Room: Living Room
Hours to Complete: 7
Main Objective: Making the space more grown up and more suited for short-term rentals.
The Details: On day two of C's we tackled the living room & its enviably deep closet.
While the layout of the room only required a few essential tweaks: center the couch on the wall, flank the extra bar stools on the wall opposite the windows, and some major cord management -- it was the wall-to-wall closet that required a major clear-out.
After: A distilled library on a wall-mounted shelf adds visual interest in a highly utilitarian manner.
C had insanely deep closet (14 feet) but only one door at the end to access. This means that the entire back several feet of the closet turns into a dark, inaccessible, ball of clutter. And you can just imagine how we feel about clutterballs:)
To make this closet a truly functioning storage area we had to remove everything on the floor or walls that blocked the internal passageway. After nearly 5 hours of sorting and paring down, C was able to donate 15 bags (or 80 cubic feet) of unneeded items to charities.
Decluttering Tip: A closet is only as valuable as it's accessibility. It might seem wasteful to leave a wall open or a top shelf free, but the true waste comes from storing items you can't access!
The greatest success? C released so much clutter that his two bikes (formerly blocking the bedroom window) can now easily fit side-by-side inside the closet. This single change drastically improves the energy and rental appeal of his entire apartment.
After: Bringing both the kitesurfing board (mounted above the bar) and the bikes (in the closet) out of the bedroom create an entirely new mature and spacious feeling throughout the apartment.
Redesign Tip: One of our favorite tools for Redesigning client's rooms is to take functional items and turn them into unexpected art. In C's case we used his stunning new kiteboard as "artwork" above his whiskey bar. We also hung his beautiful woodgrain ukelele in the corner. What better way to add visual AND conversational interest to a room!
Lastly, shelving was grouped together to have more impact and show off C’s condensed library that we had removed from this bedroom. We also added the dark bar hutch from the kitchen (which you'll see in Part 3 of this Behind the Redesign series). This both increases seating and allows C to share his fine collection of whiskey in the living room where he does most of his entertaining.