5 Common Small House Interior Design Mistakes that You Don't Know You're Making

Do you know the mistakes to AVOID when designing the interior spaces especially for a small house? This article describes common design mistakes you must avoid when designing the interior of a house.

1. Bathroom opening to the dining space

When the bathroom door opens to a dining or a living space, the user wouldn’t have enough privacy when entering and leaving the bathroom.

This is not nice and if the walls and door are not soundproofed, you may also hear the flush sound from outside the bathroom.

The bathroom door should always be hidden from living spaces.

If a person in the living space or the dining space can directly see inside the bathroom and see the fittings even for the small-time lag between opening and closing the doors, it is not good space planning.

Overall, it is not good hygiene to have a bathroom opening to a living space.

2. Furniture arrangement issues

When designing a house, spaces have to be designed having an idea about the furniture

arrangement of each space. A non-qualified designer may overlook the importance of this fact.  Furniture has standard dimensions that are essential in supporting the intended use.

When you design a space without thinking of the furniture arrangement and afterwards if you purchase furniture from a store, and try to fit them in, the spaces might not have enough room to accommodate them.

This may result in the spaces becoming underutilized and wasted.

Have you faced issues such as not having enough space when using your dining table?

Your legs hit the coffee table when you sit down on the sofa?

Do you have to walk in between furniture without having enough space to walk properly?

These are the results of poor furniture arrangement.

A space designed without thinking of the furniture arrangement may still stand a chance to utilize the intended functions through custom made furniture which are specifically designed responding to each space by an interior designer. However, you have to understand that this would mean, sometimes the furniture will have to compromise its standard dimensions.

For instance, if the dining room is too small and you still need a dining table for 6 people, the designer will have to reduce the table size to accommodate 6 people. This would reduce the space to keep plates, dishes, or cutlery; therefore, you will not be able to comfortably dine.

3. Placing the staircase disturbing the entire living area

There are mainly two ways that you could place the staircase in a house design.

i. Staircase as a feature

The staircase can be designed in the living area as a special feature of the space. This would incorporate changing the form of the staircase to be linear, straight, curved, spiral etc. to best suit the surroundings and also may include different design elements to the staircase such as glass handrails, balustrades, floating steps.

However, these details of the design should always match the overall Architectural language of the house.

ii. Staircase hidden between walls

If your house does not have enough space to feature the staircase you can hide the staircase in between walls. This would allow you to save space in a tidy house. Make sure that you would let adequate sunlight into the staircase If you are using this method.

In either method, the staircase should not disrupt the circulation of the main living spaces such as living and dining.

4. No space to include extra furniture after placing the bed in your bedroom

Have you experienced that after placing the bed you cannot fully utilize the rest of the space to include other furniture, so that your bedroom feels smaller than expected?

When designing the bedspace, the most important thing that you should decide first is the bed size. Think in advance whether it should be single, twin, queen or king size depending on your requirement.

The room size will depend on the size of the bed. If you plan on having a wardrobe or working table within the bedspace you also must decide that beforehand.

This is because including additional furniture after designing the room could be very difficult and result in a cluttered room.

5. Having a bathroom that is too difficult to clean

A bathroom usually has three main components. They are the wash basin, the water closet and the shower. Additionally you could include a bidet and a tub if you have extra space. The above three components should be placed in a sequence in a good bathroom design. The first fitting you should see when you open the door is the wash basin which would give you a pleasant first impression.

If you see the water closet instead, it will not give a good feeling.

The second fitting is the water closet and the third is the shower.

A bathroom has a way of zoning in its interior design: the dry area and the wet area. The dry area includes the water closet and the wash basin. The wet area contains the shower. You must always separate the wet area / shower with a glass cubicle, a glass partition or a shower curtain.

This will keep the bathroom dry and make it easier to clean and maintain good hygiene.