Small Apartments: Tomiko's Before Living Room

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These are the photos for the ‘before’ living room of my small rental apartment. I have to admit that the room in these shots is not horrible. Everything is neat, clean, and uncluttered. The floors are beautiful and there is a charming bay window overlooking a quiet tree-lined street.

However, I don’t like the style – it doesn’t look cozy, the colours are drab, and there is no personality. One major change we made was replacing the left pane of the bay window with a door leading to the outside, where a new deck was built. There wasn’t that much other work required in this room before we moved in, except for a few coats of white paint and glossing the floors. The main change made was the decor and styling.

As I may have hinted to it before, I am a borderline hoarder and have so much stuff. This includes trinkets from travels abroad, cute stationery, cookbooks, and schoolwork, which all needs to fit into the apartment. Therefore I had to incorporate some clever storage and create places to display my treasures.