By:Janice Wee

How to you make a small room feel less claustrophobic? There are a few ways you could go about it. One is to make it feel more spacious with a play on light. Another is to give it that touch of luxury. A third way is to play up the smallness of the room to make it feel cozier.

Let's start with the appearance of space. A large window makes a huge difference in making the place feel less claustrophobic. Letting in more light would
help a lot. Making the most of the existing light in the room would give it a more spacious feel.

There is so much you can do about the structure of the room. The landlady may kick you out if you knock a hole in the wall to create a window, but there are
other ways of bringing in the light.

Have you seen a room with a wall lined with mirrors? Those mirrors make the room look twice its size, the reflection of the room through the mirror makes it
look as if there is an identical extension of the room on the other side of the wall.
Okay, before we even talk about light, is the room cluttered up? Clutter takes away from the sense of space and adds on the closed up, stressed out,
disorganized atmosphere to the room.

The first thing you should do in a cramped space is to declutter.
Get rid of all the things you don't need. As for what you really need, plan out where you can keep them so that you have as many clear surfaces as possible
in the room. The less clutter there is, the more spacious, or at least, the less cramped and stressful the room would feel.

Keep all the papers out of sight. Organize them in files, or boxes and hide these boxes in odd corners in the room, out of sight.

Get a magazine rack to keep your newspapers and latest magazines in. Then keep that magazine rack near the wall. Actually, keeping the furniture against the
wall leaves you more space in the center of the room for you to move around.
Take a leaf out of the Shaker's book. You know the Shakers style of home decorating. Where simplicity counted, neatness and practicality was everything. They
had pegs on racks to organize all their things and racks are great space savers, highly practical and get you organized.

Instead of claustrophobic, think cozy. Go for rich fabrics that lend the room texture and an air of luxury. Cover the floor in the center of the room with a
large rug to give the room that luxe finish. Large furniture but luxurious that fill up the room give the impression of an alcove.

Fake a ceiling to floor, wall to wall window by draping curtains against an entire wall, to give the illusion that there is a window and therefore, more
space behind that curtain.

Line one wall of the room with mirrors to visually double the size of the room. The reflection of the room through the mirrors makes it look as if the room extends past those mirrors, doubling the apparent size of your room. Mirrors reflect light, thereby
making the place feel more spacious.

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The original article Practical Home Decor Ideas For The Claustrophobic was written by this author for Home Decor Ideas

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