Do you love the location of your home, but find that it’s feeling a bit cramped for your growing family? Do you dread the thought of leaving your city or neighborhood, but find that your space is a little cluttered, and you’re constantly struggling to find items you need?

When many families encounter growing pains with a small living space, they opt to move to a larger home. And there’s nothing wrong with that! But it can truly be a joy to invest in customizing your space so that it better suits for your family. That’s just what this Jersey City family did.

Their cozy apartment was feeling a bit cramped with two adults, two kids and a furry friend. (Check out the project in process post – project #2).

They wanted to transform their open-plan dining area into a semiprivate den, giving them an office area for work plus a place for guests to sleep. But that left a conundrum: where would they put their dining table?

Working closely with the family, we created two innovative design solutions. The first was to transform a storage closet into a dining nook off the kitchen. Our team installed a tabletop and built two benches that have storage space concealed in the seats.

To create a room within a room, we built a beautiful, stationary L-shaped wooden screen to section off the office/den from the kitchen. The screen creates privacy without making the overall space feel smaller – in fact, the homeowners say that the space actually feels bigger now! Finally, we installed cabinets and new shelving to provide additional storage.

Here’s what the homeowners have to say: “What the Houseplay team designed for us is beyond anything we imagined. Our home is so much more functional, and every detail they considered, literally EVERY ONE, makes us smile every time we interact with it. Consummate professionals, highly skilled artisans, and savvy, innovative designers with a finger on the pulse of modern interior architecture—I cannot recommend them enough.”

If a space isn’t working, moving may feel like an “easy” solution. But sometimes, customizing the space so that it’s designed especially for your family’s needs can work even better.

If you’re ready to make your space work better for your family, contact us today.

Photo Credit: Anne Ruthmann Photography