With a little imagination and creativity--and without hiring a professional--almost anyone can transform a small living space into a comfortable and stylish environment. Whether decorating a dorm room, an apartment, or a little cottage, what we strive for is a look and feel that expresses our individual personalities. Part style guide, part idea sourcebook, this handy volume--designed to meet the needs of real people with real budgets--is packed with smart ideas, basic design principles, and enough inspiration to get you off the sofa to make it happen.
In her lively, informative text, design guru Marisa Bartolucci takes readers inside 33 small homes from cities across the U.S. to reveal how a strong sense of style--rather than design know-how or unlimited resources--is the most effective tool for transforming an ordinary cramped living space into a smart yet functional private sanctuary.
Date Published 5/1/2003
Ratings
Rated By: Kristin Brown
From: Leesburg, VA
Rating:
Comments: Nicely photographed and interesting As a studio apartment dweller, I'm drawn to books on living well in small spaces. I've found that many are aimed at those who own their own space and have unlimited budgets. While some of the apartments featured in this book clearly fall into that category, others are a bit more realistic, focusing on the renter who doesn't have the ability to knock out walls and raise ceilings. More of a 'this is what this person's apartment looks like' than a how-to or suggestion guide, I still picked up some good tips that will translate to my apartment. Many of the apartments featured do seem to lean more toward the modern look; FYI if you know that's not your thing.
I gave the book five stars because I think it does very well what the title suggests: it offers good photographs of different living spaces sized 100 sq feet to 1000.
Rated By: A reader
From: Unavailable
Rating:
Comments: Best Book for Small Space Decorating This is far and away the best decorating book for small spaces I've read. It's 400 pages, with 400 photographs, and it explores 33 small homes from 100 to 1,000 square feet. My favorite aspect of this book is that the spaces presented are in the United States. I have found that most small spaces shown in specialty books are from Europe or Asia and so lots of the ideas don't translate too easily. The apartments/homes are presented in order of size. Each home contains a very readable description pointing out a wide variety of design ideas, decorating techniques and how each tenant achieved what he/she wanted in a home despite it's limitations. I'm so pleased I bought this book!
Rated By: Michael Webb
From: London, England
Rating:
Comments: Living Large in Small Spaces I have a confession to make. One of the 33 small homes in this engaging volume is my Neutra apartment, perceptively described by a former editor of Metropolis magazine (who kept her sanity by leaving) and brilliantly shot by Radek Kurzaj, a young Polish photographer. Bias aside, I found this to be the standout in a crowded field of books proclaiming that small is beautiful, even as many Americans are pigging out. Ours is an age of obscene excess, and it's refreshing to see how well one can live in a space half as large as mine, and a small fraction the size of mega mansions shoehorned into the Westside. The book is more about lifestyle than design, but every residential architect and interior designer could learn a lot from this varied mix of homegrown decor, which substitutes poetry and practicality for pretension. (Michael Webb is the book reviewer for LA Architect magazine.)
Rated By: Janine Sarna-Jones
From: New York City, NY
Rating:
Comments: Great ideas for small spaces I love this book! There are a number of inventive solutions that don't require hiring a contractor. We've already used some ideas from the book and all we did was rearrange some furniture and paint a wall and a couple of ceilings. This book is truly inspiring if you are struggling with a small, bland space. I've been recommending it to all of my friends and clients who are living in small apartments.
Rated By: Kate Smart
From: Vancouver, BC
Rating:
Comments: Not very useful The first problem with this book, is that the pages measure 6.5 by 8.5. making it feel like a small telephone directory. The photographs show portions of rooms that are simply too miniscule to appreciate; the context in which they are situated is not displayed. I found myself frowning a lot and feeling somewhat baffled. Also, I question the relevence of including close-ups of flowers, or fruit, or a long blank wall with a tiny window at the end of it. It's very irritating. Also, most of these homes are apartments which feature ultra-contemporary furnishings - cupboards with no knobs, couches that look like surf boards, etc. Only a few of the homes could be described as cozy and inviting and they were the best pictures, in my opinion. Ultimately, the smallness of the pictures ruined it for me - I hate having to squint at a photo. A better book is the New Decorating Book (2002, I believe) by Better Homes & Gardens. A true feast for the eyes.
Rated By: Kristin Brown
From: Leesburg, VA
Rating:
Comments: Nicely photographed and interesting As a studio apartment dweller, I'm drawn to books on living well in small spaces. I've found that many are aimed at those who own their own space and have unlimited budgets. While some of the apartments featured in this book clearly fall into that category, others are a bit more realistic, focusing on the renter who doesn't have the ability to knock out walls and raise ceilings. More of a 'this is what this person's apartment looks like' than a how-to or suggestion guide, I still picked up some good tips that will translate to my apartment. Many of the apartments featured do seem to lean more toward the modern look; FYI if you know that's not your thing.
I gave the book five stars because I think it does very well what the title suggests: it offers good photographs of different living spaces sized 100 sq feet to 1000.
Rated By: A reader
From: Unavailable
Rating:
Comments: Best Book for Small Space Decorating This is far and away the best decorating book for small spaces I've read. It's 400 pages, with 400 photographs, and it explores 33 small homes from 100 to 1,000 square feet. My favorite aspect of this book is that the spaces presented are in the United States. I have found that most small spaces shown in specialty books are from Europe or Asia and so lots of the ideas don't translate too easily. The apartments/homes are presented in order of size. Each home contains a very readable description pointing out a wide variety of design ideas, decorating techniques and how each tenant achieved what he/she wanted in a home despite it's limitations. I'm so pleased I bought this book!
Rated By: Michael Webb
From: London, England
Rating:
Comments: Living Large in Small Spaces I have a confession to make. One of the 33 small homes in this engaging volume is my Neutra apartment, perceptively described by a former editor of Metropolis magazine (who kept her sanity by leaving) and brilliantly shot by Radek Kurzaj, a young Polish photographer. Bias aside, I found this to be the standout in a crowded field of books proclaiming that small is beautiful, even as many Americans are pigging out. Ours is an age of obscene excess, and it's refreshing to see how well one can live in a space half as large as mine, and a small fraction the size of mega mansions shoehorned into the Westside. The book is more about lifestyle than design, but every residential architect and interior designer could learn a lot from this varied mix of homegrown decor, which substitutes poetry and practicality for pretension. (Michael Webb is the book reviewer for LA Architect magazine.)
Rated By: Kate Smart "burnabyheights"
From: Vancouver, BC
Rating:
Comments: Not very useful The first problem with this book, is that the pages measure 6.5 by 8.5. making it feel like a small telephone directory. The photographs show portions of rooms that are simply too miniscule to appreciate; the context in which they are situated is not displayed. I found myself frowning a lot and feeling somewhat baffled. Also, I question the relevence of including close-ups of flowers, or fruit, or a long blank wall with a tiny window at the end of it. It's very irritating. Also, most of these homes are apartments which feature ultra-contemporary furnishings - cupboards with no knobs, couches that look like surf boards, etc. Only a few of the homes could be described as cozy and inviting and they were the best pictures, in my opinion. Ultimately, the smallness of the pictures ruined it for me - I hate having to squint at a photo. A better book is the New Decorating Book (2002, I believe) by Better Homes & Gardens. A true feast for the eyes.
Rated By: AVS
From: Atlanta, GA
Rating:
Comments: Pretty and Informative, But Not a How-To This book has lovely pictures and good information; but the problem I found with it is that it is not the how-to for living in small spaces that I was looking for.
Several of the homes are more art project than living space. I agree with a previous reviewer who noted that few of houses seemed inviting, comfortable, or very functionable for every-day life.
If you are a student, as I am, looking for a practicle guide to living in a small area, such as a dorm or first apartment, this book is of little use. If you have the time, money, ambition, and know-how to redesign your small living-space, this book may offer some good ideas.
Rated By: A reader
From: Unavailable
Rating:
Comments: Great for Useful Ideas This may be the best book out there right now on dealing creatively with small spaces. Most of the others I have seen feature gorgeous Manhattan or European lofts, or are the homes of architects and designers. They are eye candy, but not much help.
This book is quite inspiring, however. It's unfortunately short on sources, giving only a brief list of featured designers at the back, but the pictures are clear and the little accounts that go with them are written by the people who actually live in the apartments and they offer some useful ideas. And when a book acknowledges that some of us do live in less than even 1,000 feet, that's a book that's operating on a level of reality I can appreciate, because I live in 544 feet. Some of the apartments in the book are much smaller. I finally feel a little validated.
Another thing I like about it is that it's not a coffee-table- book size: it's manageable to hold and look through, even standing up. It is organized by size, from smallest to largest.
Definitely worth a look.
Rated By: P. Roberts "budget liver"
From: Los Angeles, CA
Rating:
Comments: A Solace for Those of Us Living in Teeny-Weeny Places I recently moved into a <600-sf house with my husband and 33-lb dog. My decorating skills are very minimal, and I end up doing most of my shopping at IKEA. And so it was a pleasant surprise to find this book, which I came across while browsing in the interior design section of a bookstore.
Of course, I had to force myself to pull it out and look at it, since I've been so immensely disappointed by almost all of the books on the subjects of "small" spaces (probably because most of these books define small as 1,000 to 1,999 sf) and since I'm interested in more than just pretty pictures.
Lo and behold, this book, which is largely wonderfully detailed photos of real people's real small spaces (including a 100-sf dorm room and 2 couples with babies living in less than 500 sf), is inspiring in the most practical sense of the word. It's reassuring just to know that other people in the universe reside in sub-1000-sf quarters.
While it is true that many of the featured small-space livers are artists/designers of some sort, with skills that the average Jane doesn't have, I see it less as a book whose ideas you'd want to copy and more of a book whose ideas you'd want to emulate, and I quickly found several good ideas I could apply to my own spaces. Plus, I'm not even half-done just going through it and absorbing the minutiae of each photo and each apartment.
The best part(s)? No fancy-schmancy lofts (with the exception of one converted factory space) and no excessive and gratuitous photos of Wolf ranges and Miele dishwashers.
I couldn't find it used, but I can't feel too much regret about buying it for full price.
Rated By: A reader
From: Unavailable
Rating:
Comments: A Really Good Start! I am enjoying this book immensely, unlike the four to five others I've picked up on this subject.
The apartments featured are very realistic - none of that "image expanding" so popular in decorating magazines like METROPOLITAN HOME or DWELL. Tiny spaces do indeed look their size - and that is a GOOD thing! It means we're not being sold a bill of goods by having the eye tricked with photography.
I appreciate the very quirky nature of the design of each of these highly individualized spaces. I appreciate even more the fact that they are grouped by square footage and start at the walk in closet size! <S>
There are many many highly usable and accessible decorating ideas on these pages.
The one fault of this book (and it's a minor one but worth mentioning): very many of the people profiled in the pages use their very small spaces as tricked out 'hotel rooms' rather than full time living quarters. This might not seem to matter until you realize one gentleman rehabbed his kitchen but didn't include an oven of any kind. How many of us can live like that full time? Several people have their places done up as glorified bedrooms w/ the beds on full time display. One or two others have complicated Murphy beds, one on pulleys from the ceiling. While fairly commonplace in New York proper these beds are expensive to duplicate almost anywhere else in the country and are key to several decorating schemes.
Other than these few problems I would highly recommend this book to anyone to learn some ingenius ways of solving small or quirky or differently arranged space problems!
Rated By: design student
From: Unavailable
Rating:
Comments: please be aware I realize that alot of people gave good reviews for this book. But please be aware, that this book is for people who have a zero budget for decorating. This book is not for people who want beautiful design. It's for very simple people who cannot afford a large home or high quality furnishings.
Rated By: N. Slater "bookbook"
From: on the coast
Rating:
Comments: Cool Pictures I really liked the photography, and weight/size/texture of this book, but I didn't get any ideas that I hadn't already thought of for my small space. It's basically a book that shows who lives where, and how they live...which is cool.
Some of the spaces were so small there wasn't really anything you could put in them besides a dresser, a bed, and a counter with some dishes on top, and a laptop next to it.
Most of the designs are created with items that one would have in their place if they were 18-26 years old. The ideas appeared as having second-hand furniture, knick knacks they had as a kid, miscellaneous art bought from a homeless guy on the street...which is all good, but if you've moved on to the next stage of your life, I don't think this book would be very helpful, but would make a nice coffee table book.
At most, it was visually entertaining, but didn't spark my imagination.
Rated By: Scott D. Jackson "afab67"
From: Orlando, FL
Rating:
Comments: Must Have for Small Space Owners We have to face reality: housing costs are spiralling out of control. Many people, especially single-income people, simply cannot afford the monthly mortgage and escrow payments that go with full sized homes. On the plus side, we often forget that many families around the world live in homes of 500 square feet or less, and do so very effectively. This book proves that small spaces/studios/tiny one-bedroom apartments need not look like dumps or hotel rooms. While economy of space is an absolute necessity, you are fully capable of individualizing your small space to reflect your style and taste. "Living Large" shows an abundance of styles, from classic to bohemain to ultra modern. Sometimes it's hard to believe you're looking at spaces as small as they are. The book groups the different units from as little as 100 square feet of living space to over 1000. Don't like the style or layout you see on one page? Turn to the next and you probably will. Good diagrams and multiple photos from a variety of angles compliment the text very nicely. Plan to live in a small space out of choice or necessity? Make sure sure you get this title. It's invaluable.
Rated By: Carol DeChant
From: Chicago, IL
Rating:
Comments: #2 of 7 "small decor" books I rated this second best of the 7 "small space" decorating books I bought. The author says the average American apt. is less than 800 sq ft.,the average NY city one is less than 400. Most featured here are in NY, but there's a healthy mix of other US cities. Pros: Gives square footage, helpful photos, units more like what Americans live in then in many other decor books; with 398 pages, it's hard not to find ideas you can use.
Rated By: flusteredconsumer
From: Ann Arbor, MI
Rating:
Comments: Flip Through at the Bookstore but Don't Buy I didn't find the contents of this book inspiring enough to justify the $23.10 price tag. To its credit, the photographs are well-done, and you will start to think differently about making small spaces work. But I personally didn't walk away with any ideas for my small space, and I found the decorative styles of the apartment-dwellers interesting but not suitable for my lifestyle. A lot of the apartments featured are 2nd homes for people, so their apartments serve more as places to sleep rather than a dire need to live in <500 sq. feet. There's very little to no "how to" in this book, from furniture arranging tips to how to save space to how to make your life fit into 1 or 2 closets.
Rated By: C. McLaren
From: Melbourne, Australia
Rating:
Comments: Another coffee table book Don't buy this book if you want hints and tips to making your small space bigger. Do buy this book if you want to flip through it once and then leave it on the coffee table for visitors to look at. The book is beautiful to look at but for the price tag I would have preferred an art book. There is a lack of people who don't work in design fields that are featured in this book, giving the book a feel of "look at what others can do, but don't think you can".
Rated By: leigh ann "leigh ann"
From: Louisville, KY
Rating:
Comments: I loved it! This book is a wonderful photographic journey of small space living. What you get with this book is an inside look into the unique decorating styles and challenges of those who live in spaces from 100 - 1000 square feet. What you will not get is perfectly designed spaces and "how to's". I found this book refreshing and realistic. It is a peek into the living quarters of these folks. The book is loaded with photographs.
Rated By: Beatrice Izzey "Nanny Dog"
From: Los Angeles
Rating:
Comments: THE BEST This book is my absolute favorite. Real people with real space concerns (i.e., 300 sqft for two adults and a baby), limited by realistic budgets, and who have learned to love who they are and incorporate their quirks into their space. Not a coffee table, idealistic lifestyle book advocating that we should throw out all of our knickknack collections and live ascetically. Beautifully, lovingly documented and photographed. Afterwards makes you feel rich for having so much space (compared to the New Yorkers) and hopeful about what you can do with the space you have.
Rated By: Moji
From: Oakland Park, FL
Rating:
Comments: Awesome . . . Can't stop flipping through the pages This is a must-have book for "small spaces" owners in making the utmost use of their spaces. I love the real-life examples in the book and though a few of them were over-the-top,it still broaden my horizons about the concept of designing. The only caveat to this book is that most of the owners were based in New York, a few in California and one in Texas (a good way to see that everything isn't big in Texas). I wish the book was more diversed in the settings but then again, New York is the paramount place for getting a small space at a premium.
Rated By: E. Richards "Herself"
From: Alone with my thoughts
Rating:
Comments: Go Ahead, You Know You Want To Look I enjoy books that have photos of people's homes. It is the same driving curiosity that has people going to open houses. They're not after buying the house, they just want to see what the neighbors did with the place.
This book is refreshing because, face it, no one but yuppies in McMansions and the inaccessible rich have very large houses. The magazines and books feature houses that make the majority of people (who live in cities) sigh with despair.
This book shows how people have done up their abodes. The humblest was a Columbia student's dorm room (like a trip to the wayback machine - I think I had a few beers in that room 20 mumble years ago). On the other end of the spectrum are some glossy apartments owned by well to do men of Good Taste. In between are a grandma, some young folk, people who just love rent control, and artists.
I keep the book by my bedside and enjoy looking at how people can make the smallest of spaces comfortable and distinctive.
Rated By: Lye Ai Leen
From: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Rating:
Comments: Highly recommended This is a great book, about real people. It just shows how a small space can be just as grand as a mansion, given some imagination and effort. The ideas presented in the book are ideas that you and I can accomplish quite easily and within our budgets too!
I've gotten a few ideas from this book and it's made my life a lot more pleasant for the experience.
Rated By: Beth Hartford-DeRoos
From: Jackson, California
Rating:
Comments: This book lives up to its title Shy 400 pages this book lives up to its title and didn't disappoint me. Love that the author and photographer have included so many many examples of each square foot style abode, be it city or elsewhere. And an eclectic array of styles so that there are more than a few examples for just about anyones situation.
This is a great book for the person looking to change their environment as well as the person who is about to search for a new place to rent or buy, since the ideas given in the book can be filed in your head so when you are looking at places you can be asking yourself if what you liked in the book could be used in the new place.
Also loved the book because I am planning on building a small place and wanted some ideas and also wanted to be exposed to ideas and problems I had not even considered. The photographs are great. Not cute or fussy, but crisp and clean and well laid out.
At the back of the book there is a listing of the design professionals from the book. And I am in awe with what careful planning can do with a small place under 400 square feet. The book also makes you wince when you think of all the McMansions that people are building that are so wasteful per square footage.
Rated By: small spacer "small spacer"
From: florida
Rating:
Comments: no bathrooms! I don't know why this book indicates that bathrooms are included inside? There are like two pictures of bathrooms and they are both at poor angles. Do people not use the loo in small spaces? i guess i'll go bathe in the ocean!
Rated By: K. Daniels "infinies2"
From: Chicago, IL
Rating:
Comments: Beautiful and practical! Finally, a book that actually takes the phrase 'small apartment' literally! Organized by square footage and featuring a wide variety of styles, plans, layouts, and schemes, this book is an inspiration. Plus it takes into account that not every city dweller has a million dollars with which to decorate. There is an emphasis on DIY and innovative uses of non-decorative items as functional decor, both of which are a relief to me as I am a person who lives simply and paycheck-to-paycheck. And the book is sharp-enough looking I plan to reserve a space for it on my extra-small, extra-chic coffee table!
Rated By: Shona Wilkinson
From: New Zealand
Rating:
Comments: A fun and useful interiors book, and I have many! I love this book, and return to it time and time again for inspiration on the use of limited space. The floorplans and photos of the owners/renters add to the already interesting format.
With a little imagination and creativity--and without hiring a professional--almost anyone can transform a small living space into a comfortable and stylish environment. Whether decorating a dorm room, an apartment, or a little cottage, what we strive for is a look and feel that expresses our individual personalities. Part style guide, part idea sourcebook, this handy volume--designed to meet the needs of real people with real budgets--is packed with smart ideas, basic design principles, and enough inspiration to get you off the sofa to make it happen.
