15 Tips for Arranging and Decorating a Small Bedroom

Your bedroom is your sanctuary. At least, it's supposed to be. But feeling closed in or cramped isn't particularly pleasant or relaxing. If you have a small bedroom in your home, you might feel deprived of the ability to fully enjoy the space as you should. It doesn't have to be this way, though. With some thoughtful approaches to arranging and decorating a small bedroom, you can make the space feel more spacious and comfortable.

How to Make the Most of a Small Bedroom

1. Don't clutter the limited space with a lot of knick-knacks, tchotchkes, trinkets, pictures, or other decorative items on the shelves, furniture surfaces, and walls. As a general décor rule of thumb, the busier it is, the tighter it feels.

2. Bring in a little nature! Wood, plants, flowers... anything from outside makes your room feel bigger and brighter due to the automatic association with the great outdoors.

3. Opt for a simple, streamlined bed design with a low headboard and footboard to avoid adding too much bulk with what's typically the bedroom's most prominent piece of furniture. Heywood-Wakefield's Kohinoor Bed is a great example. Or, there's our StyleMaster Bed, which features an attractive cutout in the footboard that creates an even less bulky appearance.

4. Consider a platform bed setup to further minimize the impact of the bed in the small space. FYI, all queen and king-size Heywood-Wakefield beds can be easily converted using our Platform Adaptor Kit.

5. Float your bed at the center of a wall, rather than push it into a corner, for a more open feel and more options for using precious wall space.

6. Stylize your bedroom with a neutral base color and one lively accent color. It's a winning formula for maintaining a sense of openness and avoiding busyness, while still delivering personality.

7. Forgo hectic or elaborate patterns, like with your bedding, throw pillows, wallpaper, decorative items, or other elements. Again, busy is not a small room's friend.

8. Use a vertically oriented dresser rather than a long one. Vertical items have a way of lifting the room to make it feel larger. Also, a piece extended horizontally eats up more precious wall space. Take a look at our Encore Double Chest; it's ideal for maximum dresser storage in minimal space.

9. Put your dresser in your closet if you can. This is a huge space-saving advantage, and removes one of the bulkiest pieces in the room from view.

10. Add storage capacity with vertically stacked floating shelves. This takes advantage of the vertical principle mentioned above. It also gives you more space without adding bulky furniture, eating up floor area, or obstructing a large section of wall.

11. Hang a large mirror on one wall for a powerful expanding effect in the room.

12. Place lamps with frosted shades or low-wattage bulbs to provide soft light from two or three different areas of the room. This has a way of creating a calmer ambiance and blurring the edges of the room to make it feel more expansive.

13. Find nightstands with an open, airy design that doesn't look too bulky. For example, Heywood-Wakefield's classic, elegant Lamp Table with Drawer is perfect for this purpose. Alternatively, our Sculptura Night Stand and Kohinoor Night Stand offer a good deal of mid-century modern character without being too assertive for a small bedroom.

14. Let as much natural light in as you can. It really opens things up when it bathes the room. Keep the blinds or curtains open during the day and don't partially block off windows with furniture.

15. Make your bedroom an electronics-free zone. It's better for your sleep hygiene to get off electronics for a few hours before bed, and to refrain from using your bedroom for work or watching TV. Save surface space (and maybe even eliminate the need for a desk in the bedroom) by not having a TV or computer in there.