"Sire, I have a cunning plan..."

[denny]

For various reasons involving the size of the two rooms and the amount of stuff I want to fit in each, I'm considering using this flat's living room as my bedroom (bed, wardrobe, etc), and its bedroom as the living room/study (sofa, computer desk, etc). Because of the way the place is laid out, this would mean walking through the bedroom to reach the living room. I'm now trying to work out the pros and cons of this plan...

Pro:
* More space in new-bedroom, which means
  (a) I can have a king-size bed, with access to both sides of it (current-bedroom just fits a double, with one side against the wall)
  (b) I'll have more room for clothes storage - current-bedroom has one wardrobe and will start looking a bit crowded if I add a chest of drawers
* Less light in new-bedroom - current-bedroom has two windows, new-bedroom only has one
* Less noise in new-bedroom - one of the windows in current-bedroom (the one right next to the bed) opens onto the road and a footpath. People walking past talking sound like they're in the room with you.

Cons:
* Problems if people come to visit who I don't want traipsing through my bedroom
* Problems if someone is crashing on the sofa - they have to come through my bedroom to get to the loo, etc.

That's about everything I can think of so far. As far as I can recall, I've only had two or three people sleep on my sofa in the last five years, so I don't really feel a need to give that a very high weighting in my priorities. As for the thing with general visitors, I don't tend to have people visiting my home unless I'm quite comfortable in their company... so I don't think it will be a problem. Not 100% sure, but again to some extent there's the question of how much it bothers me on the odd occasion that I have a visitor, compared to the daily benefit of having a better layout for me to live in.

Does anybody have any extra cons I might want to consider before I start moving furniture around? :)

Comments

[monkage.livejournal.com]

Is the door to your flat next to the current living room?

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

No, there's a small hallway inside the front door, with doors to kitchen, bathroom and living room.

[monkage.livejournal.com]

Hmmmm, I can honestly see no reason why you SHOULDN'T move everything. It is what I'd do.

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

Another pro is that then there would be more light in the living room.

Flat layout in glorious ASCII-vision :)

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

           ____
        __|F |_|__     _____
       /  |  |D   \   /     |
 _____/  _|__|     \ |      |
|       |  D |      \|      |
|  Ki   | Ba |  Li   |  Be  |
|_______|____|       |D     |
             |_______|______|

F marks the inside of the front door, D marks the doors between other rooms. The little square at the top is a cupboard off the hallway.

Making this diagram was far more fun than moving furniture :-P

Re: Flat layout in glorious ASCII-vision :)

[monkage.livejournal.com]

LOL, that ASCII does look wicked cool though....
I'd say get to relocating everything!

Re: Flat layout in glorious ASCII-vision :)

[hythloday.livejournal.com]

:-D

[hythloday.livejournal.com]

How hot do the rooms get at various points of the day?

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

I don't really know. The bedroom certainly cools off in the middle of the night, I fell asleep on top of the covers last night and woke up around 4am to scurry under them. I dunno if the rest of the flat does the same, I would assume so to some extent (maybe less, with less windows to lose heat through?)

The bedroom might get hotter in the day from sunlight than the living room, given the extra window, but I have no idea... I'm generally in work, in bed, or out with friends :)

[missyasmina.livejournal.com]

How about a "smart solution";
http://www.compact-living.com/loftsangar.asp ?

I'm sure London can offer something similar.

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

Bit difficult to tie someone down on that and then walk around it whipping them :)

one word : rope!

[hashbangperl.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a great excuse to add rope and pulleys to the mix

[kelemvor.livejournal.com]

That looks like something a friend used to have. Except that her bed was above the en suite...

[missyasmina.livejournal.com]

They really are cool, dont you think?
I've decided I want a new bed after seeing those.

That design + my handy-man-friend + my bf's Visa and *vips* I've got a bed that can be lowered down whenever in need for..well..aehm..walks around it.

Now I only need to get a smaller place to live, so I'll have an excuse to buy it.
A cabin!
Yes, I need a cabin.
Cabins need smart solutions. *agrees with self*


Oh well..maybe not then.
But they're just so..pretty. *want*

[kelemvor.livejournal.com]

They do make me think of the Home Of The Future from one of the Daffy Duck/Porky Pig cartoons:
"Why go upthtairs, when you can bring the upthtairs downthtairs?"

Thinking back to the above-mentioned friend, her en suite was pretty much a self-contained cabin within her bedroom, and the top of it merely a good place to put the bed without losing any more floor space. Not that floor space was an issue, as the room was big enough to sleep *thinks* seven on the floor, plus her and her boyfriend. That was a fun night, in a very innocent way. (I'm sure that her parents had managed to acquire more money than sense, while still retaining vast amounts of sense. In an area where most people rented a flat in one of the gorgeous old four-storey townhouses in Bristol, they had the whole house!) As I just managed to mis-spell "sure", I'm going to bed.

Not to worry..

[missyasmina.livejournal.com]

I can't see any spelling-errors ;)

Re: Not to worry..

[kelemvor.livejournal.com]

Ah - I corrected it when I spotted it! :D (I'd put an "h" in "sure", and wondered what didn't llook right all the way through the comment.)