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Decorating a small home or cosy apartment is never easy. From tight corners to tiny hallways, choosing furniture and accessories that make your home feel bigger than it really is requires a creative mind and an eye for detail.

From carefully placed mirrors to intelligent furniture selection, read on to learn four tips that will help you get more living from less space when decorating your home.

Using mirrors to your advantage

While mirrors obviously can’t make a room physically larger, than can be used as a helpful tool to increase the amount of visual space inside a room. Interior designers have long used mirrors to ‘expand’ small rooms – now, you can too.

In a living room, mirrors should be placed on a wall that is perpendicular to your TV or digital display. In a bedroom, they’re best installed on the doors of your closet or on the bedroom side of your door – two places that combine style and function.

Creating ‘perceived space’ with light

Mirrors create visual space by reflecting light, but they’re of little value if your room is poorly lit in the first place. One of the easiest ways to ‘expand’ your room is with a strategically placed window.

Try to maximise the amount of light that enters your room while minimizing glare and excess heat. Large windows are doubly good for creating space – not only do they allow light to enter, they also open your room up to the outside and make it seem more spacious than it really is.

Choosing the perfect furniture

Picking the right furniture is tricky, especially when you’re starting from scratch. In the living room, focus on furniture that’s the right size for your room – a sofa that’s too big will do far more harm than a loveseat that’s slightly too small.

In the bedroom, look for furniture that serves a dual purpose. Bed frames can have built-in storage, closets can have mirrors for makeup and hair styling, and shelving can be mounted on the wall so that it doesn’t take up valuable floor space.

Decorating around a focal point

Focal points are just as important in interior design as they are in painting. Choose a single focal point for every room in your home – it could be a doorway, a television, or a staircase – and use it as a magnetic force that guides your furniture placement.

In the living room, this could mean arranging your sofas, recliners, and coffee table to point towards a television or fireplace. In the bedroom, it could mean using your bed – particularly if it’s a very large bed – as the centrepiece of your furniture.