Space Saving Solutions and Flexible Living

With the high prices of city living forcing us into increasingly small spaces, combining creativity with spacial efficiency is more important than ever. Aside from enhancing your existing environment, thinking big and living small can enable you to create the house of your dreams, wherever you are. Last week, Japanese retailer MUJI, known for its minimalistic and affordable designs, unveiled three new micro-homes in Tokyo, pushing the boundaries of how and where we live. Built using sustainable materials such as aluminium, cork and wood, these ‘Muji Huts’ are lightweight and environmentally efficient, allowing them to be taken anywhere without dramatically increasing your carbon footprint. Designed by Naoto Fukasawa, Jasper Morrison and Konstantin Grcic, these little houses aren’t cheap and are currently unavailable in the UK but as one of the first pre-fabricated units to be sold on the mass market, we’re extremely excited to see where they’ll lead.

Here at Stuff of Dreams, we’re always looking for ways of enhancing or developing our existing workspace and were particularly inspired by Gregory Han’s ‘backyard escape project’, documented by Design Milk Magazine (http://design-milk.com/the-tiny-tool-shed-backyard-escape-project/). After purchasing a relatively basic but robust storage shed from Home Depot, Gregory adjusted the exterior and re-shaped the interior, using his research and strong vision to create something out of nothing.

For the city dwellers amongst you, we were equally impressed by the space saving efforts of Polish designer Szymon Hanczar, who managed to take an area of 13 square-meters and turn it into a fully functioning home. Through his utilisation of different spatial planes, Hanczar was able to leave his floorspace free and open, making the room feel larger and creating space for everyday items. We were also particularly fond of this Turntable Station, designed by Kickstarter collective Line Phono. You can check out their page here - (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/linephono/turntable-station-audio-furniture-solution)

To cut a long story shot, we believe that small spaces should never lead you to compromise on the environment you hope to create. If anything, the restrictions they provide should harbour creativity, enabling you to come up with exciting solutions to any existing problems and inspiring you to step into the unknown...Let's go!