From kitchen to bathrooms and living rooms to office spaces, everyone could use a little more storage space in their humble abode. When it seems like there simply isn’t any more room to expand your home to accommodate your ever-growing family and lifestyle, what are you do to? Look up. Though the room itself may not be able to change, you can change where and how you store things with innovative shelves. Small spaces and airy rooms alike will not only look sleek and modern; they’ll now have the added benefit of extra storage with these shelving ideas.


·    Kitchen 
Dishes, glasses and silverware alike take up plenty of space in drawers and cabinets. Once everything is put away, what do you do if you’re left with only a few inches of space? The types of shelves you add to your kitchen depend on the size of your kitchen and your own personal preference. But here are some ideas, nonetheless. Have a column you can’t do anything with in your kitchen? Install an open shelving unit around it. Items are easily accessible, and not only do you now have a more defined space between rooms, but the shelves give you floor-to-ceiling storage that will make even mansion owners jealous.

Not everyone has a giant column in their kitchen, though, but we all do have an area that causes head scratching when it comes to storage: corners. Placing two rectangular units into one corner takes up valuable square footage. Utilize those corners and keep your square footage by adding in a vertical row of corner shelves. This is another way to give your kitchen floor-to-ceiling storage space. Plus, you’ll finally have a place to store all those cookbooks grandma bought you.


·    Bathroom 
There’s no denying there is always a need for more room in a bathroom. Shampoos, soaps, medications, cotton swabs, towels, washcloths — the list of items that call a bathroom home goes on and on. But if where you call home has just one bathroom (and at that, that bathroom has a door that barely passes by the toilet), it’s hard to fit all of these and your essentials in the bathroom. With no room to boot, overhead shelving units are a must in a tiny space. You don’t need to rush out and buy the largest and widest shelves you can find; for a small bathroom, narrow shelves will do. Since the room you’re working with is already small as it is, wide shelves won’t work. Narrow shelves will be able to fit in a small alcove between walls or in a small space in general. Stacking two to three shelves on top of each other — measuring between each one to ensure room for your toiletries and such, of course — almost magically creates more space in a room that may have been more like a closet beforehand. Not enclosing the shelving units means everything you need is at hand right when you walk into the bathroom. So go ahead, leave your towels or body wash in plain sight. It is your bathroom after all.


·    Office Space
Not everyone is lucky enough to have a whole room dedicated to being an office in their home. For many that are fighting for space, making do with a corner or a desk shoved behind the couch just aren’t good enough when it comes to working from home. Depending on how large you want your office space to be and what part of your home you’ll be working in, there are many solutions to this problem.

Want a corner nook? No problem. Install floating shelves all around the desk for optimum storage. Plus, the shelves will host numerous books, movies or other items family members can also enjoy. But, if you don’t have room to create a cave of shelves around you, there is always the option to build upward. Having your desk fitted under wall-to-wall shelves still allows for a desk with plenty of surface area as well as storage for office supplies, magazines, books and other do-dads or gizmos you need for working.

If your room permits it, have your desk and shelves built into the wall. That way, you still have a functioning office space that isn’t just an afterthought in your home’s design, but it isn’t taking up square footage that could be used for something else (you know your significant other has been eyeing that sectional for awhile now). This idea also works if you have an awkward alcove in your home that won’t function well as anything else. In an alcove that really can’t function as a sitting area, install long, horizontal shelves to create a great bookcase. Placing the shelves higher up on the wall give you room to place a large desk underneath for the perfect private workspace. How’s that for an afterthought?


·    Our advice 
Since the primary reason you’re looking at this blog is because you’re grasping at straws for more storage space, then there is one main piece of advice we want to leave you with: use light colors. While dark colors can provide ample contrast for a room, if you’re already cramped on space as it is, dark colors will only make a space seem smaller. Instead, light colors, like the always prominent white, will make a room seem larger than it actually is, and will bring in more natural light. All allowing you to enjoy your new shelves.

     
Of course, these aren’t the only rooms in a home that you can add resourceful shelves to. In fact, some may not be in rooms at all! Under the stairs, a child’s playroom, in the hallway, in a closet, in a bedroom or for anywhere else you are in dire need of a spot that allows you to actually put things away rather than just in a basket or in a corner, look up. Shelving units that stack upward just may be your saving grace.