How to Make a Small Room Look Bigger
by Christine
Not all of us are able to buy a big house, however, larger spaces do make us feel more at home. Whether we’re living in a house or visiting as a guest, we tend to prefer a room with more space.
Luckily, there are ways for us to make a room look bigger: certain lighting methods will leave an average-size room looking much larger.
In this article, we’ll look at 7 tips for how to use lighting to make a room feel less cramped. Using one, a few, or all of these tips will help make your rooms look larger, leaving a positive impression on your guests and making yourself feel more at home.
Make Sure Your Lights Hit All Walls and Corners
Dark spaces in a room actually make it feel smaller. You should try to position various types of lights throughout the room to hit every nook and cranny. When all the walls and corners of a room are well-lit, you’ll find that the room feels much larger right away.
When we say this, we don’t mean you should set up a light to shine on one specific corner. Try your best to set up your lights so that they hit those spots without overpowering the room. Bear in mind, there is such a thing as too much lighting!
Use Low-Hanging Ceiling Lamps
Some rooms may be small in length and width but tall in height. Low-hanging ceiling lamps can be utilized in rooms such as these. Low-hanging ceiling lamps gives the impression of a larger room. The eyes of your guests will be diverted upward, and they are less likely to notice the actual size of the room.
You can improve this even more if you use ceiling lamps that have varied and interesting patterns. This will leave your room looking even larger than before.
Use Tall Floor Lamps to visually elevate the room
In the same way as with low-hanging ceiling lamps in a room with a high ceiling, you can also use tall floor lamps. Floor lamps have a similar effect to low-hanging ceiling lamps. Obviously, you need to be careful with how many lamps you’re using: you can’t have four ceiling lamps and four floor lamps and expect your room to look large and balanced.
You should aim to have an odd number of ceiling lamps - either one or three - depending on the size of the room. As for floor lamps, two tends to be enough. Again, you need to alter the number based on the size of the room. However, in general, you shouldn’t need more than two or three lamps anyway for your living room lighting.
Utilize Mirrors
Mirrors are the best way to make a room appear larger. If the room permits it and you’re able to place a floor to ceiling mirror behind a sofa or over an entire wall, then you really have an amazing room.
Have you ever noticed how clothing stores have a ton of mirrors in them? That is because it gives you the impression that the space is much bigger than it really is. The same concept works in your own home. If you add a large enough mirror to the room, especially if it covers a whole visible wall, your room will gain a decided advantage and appear much larger than before.
Strategically place glass to reflect more light
Glass objects also bring out a room’s size. Using a glass vase or table will further increase the lighting’s impact on a room’s size.
Even better than that, you can utilize glass lamps to really amplify the effects of your lighting and improve the room’s aesthetic. The more light that reflects throughout a room - so long as you don’t overpower the room - the larger it will appear.
Again, make sure you don’t overpower the room by adding too much glass. A glass table or a glass lamp would be just enough. Don’t go so far out of your way to make an entirely glass room or it won’t look nice anymore. You need to balance the original aesthetic of your room with your means to make it look larger.
Make Use of Natural Light
Natural light is one of the best sources of light for your room. No matter what room it is, natural light should be a priority. Although, you can’t get natural light into a bathroom without risking your privacy!
Natural light can brighten up a room in such a way that cannot be compared to artificial light. Not only will your guests feel relaxed and at home under natural light, but it will also be a huge distraction and will make the room appear more sizeable.
The more natural light in a room, the more space you will seem to have. It can also work to compliment the above tips if you also have some of the previous factors set up to further improve the aesthetic of the room.
Try Not to Clutter Your Floor Space
The last and perhaps most important way of making a room feel bigger is to make sure it doesn’t get too cluttered. The more free floor space you have, the better your room will appear.
If you clutter the floor of any room, it will appear very small. Make sure to keep everything in order and avoid putting too many objects on the floor wherever possible. Keeping about half the floorspace bare is a good general rule to follow.
These are seven tips for how to use lighting to make a room look bigger. If you can follow just some of these tips, then you’ll find your home looking much larger than it used to!