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Design Dilemma Building a Home home office

Should I bring builtins all the way up?

2 years ago

Hi there! We have been working with a contractor for a desk/cabinets/shelfs in our office (since we’re going wall to wall, I guess it’s considered as “built ins?”)
Anyway, the ceilings are 12 ft high so we’ve been planning to only make them go up 9 ft tall. Now I’m wondering if we should build them all the way up to the ceiling. We’ve already gone back and fourth about the design so I don’t know if I should change it up again! Photos attached are of inspiration and also of my space. I’m wondering if the inspirational photos I’m looking at just have lower ceilings so it works there but not sure if we can go all the way up with such tall ceilings. Our office is very narrow and 16” long. Should we go all the way up?

built up to the ceiling

keep it at 9 feet

Comments (6)

Susan
2 years ago
In looking at the photos, it doesn’t seem that the office ceiling height is 12’. Are you sure about the height?
Keith Dcil
2 years ago
last modified: 2 years ago
Since you say the room is narrow, I would not want the cabinets going wall to wall. I would leave at least a foot on either side to make the room feel wider (similar to the insp. pic with brass lamps). Make up for the lost cabinet space by taking the unit up to ceiling.
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PRO
Patricia Colwell Consulting
2 years ago
IMO you will get a real tunnel effect if you go high in fact I would probably not do much above the desk height to avoid that feeling maybe just lower book shelves and some art on the wall to make the space feel a bit wider. IMO an office needs certain things and make sure you get those but a lot of diplay of decor is just one more thing to dust in a space that gets dusty from all the electronics. I would much rather look at art than a bunch of shelving.
chispa
2 years ago
Assuming the ceilings are 12 ft, if you are only doing open shelving above then I would just go to 10 ft. If you were doing some closed storage space then I would consider going to 12 ft because it would give you extra storage for rarely used items, also assuming you needed more storage space.

How wide is your desk area? I have 40" width and wouldn't want it any narrower and I'm a smaller sized person.
kandrewspa
2 years ago
If you're really going to work in this room then the desk area should be 60-72" wide. If you're only going to be in there a couple hours a week then I guess 48" would be wide enough. It depends on whether you will be working with any paper or just need a place for a laptop. I wouldn't take the built-ins above the height of the windows, and by that I mean the bottom set of windows, not the curved top window. That keeps them human-scaled which makes the room more comfortable. If you go taller you will have shelves you can't reach that you will have to get a ladder to dust. But once again it depends on how much you're going to use the room and whether it's a show piece or a real home office. I also don't like having my back facing the door, so I wouldn't do that in a real home office.
Paige C
Original Author
2 years ago
Thanks everyone! Yep, the ceilings are 12 ft.
I feel bad going back to the contractor to change not going wall to wall.😕 the sides by the wall are only going to go out 19 inches so hopefully that will help!

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