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How to Turn that Unused Office into a Chic Guest Room

You bought a great desk to try and encourage yourself to get more work done on your hobbies, passions and career but it didn’t quite work out as you had planned. That desk is now covered in junk and it is slowly accumulating dust. It’s time to reimagine that room as something useful.

A guest room is a great addition to any home an one you’ll be happy you decided to pursue. The first thing you need to do is empty the room out to make room for the new furniture. You should never just add futons to an office and call it a guest room. This needs to be a guest room first so take everything out and start over. You can leave the desk in there but empty it out and only out back exactly what you need.

Next you can think about the bedding situation. Is this room big enough to consider platform beds or are you going to have to limit yourself to day beds and futons? Platform beds offer some great additional storage if you buy a model with hidden drawers built into the actual frame. This can act as a great place to keep linens and extra pillows so your guests have access to them at all times.

If you don’t have the room for platform beds then futons are your next best bet. This will allow you to have a full sleeping space that converts into a couch when not in use. Futons are a very space efficient option for smaller apartments and houses. Make sure that you don’t keep anything in the guest room that you need on a daily basis. This should be your guests’ space and if you are intruding every few hours then they will not feel at ease.

How to Maximize Space in Your Kids’ Rooms

The economy may be slowly improving, but the housing market doesn’t appear to be leading the way. With banks often refusing to make loans, even families with reasonably substantial financial wherewithal are quite often simply unable to move. And so the question for many parents of growing families has become, “just where the heck am I supposed to put all these kids?”

A bunk bed in a kids roomWell, lack of household space is actually a far from new problem, and so we have a solution that’s rather traditional to go with it. Bunk beds are quite an ancient way of making the most efficient use of a room and you’ve probably slept in one at camp or in a college dorm. Once enormously common in an America of larger families, of “Leave it to Beaver” and “The Brady Bunch,” they receded somewhat in the latter portions of the 20th century, only to have made a modest comeback in more recent times.

The good news is that bunk beds are quite often welcomed by kids who enjoy jockeying for position over who gets the top bunk and being able to chatter through the night. (Something you’ll want to watch out for, though eventually the novelty will wear off and your kids will sleep as normal.)

There are, however, a couple of safety issues you’ll want to take note of. In particular, it is not a good idea to allow children under the age of six or so to sleep on the top bunk. Also, you want to be very sure that proper guardrails have been installed to prevent kids from becoming trapped between the wall and the bed. This is more dangerous than it sounds.

That being said, bunk beds and their cousins, loft beds, are the best way we know to really make the most of your children’s rooms. They’re fun and practical. How many other items around the house are both of those things?