Make Your Guest Room Work Overtime
When my husband goes through heavy bouts of work travel, as he has over this last month, I retreat into the guest bedroom beside our children's shared bedroom. For some reason I feel more secure that I can be near the kids who, honestly, at 5 and 3 years, don't need me in the night.
Yes, being honest, I love of course my husband being around but a close second is the small and cozy guest room housing a mahogany double sleigh bed flanked by night stands, and a small writing desk. A collection of vintage letter Es filling one of the walls. There's something about burrowing into the down comforter and, say, finishing off Jane Eyre again.
It got me thinking about how we should use the room as much as possible and let ourselves feel that we are experiencing every inch of our little 1930s bungalow. And that, while guests rooms should do best what they were created for, they shouldn't be limited to enjoyment by those who don't themselves actually live in the dwelling. To help make your guest room work overtime:
1. take advantage of the non-bed spaces that the room has to offer. Feel free to burrow down. You can always clear it all away for guests.
2. Use convertible furniture. A quaint daybed can not only serve as an everyday lounge area, but provides floor space for private yoga practice or blocks and trains.
3. Get good at storage. This makes clearing things away easy. Create a space for your sewing machine and materials, for instance, in organized bins in the room's closet, simultaneously allowing you easy access and the guest fresh space to hang their clothes or tuck away their suitcase.
4. Make the Lived-In-Look part of the room's charm. If you choose to set up that antique bassinet in the room's corner as another place to nap the baby occasionally, fill the bassinet with guest towels and magazines for your guest.
5. Enjoy your guest room as a guest. Who says you can't appreciate fully the space yourself? Set out towels and guest-worthy toiletries, magazines, a carafe with water, and schedule your weekend vacation. Allow yourself to experience the leisure of get-away mode without the cost.
Yes, being honest, I love of course my husband being around but a close second is the small and cozy guest room housing a mahogany double sleigh bed flanked by night stands, and a small writing desk. A collection of vintage letter Es filling one of the walls. There's something about burrowing into the down comforter and, say, finishing off Jane Eyre again.
It got me thinking about how we should use the room as much as possible and let ourselves feel that we are experiencing every inch of our little 1930s bungalow. And that, while guests rooms should do best what they were created for, they shouldn't be limited to enjoyment by those who don't themselves actually live in the dwelling. To help make your guest room work overtime:
1. take advantage of the non-bed spaces that the room has to offer. Feel free to burrow down. You can always clear it all away for guests.
2. Use convertible furniture. A quaint daybed can not only serve as an everyday lounge area, but provides floor space for private yoga practice or blocks and trains.
3. Get good at storage. This makes clearing things away easy. Create a space for your sewing machine and materials, for instance, in organized bins in the room's closet, simultaneously allowing you easy access and the guest fresh space to hang their clothes or tuck away their suitcase.
4. Make the Lived-In-Look part of the room's charm. If you choose to set up that antique bassinet in the room's corner as another place to nap the baby occasionally, fill the bassinet with guest towels and magazines for your guest.
5. Enjoy your guest room as a guest. Who says you can't appreciate fully the space yourself? Set out towels and guest-worthy toiletries, magazines, a carafe with water, and schedule your weekend vacation. Allow yourself to experience the leisure of get-away mode without the cost.
A guest room with more than just a place to sleep not only offers your visitors a private place of their own to retreat to (and allow both of you some space)--but when guests have gone, provides another room to spend time in. Who says that guests are the only ones to enjoy a fireplace such as this, curled up in the chairs by the nice view?
Q