If you’re feeling a bit cramped at home right now, you’re not alone. In the best of times, small houses can be challenging, but when everyone is advised to stay home as much as possible, the issues can be magnified.

We’ve put together a few ideas to help create more space, for right now and into the future. One or two is sure to work for you.

Shelves Galore

You can never have too many shelves. The wall space in any room is often underused, but if you can lift furnishings up off the floor the more spacious a room may appear. Incidentally, this concept also applies to furnishings that have legs over against those that sit flat on the floor.

Some ideas for shelving you might not have considered include:

A shelf behind a sofa - if your sofa lives up against a wall, why not install a long shelf behind it. It’s the ideal spot for some directional lighting if you like to do crafts that need good light in the evening while others are watching TV, or to stow books or ornaments for either practical or decorative purposes.

A single shelf that circles the room at picture rail height - this is great if you have collections of small items you want to display but keep out of reach of children or pets.
Narrow shelves fitted to the end of a kitchen cabinet - it’s the ideal spot for recipe books, herb and spice collections, or even colouring books for the kids if they like being with you in the kitchen.
Around doorways - if you have space, small shelves fitted around and over doorways can create the illusion of a recessed doorway and offer plenty of space for book collections.

You can also put shelves into awkward spaces, such as under the stairs, to help make better use of those challenging spaces.

Storage Furniture

When you’re considering replacing items of furnishings, always look for things with shelves, drawers, or other hidden spaces for storage. Not just occasional tables, but beds too in the form of divans or ottoman styles.

There are also chests and trunks, or footstools, storage tubs and baskets. If it will hold several smaller items, you can use it to corral similar items and stack them neatly away. Just clearing some of the small items from living room surfaces (such as TV remotes or games controllers) can make a room feel instantly more spacious and comfortable.

Room Zoning

When everyone’s at home, the pressure to make better use of every room often needs a bit of sideways thinking.

If you have a family computer that lives in a shared area, such as the living room, you can make it feel more private and like a workspace if you create a work area around it.

One way to do this is to use a bookcase, turned outward so it’s at right angles to the wall, with the computer table or desk directly behind. A tall bookcase works very well, but shorter ones can have the same effect. Use the shelves for printer paper, pens and notebooks, or text and reference books.

If you have a spare bedroom and want to make a home office or study, consider self storage for bedroom furnishings you’re not using. Having those items handy means you can quickly restore the room to its previous use without the expense of buying new furniture.

Store Your Seasonal Items

We all have things that don’t get used for half the year, such as summer or winter clothes or garden furnishings and toys that lie idle through the winter.

With a self storage room, you can move those possessions out of the house, creating lots more space for the things you are using. As well as seasonal clothes and furnishings, consider storage for sports equipment, hobby and DIY tools, kitchen gadgets, out-of-favour toys that might come back, baby items you want to save or hand down to future generations, inherited items that don’t really suit your home but are precious.

There are hundreds of types of items that we hang onto but don’t have an immediate use for, and those things take up valuable space.

If you’re feeling cramped at home and need to make some space, hopefully, these ideas have sparked a few of your own for how you can make some changes to make things more comfortable.

Disclosure: This is a collaborative post.