Modern Furniture

Every building is different. Its shape, size, age and architecture give it a distinctive character that needs to be taken into account when you are planning how to use it.

Give yourself time to get to know your home before you start imposing your design plans on it. This usually means waiting for a few weeks after you move in (or preferably a couple of months) while you feel your way around.

Establish which rooms feel most comfortable at different times of day - which are the lightest, which are quietest, which have the best views and which are overlooked? Trust your instincts and take note of which spaces you tend to avoid and which you gravitate towards Consider how you can make the most of your preferred areas, and think about the other parts that need to be rearranged in order to create more usable space, perhaps by moving doorways or knocking rooms through into one another.

Try to forget the existing furnishings and instead look for the potential of the space. Do not be put off by unsympathetic wall colours and shabby carpets, and learn to distinguish between permanent fixtures and things that can be changed. Built-in storage is useful, but can be removed if it is not needed, and it may be much more effective somewhere else instead.

Which activity is more important to you? Is it plenty of room to cook for your family and friends, or enough space to enjoy eating with them? Considering this question will help you decide whether you need a full-sized kitchen for food preparation or whether you are better off limiting it to a neat run of cabinets and reallocating the rest of the space as a dining room, it may be that you do not need a separate kitchen at all, but could create a galley area at one end of a large living space.