Living in a smaller house or apartment doesn’t necessarily mean you have to compromise on living large. Here are some house hacks for tiny digs that will maximise your space so that you can enjoy a decluttered, relaxing, and seemingly spacious home.

High ceilings invoke a sense of spacial grandeur, and when these are apparent in our homes, it can add a sense of peace and relaxation to our living environment. But how do we make a ceiling that isn’t that high give us that visceral feeling? Here are some hacks that help us achieve that feeling, adding illusions to a low ceiling or small space to appear bigger and calm.

1. Add a tall, skinny, floor to ceiling bookshelf to rooms. This will cause the eye to naturally move upward, giving the sense of height.
2. Make your kitchen cabinets go all the way to the ceiling. This can be achieved but either building an extra level of cabinet and creates a feeling of extra height. It is a great place for storing things that you don’t need to access on a daily basis.
3. Full height doors and hallways effectively open up spaces, giving a greater feeling of expanse. A lower doorway can make you feel more confine and boxed in.
4. Ceiling to floor curtains will offer a sense of elegance and the illusion of height. If you are able to find curtains with a design that has a ripple fold effect, it will enhance your entire rooms vertical detail.
5. Keep wall paint to light and breezy colours. The lighter the colour, the larger a room will feel. By keeping the base or skirting boards the same colour as your walls and ceilings, the join lines will feel more merged and make the whole area appear larger.
6. Make as much use of mirrors as possible. Full height mirrors will always make a ceiling appear higher and create space illusion with maximum effect.
7. Put in vertical wall lighting. This will make your wall look taller and as the light will pitch both upwards and downwards, the eyes will be tricked into creating further height.
8. Keep your furniture low profile. Low slung sofa backs give a dramatic impression of a much higher ceiling.
9. Create a vertical feature wall. You can be as brave as you like with this, as long as the orientation is vertical and doesn’t emphasise the lowness of your ceiling.
10. Get rid of the clutter. Clutter will make any room appear smaller than it is and the best way to eliminate this with limited space is to get inventive with your storage space. Stacked boxing can work well and add an interesting quirk to your room.
11. Feature walls. Orient your feature wall vertically. Don’t be afraid to do something daring in a space with a low ceiling. Just ensure that you don’t emphasize that low ceiling in the process.
12. Declutter. Avoid cluttering rooms that have a low ceiling. Each item in the room will add to that feeling of being boxed in. Use inventive storage methods and keep your rooms tidy.

These tips plus smart creative interior designing can help to promote visuospatial exploration. This is the reason why realtors will always highlight high ceilings to prospective tenants. Headover to mdsi.sg/contact or call 6877 1381 to find out more.

Choosing a great interior designer can be one of the toughest jobs of all. They can make or break the look of your home or space, so it is very important to consider the following before diving into that labyrinth. A successful professional in this field does not simply achieve this status by mere accident or coincidence. We need to take on board what qualities make a great designer, and understand how they apply these attributes to their practice.

1. Great Observers

A potential designer will use their eyes as their first and foremost tool. They often see things we would over look and are often very talented at putting in place a DIY alternative to make up for an existing poor design. Observation is their primeval form of research and research gives a purpose to take further action.

2. Great Listeners

Rather than making assumptions, a good interior designer will listen to what it is you are trying to describe and rather than implement their own take on things, will follow through to what it is that you really want. Those who listen won’t just assume that they have the best solution for you, they will provide insights that you would need and are prepared to spend your hard earned cash on.

3. Great Desire

A great interior designer will have made observations and then strive to positively exploit on an existing design. They will have the drive to improve on what they have been given to work with and evolve the brief to achieve the desired results.

4. Great Understanding of Context

Context is essential to help us make sense of things, including whether something is relevant or not. Those with a good eye will achieve a solution that is appropriate to the context or scenario that the look will be used for.

5. Great Solutions

There should always be a solution to a problem, not just a visual. Observation and listening needs to be translated into a solution. If a design fails to solve a problem, or doesn’t make good use of the space, it then becomes a weak one.

6. Great Communicators

A talented professional will be able to transfer their solutions into sketches, models, CAD designs, notes, and verbal communication. They are great at using whatever tools are available to get their ideas across and make them become a reality. Good interior designers will be able to communicate effectively what they have envivioned, and put these thoughts on paper and screen to share their ideas and insights with their clients.

7. Great Awareness

They have an awareness of the world surrounding us and have integrity to provide solutions to real problems, often showing a high sensitivity to the impact that their design may have to the environment and more importantly how it will affect the occupants when their project has been completed.