, bottles, and boxes. Without the sliding function, it can be difficult to get access to the items at the back, so a pull-out shelve can help make cooking much easier.
Looking for fitted furniture suppliers in London? Get in touch with our team today to discuss how we can help maximise your space.
Custom made bedroom furniture can help you to maximise the storage capacity you can
extract from the space you have available. But getting the right lighting for a closet is
something that’s often overlooked.
Good lighting helps you to get the most out of your bespoke fitted furniture by illuminating all
the corners that would otherwise be cast in darkness. By adding a little light inside, you can
make it easier to find things and create a more stylish look for your closet.
If you engage the services of a fitted furniture supplier, they can talk through all the different
lighting options with you and make suggestions based on the size, shape, style, and use of
your made-to-measure bedroom furniture.
Here are some of the factors that need to be considered when choosing lighting for your
closet.
We measure how bright something is in lumens. In a living room or bedroom, you’ll usually
use around 10-20 lumens per square foot, though bathrooms and kitchens can require up to
80.
As a general rule, closets don’t need to be as bright as rooms. In a small bespoke wardrobe
interior, you would typically only need 5-10 lumens per square foot. So in a 4-6 ft closet,
you’d need between 60 and 250 lumens.
The number of lumens required per square foot increases in larger closets because their
volume is considerably bigger in proportion to the area, creating more space to be
illuminated.
Therefore, for a large 10 ft closet, you can expect to need up to 3,000 lumens.
The lumens don’t all have to come from a single bulb, you can reach the required number by
combining multiple light sources together. This gives you a lot of freedom to be creative with
the way you light your custom made bedroom furniture.
In the past, there were only really two options but in recent years, we’ve seen a big increase
in the number of different types of bulbs available for lighting our homes and closets. The
main options are:
Of course, you can use any of these options for lighting your closet, but there are some
factors you need to take into consideration.
Firstly, incandescent bulbs can get quite hot, which may not make them practical or safe for
use in a closet.
Fluorescent tubes and CFL bulbs don’t get as hot but they take up a lot of space, can take a
while to get to full brightness, and can be broken easily.
LEDs can cost more upfront, but they’re significantly cheaper to run. They’re very bright from
the moment they’re turned on and don’t get very hot, making them practical and safer. Not
only that, but LEDs are much more versatile, allowing you to choose just about any colour
imaginable and lay them out in different ways.
Once you’ve settled on a bulb type, you can examine your styling options.
Strip lighting is fast becoming one of the most popular choices for closet lighting because it
allows for uniform illumination of an entire area and also looks great. Generally, strip lights
are LEDs, so they’re cheap to run and can be battery operated.
Recessed lights are installed in a ceiling, wall, or closet surface. They have a great aesthetic
and remove the risk of you banging your head or an object on them when you’re reaching
into the closet.
Tracking lights are ones that have multiple individually-positioned bulbs attached to a single
metal rail. They’re a popular choice because they can be repositioned to maximise the
coverage of the bulbs. They work great in walk-in closets because they have a very modern
and professional feel.
These are lights that hang from the ceiling and are the most common choice in the home.
Chandeliers are essentially just fancy pendants, though they can both create a very elegant
and classic look for your closet. They do, however, require more room than other options, so
they work best in larger closets.
Most lighting options work with a switch that you manually activate with your hand. However,
there are some automatic options that mean the contents of your closet will always be
brightly lit up whenever you open the door. Some work off motion sensors, while others can
have a switch that activates when the door opens, just like your fridge.
All lights need electricity to work, but how you get that energy to the bulb(s) will depend on
how many lights you have, how bright they are, and whether you want to have an electrician
run new cables through your walls.
Fitted bedrooms in London and other historic cities may be installed in old properties where
it can be impractical to make new electrical installations. You may also not want to go
through the trouble and expense of employing an electrician to do this.
In which case, “wireless” lights that are powered by batteries can work a treat. Because
LEDs use very little energy, they can quite comfortably run on a couple of AA or AAA cells
for months or even years without needing to be replaced.
If you opt for any of the other types of bulbs, you will almost certainly need them to be
connected to the mains. This doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll have to be wired in by an
electrician as they could be simply fitted into the custom-made bedroom furniture with a
single cable running to a mains outlet. If you have a socket that’s nearby, then this can be a
good option, but it won’t look great if you have to have a cable trailing across a room.
Need help creating the perfect fitted furniture design? TV and Media storage, Bespoke Headboards to complete the perfect bedroom, Get in touch today and our team will
work with you to find the system that’s right for you.
