To make a room appear larger, you don't necessarily need to knock down walls or undergo expensive renovations. Visual expansion of a room is possible through optical illusions. There are many ways to enlarge even the smallest room without much effort and avoid significant financial expenses.

White Color - A Timeless Classic

Any shade of white fills the room with light, airiness, and visually enlarges the space. In addition to white ceilings and walls, you can buy light-colored furniture and textiles. If you're not a fan of monochrome items, you can enhance the design with decorative prints like butterflies or small flowers. Decorative interior items should be in cool tones - blues, grays, greens, light blues.

'Mirror' Space Enlargement

Reflective elements excel at visually enlarging a space. You could install a fully mirrored wall or simply hang several beautiful mirrors. A glossy stretch ceiling, which reflects light, adding a sense of larger space, would be a great addition. Small decor elements like mirrored photo frames, a chandelier made of clear glass, and light curtains are also beneficial.

Proper Furniture Placement

For small spaces, use compact, foldable, suspended, or built-in furniture. Opt for sofas, cabinets, and tables in classic square shapes without bulky armrests. Narrow console tables and wall-mounted shelves visually elongate the room. Place furniture along the wall; central arrangements are more suited to larger spaces.

Choosing the Right Wallpaper

Light wallpapers with vertical stripes make rooms with low ceilings appear taller, while horizontal stripes make them appear wider. Ideally, the stripes should be narrow and in light tones. Not only do they enlarge the space, but they also create a positive atmosphere. If you can’t find the right option in stores, buy paintable wallpaper and create your unique design. Additionally, you could purchase a tall floor lamp with a striped fabric shade and place it in any visible corner.

Selecting Floor Coverings

If you are looking to expand a narrow room, first consider the flooring. Dark linoleum or laminate can significantly reduce the appearance of space. Opt for light, solid shades - light beige, milky, white. Longitudinal stripes on parquet boards elongate the room, while perpendicular stripes widen it.

If the apartment has two or three rooms, it's best to use the same flooring throughout. A uniform structure helps increase space. Avoid high and dark thresholds between rooms as they emphasize boundaries and highlight the small size.

An ideal option is a monolithic poured floor. Although costly, its glossy surface and reflective properties effectively enlarge the room.

Zoning

If you need to divide a room into several zones but can’t do without partitions, glass is preferable. Glass partitions can be draped with beautiful light curtains, which can be drawn when necessary. If there are children in the house, consider partitions made of tempered glass or laminated glass, which are practical, safe, and keep the room bright. In bathrooms, frosted glass partitions can be used.

Sliding Doors - Space Saving

In small apartments, instead of traditional doors, sliding systems are installed. When opened, they align with the wall and don’t require additional space. Manufacturers offer many different options, including convex (rounded) panels, but straight ones are more suitable for small areas.

Transparent or Glossy Furniture

Transparent tables, chairs, and shelves blend well with any interior. They are virtually invisible, creating a sense of vast, empty space. Light furniture with a glossy facade that reflects light also works well. Optimal shades are ivory, light gray, beige, white, light blue.

Voluminous Wallpapers

If it's not possible to undergo expensive renovations or change furniture, small 'sacrifices' like applying 3D wallpaper can visually enlarge the room and fill it with color. This solution is suitable for any apartment, especially small ones. Opt for classic light combinations without bright or dark elements. Wallpapers with images of nature or water surfaces visually enlarge the space.

Textile Curtains Reduce Space Indeed, so the best option would be not textiles but roller blinds. Thanks to the open window spaces, the room becomes wider, longer, and brighter. If there is a need to hang textiles, opt for transparent light fabrics. 'Heavy' materials like jacquard, velvet, or burlap are not suitable for small apartments.

Minimalism in Interior

Avoid decorating the home with too many decorative elements. They create a cluttered atmosphere and make the space feel cramped. Large vases and other bulky items are better removed or placed in a distant corner. The fewer items within the line of sight, the more spacious the room appears. Moreover, with a minimal number of decorative items, the room looks much cleaner and cozier.

Proper Lighting

In small spaces, use diffused light. To visually expand the room, install chandeliers with matte glass shades. Bright and large models are inappropriate. In addition to hanging fixtures, table floor lamps with light shades are installed. Point lighting can also be set up around the perimeter. Due to the large number of light sources, the apartment visually becomes much more spacious, and the ceiling appears higher.

11 Ways to Visually Enlarge a Room with Paint Various color solutions can visually expand, lengthen the room, or make it taller.

In a small apartment, the floor is not only made monochromatic but also colorful. This can be white-beige tones, light green combined with blue, or, for example, milky with blue streaks. There are many options for colors, but it's important to consider that cooler paint tones help visually expand the room and make the ceilings higher.

Bright floors and ceilings with saturated colors make the room wider, but as a result, the space appears lower. This option is suitable for apartments with ceilings over 3 meters.

If you paint the floor and the back wall in one color, the room will appear more spacious and voluminous. For such a design solution, beige, milky, light blue, and light green shades are suitable.

The ceiling and the back wall painted in one color will make the room wide. This option is suitable for narrow and long rooms. If the room is square, then this type of painting will visually make it shorter and less voluminous.

Visually expanding the room can be achieved by reducing its volume. For this, highlight the back wall with a cool color. It can be painted or covered with 3D wallpaper.

Highlighting the side walls with color helps increase the depth of the space, but in this case, the width decreases. This solution is suitable for square rooms.

The problem with low ceilings is solved by painting the far wall and side walls in one color. The color solution allows you to visually make the room taller, but then the width and depth decrease. This option is well suited for low and square spaces.

Visual enlargement of the space is possible with voluminous wallpaper with small patterns - flowers or geometric shapes. Keep in mind that the main background should be light, and the patterns, on the other hand, bright and saturated.

If the ceilings are very high and make the room uncozy, you can paint the back wall in a light color and add horizontal stripes in cool tones. This option helps make the room a bit lower and wider.

Conversely, vertical stripes solve the problem of low ceilings and make the space longer.

To visually reduce the depth of the space and make it wider, you can paint the floor in a light color and apply horizontal stripes in cool shades.

Visually Enlarging a Room Is Not That Complicated It's indeed not complicated, the main thing is to approach the issue competently. If you can't come up with an interesting solution for your apartment on your own, seek help from designers. Professionals will develop a unique project with which you can realize your dream and visually enlarge your apartment by several square meters.