Fix It Renovations

How to make a small house feel BIG

Got a small house? It needn’t look – or be – small. Here are a few tricks and techniques for making the most out of every square metre.

Use light-coloured interior paints to open up the rooms. Cream colors and icy blues are among the best combinations. It is all about illusion.
Replace dark heavy curtains with lighter ones or, better still, blinds that can be pulled up right out of the way during the day.
Furniture can make a huge difference to how a room is perceived. Often people with smaller homes try to get as much into the available space as possible. The result is a cluttered look that makes rooms seem even smaller than they are. The answer: clear out unnecessary furniture and store it in the shed, attic or basement, put larger items against the wall to open up the centre of the room, and use furniture that serves more than one purpose (for instance, coffee tables with storage under).
Letting natural light flow into the room can make a massive difference in opening up a room. If you don’t have a lot of natural light, increase the wattage of your electric lighting and add some lighting features.
Mirrors can make your rooms look bigger. Use a focal point and angle your mirrors towards it, which will give the illusion of depth. The mirrors also reflect both natural and artificial light to make a room brighter during the day and night.

Open up the corners with windows to make rooms feel much larger.
Put in larger windows or replace them with French, sliding or bi-folding doors to bring the outside in.
Do you need all that hallway? Halls are a lazy way of organising rooms, and they eat up a tremendous amount of living space especially in a small house. Consider opening up a hallway or two and you will be surprised at the difference it makes.
Offer one semi-formal dining area. Combine tiny breakfast nooks and claustrophobic dining rooms into a single large eating space that is separate enough from the kitchen to feel special.
Remove non-loadbearing walls or cut them down - low walls define rooms without closing them in. Your eye will be able to see beyond, giving it a much more open feeling.
Open up enclosed stairways and balconies if possible. Enclosing stair halls and solid rail walls mess up sight lines.
Create open-plan areas where possible to eliminate space-consuming walls and open up your home.
Use continuous flooring. Floors that change abruptly from one type of flooring material to another create visual clutter. Instead, use the same type of flooring material across larger areas of your home to create flow and openness.
Build up, build out or build under with Fix It Renovations. It may not cost as much as you think, especially if you can make better use of the existing space inside your ceiling or your basement, or you have enough land to allow you to add a room or two.