Ready-to-assemble (RTA) furniture makes it easy for every homeowner or apartment dweller to afford stylish digs. But many of us must make ourselves at home in increasingly small spaces. Luckily, there are plenty of RTA hacks out there to help you fit your stuff into a tiny space – without sacrificing comfort or style.
Use the Space under Your Bed
If you haven’t yet upgraded from the mattress-on-the-floor life, it’s time to make use of the free real estate that’s underneath your bed. Hack an IKEA Ribba picture frame with casters to create cheap, easy, and attractive under-bed storage that rolls right under your existing bed frame. Craving a storage bed to empty your closet or create more space in your stamp-sized studio apartment? Use IKEA kitchen cupboards to build a gorgeous, practical platform storage bed that can help delineate sleeping and waking space in a super-small abode.
Don’t Settle for No Closet
Are you cursed with a closet-less bedroom? You don’t have to be, and you don’t have to sacrifice a corner of your room and spend a long weekend putting up walls, either. Bring closet space back into your life with a wardrobe or armoire. You can hack a cheap RTA wardrobe like this blogger did to create a modern, sleek armoire, or you can purchase an RTA armoire with shelves, drawers, a clothes rod, and other features already built in. Not great at putting things together? You’re not the only one; that’s why many handyman services offer furniture assembly help, too. Search for furniture assembly in your city, for example, Philadelphia, and don’t be afraid to ask for help hacking your item into a custom finished product.
Maybe you need more space than an armoire can offer, or maybe you don’t like the idea of a big piece of furniture looming over you while you sleep. Get the closet storage space you need without the closet – put in a storage wall instead. Use whatever combination of shelves, baskets, rods, drawers, tables, and mirrors you need to get exactly what you want in terms of storage. Need just a little more space to hang clothes? Install a metal rail beneath a well-anchored wall shelf, or install a corner rod to maximize storage space in your bedroom or closet.
Get the Space You Need in the Kitchen
Bedrooms aren’t the only rooms in a home that can be too small – miniscule kitchens can present issues, too. Double kitchen cupboard space easily when you install rolling drawers from IKEA. Turn $10 IKEA bed slates into vertical storage with hooks for houseplants, pots and pans, jars, cutting boards, and other kitchen essentials. Install a cheap rail and hanging basket under a kitchen outlet for a super-convenient charging station. Use command hooks and adhesive tabs to add under-sink storage for sponges, scrub-brushes, washcloths, and other tools that might otherwise clutter up your sink and sit around looking unsightly and smelling kind of weird. Use an RTA bookcase to create a kitchen island with shelving space for recipe books, snacks, baking supplies, pots and pans, or whatever else you need to stow away.
Take Your Living Room to the Next Level
With a little creativity, you can customize RTA pieces into modern, chic storage solutions for your other living spaces. Use picture ledges to store craft items, display books and magazines, or even to show off your grandmother’s china. Choose a three-tiered kitchen cart as a bar cart for your TV room, or an end table with plenty of space for your books, magazines, knitting projects, and cat toys. Use a series of IKEA kitchen cabinets to create a media storage TV stand that fits your space perfectly. Need low-profile storage in a hallway? The IKEA Trones storage boxes are only seven inches deep, and can be arranged in any configuration you desire.
Living in a small space doesn’t need to mean living with clutter. With the right RTA storage hacks, you can keep your space neat and organized, and get all the storage you need, whether it’s in the kitchen, the bedroom, the living room, or elsewhere. Start brainstorming today, and you’ll soon feel like you’re living in a whole new space.
