How to create a comfortable place to sit that doesn't take up much space?
Asked by
Vincentt (
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)
December 19th, 2009
There’s not much space in my room (12 m2), so I don’t really have room to place a couch (it would theoretically be possible, I suppose, but wouldn’t leave a lot of walking room, so only as a last resort). As a consequence, when I want to want a movie with someone, there’s not really a great place to sit – it’s mostly struggling about with my desk chair and sitting, quite uncomfortably, on my bed.
So, does anybody know of a way to conserve space while creating a good place to sit? Is there e.g. something I could place on my bed while e.g. watching a movie (it’s 1.4m wide) but then remove it afterwards? Or do there exist couches you can quickly set up and remove again quickly? Are there other solutions, preferably not too expensive?
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19 Answers
Time for a futon with a great mattress.
Post a few pictures of your room. Let’s see what you’ve got.
I would seriously recommend getting a hammock (There are some comfortable ones as well as uncomfortable ones, you have to be willing to spend a little bit more for a comfy one). You can hang it from the ceiling with relative ease, it takes up hardly any space.
I’m not sure if you can afford one but you could get a Murphy Bed that converts into a couch. It sounds like you are in a studio apartment. If that is the case a Murphy would be great. It does double duty.
Place two chairs together and stretch out on top of both. having a pillow is an assest.
Depending on your ceiling height you may be able to construct a Sky Rack. This is like a bunk bed without the lower bunk and with the “upper” somewhat higher than usual. This frees up room that the “footprint” of the bed would have taken up without the need to fold the bed away as with a “Murphy Bed”. The space underneath this bed could then be used for a standard couch, or a frame for couch-type cushions could be built into this. Incorporating the couch frame as the lower element would also eliminate the need for some of the lateral bracing of the bed frame. An integral ladder would serve as lateral bracing on one end of the bed; the bracing on the other end could become bookshelves, etc,
Put bed in a corner, add a few throw pillows (you can keep them under the bed), rearrange the angle of the TV, and use bed as sofa.
(Sky Rack link doesn’t work, although it sounds like a good idea if the landlord permits that kind of construction.)
Sorry, didn’t mean it as a link. I just put it in quotes and the system somehow turned it into a pseudo-link. :^(
The Sky Rack doesn’t need to be attached to the walls of the room in any way. These are used frequently in dormitory rooms, BOQs, etc.
I’ve considered the sky rack (they’re also a common solution to this problem and permitted by the housing foundation), but have decided against it because I don’t really want to have to climb into my bed – I love just being able to fall down onto it. I’ve slept on a sky rack for a lot of years before. I have the bed now and am not really considering replacing it, I’m merely looking for a solution to turn it into a couch.
I quite like the hammock idea, but not so sure whether there’d be something like that that would suit just sitting. I’ve tried throwing a bunch of pillows into a corner as well, but that, too, isn’t ideal because my screen (which is just my normal computer screen) isn’t really that big, so reading the subtitles is quite difficult (though I just realized I could set the font size bigger, so this should be better in the future). Perhaps I should find a really cheap/gratis second-hand television somewhere…
@PandoraBoxx I’d post a picture if it didn’t look so darn sloppy (I’m going to paint it during the holiday in the coming two weeks) and if I had a camera whose battery’d last long enough…
Would you have room for a chair and a half, with an ottoman? These are oversized armchairs, that frequently double as an extra single bed. The chair is big enough to hold two people cosily but not uncomfortably.
@PandoraBoxx Hmm, good idea, I’ll look into that. And now I know that it’s called an ottoman in English too :)
@EdMayhew As said above, I’m not considering a sky rack :)
@missingbite Hmm, while marking great answers here I noticed I missed yours. The futon does fall under the category of not purchasing a new bed, though. Also, this isn’t a studio apartment, just my bedroom in a house with shared bathrooms, kitchen etc.
Haha, that feather duvet would beat anything any other student has :) Unfortunately the second benefit link didn’t work. I’ll get some more cushions anyway.
We don’t call them sky racks either (we call them hoogslaper), I had to look it up. Loft bed sounds way classier than sky rack though.
Oh, the second benefit link was just a picture of a duvet rolled up!
If you want to make a place more comfortable to live in, it’s about the furnishings, not the furniture – i.e, if you have a scrappy old sofa, don’t waste money on a new one, get a really nice exotic cover for it and some cushions – to maximise your seating area, buy some candles, big ones, (remember to light them for an hour when you get them so it doesn’t look like you never use them the first time someone comes round) and light them when you have company, find some mirrors, preferably either antique and worn ones, or alternatively mirrors that you find in bars, like old school cola mirrors, or bud mirrors, you can find these cheaply and they make the space feel much bigger.
You see, it’s not just the seat you’re sitting on that dictates the level of comfort, it’s also just about the room you’re sitting in.
xx
Sounds great, luckily my sister already gave me some mirrors (four of them, to be hung together in a square), which I just liked as decoration and for their practical use, but I didn’t really think about the fact that they also make the room appear larger. So now I’ll have to decide whether to hang them on the tall end (?) of the room or the other (short?) one. And yeah, I suppose I should light my candles sometime…
hang them on the longer wall, then you will make your room feel squarer and bigger, if you hang them on the shorter wall it will make it feel longer, giving it a corridor effect and making it feel less spacious. Get pictures as well – large blank areas of wall bring the space
inwards and make it feel more confining, so break them up with pictures, photos and a couple posters.
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