Interior Design Sense

Reader request time! This one comes from Kristín: “My best friend just moved in to his new fab flat, and here’s the best part: He’s letting me decorate it! Ive been searching some picture for inspiration, and I was thinking something masculine in grey-blue colours. I still havn’t found anything though, so I was hoping you might have some pictures?” I don’t think masculine has to be blue and grey so I went through my stash and found some spaces (mostly living rooms and a couple bedrooms) that I personally think would generally appeal to the average guy, that aren’t necessarily bathed in “manly” colours.

James MerrellDecor Demon
Apartment Therapy
The New York Times
Vanessa Hadaway
Sköna hem
Tommaso Ziffer
Apartment Therapy
Apartment TherapyDesigner Guys
Elle Decor
Residence
Style At Home

The layout of your home is probably one of the most significant choices you will ever make regarding your home. Regardless if you live in an apartment, a condominium or a house, the layout of the rooms and how they flow will largely depend on your lifestyle.  Whether you prefer single story or multiple stories, and all the bedrooms on the top floor – choosing a perfect plan can be stressful.  Here are 5 tips to help you decide on a plan right for your family.

1.) Choose a floor plan that suits your lifestyle: In a previous post we discussed the pros and cons of having an open floor plan.  There are factors you should consider regardless of openness. Factors such as: layout of rooms with consideration of family size and ages of children is essential. Most families who have young children like to have the private spaces of the house – bedrooms and bathrooms grouped in one area of the home.  While families with teenagers and young adults prefer to have bedrooms separated from each other.  If you’re house hunting, these factors will be important when choosing a home to move into. Assess your current floor plan and what the pros and cons are.  You may like it, or would prefer to try a different one.

2.) Do you entertain often or rarely? Many home floor plans are centered on entertaining and welcoming guests the minute they step through the front door. A wide foyer opening into an open floor plan living and dining room and meandering to the outdoors would be perfect for guests visiting. Although, if you and your family are more private and don’t like your full home on display every time the front door is opened, you may opt for a formal living room adjacent to the front door. This will allow guests a place to immediately sit and feel comfortable while leaving the rest of your house private.

3.)    Single story or multistory? Many families enjoy single story homes for the quietness of no overhead foot traffic noise.  Some single story homes, or ‘Ranch’ style homes tend to group public rooms in the center and bedrooms and baths are located on the “wings” of the floor plan.  Multistory homes give the added benefit of views to the outside instead of looking directly into a neighbor’s window. Multistory homes also give each family member their own space and room to have privacy over single story floor plans.

4.)    Do certain functions of your home need special accessibility? Whether you have a live-in family member that needs extra space to maneuver or children who need extra wide hallways to run around, consider this factor when choosing a floor plan.  Older homes tend to have narrower hallways, doorways and often door head heights. Remember renovating or altering non load bearing wall locations in the future is an option.  Consider this if you fall in love with a floor plan but your family needs change over the years.

5.)    How much outdoor living do you wish to have? Your floor plan will most likely include an outdoor leisure area. Whether that is a porch, lanai, swimming pool or other amenities.  When choosing a floor plan, assess how much your family will use these outdoor leisure amenities. Similar to a large yard, it looks beautiful when you keep up with it, but can look terrible if you don’t.  Ensure you want the added responsibility of keeping up with the outdoor plan AND the indoors at the same time.

Deciding on a floor plan can be fun and frustrating at the same time.  Assess your family’s lifestyle and your preferences to how you enjoy living.  With patience your dream home floor plan will be easier to find than you think!

Freshome reader’s how did you choose the floor plan of your current home? Do you like it, or would you change it? Share with us your thoughts.

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Have you ever seen so much vitality in an apartment before? Usually, when we are dealing with so many colors, we have to overcome the huge risk of visually jamming up a room. However, in this situation it seems that everything is in its right place and the atmosphere that this apartment inspires is that of extreme energy and jauntiness. Especially designed for a young working couple, this house is meant to be a fusion of passions and interests. As their styles were very different and both wanted some of their own furniture to be integrated in within the new home, things were pretty challenging for the designers. All throughout the crib, you will notice interesting decorating elements such as classic wood furniture (his influence ) and unusual masks and shoes ornaments (for her). We have to say the end result is creative, fun and unconventional.-via micasa

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The Red Nest is an interesting design that makes the most of small apartments. It’s a modular design that offers plenty of storage space, a sleeping area and a working area, but we’ll notice there’s no kitchen area. The red coat of paint combined with a couple of strategically placed mirrors make the whole room seem a lot bigger than it actually is. The bookshelf is a mobile unit meant to hide the bed or the working area, according to your needs. The bathroom is also worth noticing since, as you can imagine, it doesn’t offer that much space either. The Red Nest is definitely a great design for small spaces, and in case you’re thinking about renting such an apartment then you know how you can decorate it to make the most of the available space. Via Mocoloco

Post from Red Nest Modular Design Makes The Most of Tiny Apartments

We recently showcased BIG’s 8 Tallet mixed use project in Copenhagen and were wowed by its energy-efficient design, so we were excited to hear that it just received the 2010 Scandinavian Green Roof Award for its 1,700 square meter roof! The immense roof descends 11 stories to the ground, making it an integral part of the complex’s visual language — the judges commented that “BIG has demonstrated a very clear and conscious use of the green roof successfully integrating it into the visual identity of the building”. The project has offices, apartments and retail all under one roof and it features a walkway that transverses the entire building, turning the exterior into a pedestrian path.

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Post tags: 8 house, big, Bjarke Ingels Group, Copenhagen apartment, Danish design, danish green, green roof, mixed use building, Urban design

Modular furniture is more and more popular, at least with some crowds as it can bring your apartment or house to life in new ways day in and day out. We’ve seen plenty of interesting modular designs here so far and today we’re showing you one more, the Grado, which I encourage you to consider for your crowded living room. The modular design of Grado is perfect for tinier rooms but, as you can see in the pictures above, it is not limited to small spaces only. You can always add more elements to your Grado, and move them around to fit your seating needs. The Grado can be transformed into a comfortable couch, instant bed and anything else you can think of. How do you feel about modular furniture? Via Nintek

Post from Grado Modular Furniture Is Your Personal Furniture Jolly Joker

As I’ve mentionned a couple of times, my husband and I have been doing a bit of research looking for architects to help us plan the additions we want to make to our WAY too small and WAY too boring home. Our cat-sitter used to live on a street a few blocks from us where there was one of the coolest yet simplest homes I’ve ever seen around Ottawa. We recently saw the home in Ottawa Magazine and found out it was designed by local architect John Donkin. It’s 1700 square feet and his client had 3 requirements: a garden, a visitors’ apartment, and a strong street presence. The visitors’ apartment is cantilevered sideways over the lot which creates a shaded area in summer and a covered parking spot and sheltered entrance in winter. The mix of materials on the facade is exactly what I’m looking for and the kicker is the front of the home (iron?) has rusted over time and turned the most beautiful deep orange shade (second photo found on the blog Move That Bus!!!). Check out more of his designs after the jump.

So you just mounted your brand new big screen TV on a wall in your living room and now you’re wondering what to do with all the extra accessories, the cables and all your other gadgets part of your impressive entertainment center. You can’t simply leave them around the house especially since with all the wireless technology available to man we still depend on plenty of wires to power the gadgets we use regularly. Why not build a special compartment right behind your big screen TV. Inside you could place your TiVo, your DVD player, your ultra-portable desktop, and anything else you’d want to add to your home theater setup to turn it into a powerful media center. Check the pictures below and start planning the whole project but remember to let air and IR in for cooling and controlling your gadgets, respectively. Via Apartment Therapy

Post from Hide All Your Home Theater Gadgets Behind the Big Screen TV

The My Space cardboard folding play area in the images below doesn’t have anything to do with the popular social networking site “My Space.” Instead this design is made specifically for children and their busy parents. My Space can be folded into a bunch of interesting decors that can inspire you kid’s imagination and it can be a perfect solution for a crowded apartment. Add some color to the cardboard and your children will have a playground set-up right inside your house which will be open at any time of day ready to put a big smile on their faces. My Space isn’t meant to replace actual outdoor playgrounds, but can be an alternative for rainy days. Designed by Liya Mairson, the pop-up folding My Space playground isn’t available in stores but, with enough patience and plenty of materials you could build this yourself. Via DesignBoom

Post from My Space Opens a Playground Made of Cardboard in Your House

Remembering where you put your stuff will be terribly difficult once you get yourself the Solo storage cube designed by Franck Tawema. Not only is it beautifully conceived, and thus very interesting, but this design is pretty mind-boggling too (video available after the break). With 36 strategically placed drawers you’ll have a hard time getting used to your new storage setup. The Solo storage cube combines drawers of different lengths that can be the perfect solution for your storage needs. The Solo would fit perfectly with a studio that need a touch of personality but since it doesn’t occupy that much space it would fit in any other kind of apartment too. And, as long as you have a great memory you could get a bunch of Solos and spread them around the house. Via YouTube

Post from Solo Storage Cube Comes With Plenty of Drawers