Use paint and color to mold your retangle room into a square.
Long, narrow rooms can make you feel as if the walls are closing in on you. Tips and tricks of interior design, including furniture arrangement, color placement, window treatments, floor coverings and accessories, can help square out your room and open up the space. In situations with limited space, keep in mind that less is more. Par down your furniture to maximize your square footage. Utilize dual purposed pieces, like an ottoman that can double as a coffee table, or stools that can be used as extra seating or end tables, depending on your needs.
Instructions
1. Paint the walls cool colors that appear to recede from the eye, such as violet, light blue or pale green. Avoid dark colors that appear to approach, such as yellow, orange and red. Paint the ceiling a shade lighter than the walls to create the illusion of light widening as the room rises. Choose a focal wall and paint vertical stripes to further the illusion of height.
2. Paint the short walls in your room a shade darker than the long walls to create the appearance of depth and square up the rectangular shape. Paint the trim on the short walls darker to bring the walls inward; paint the trim on the long walls lighter to push the walls outward.
3. Keep the floors light to continue the feeling of height. Install wide floor boards or large ceramic tile; if renovations aren't in your budget, put down light-colored, striped floor rugs with the stripes running parallel to the long walls.
4. Install low furniture, such as chairs, tables, couches and shelves, to make the walls look taller in comparison. Install a few pieces of tall furniture, such as bookcases, to draw the eye upward and to exaggerate the juxtaposition between high and low. Mix and match your lighting for a similar effect; place tall floor lamps in the corners, install high light sconces along the wall and put low lamps with light colored shades on your tables.
5. Mount artwork at eye level and upward toward the top half of the room. On the long walls, mount art in vertical groupings to emphasize height. On the short walls, mount art in horizontal groupings to emphasize width.
6. Hang mirrors throughout your narrow room to amplify the appearance of spaciousness.
7. Over extend window treatments to make your windows look higher and wider than they actually are. Hang curtain rods close to the ceiling and extend them past the boundary of your windows on both sides. Hang bamboo shades to camouflage wall space between the curtain rod and the actual start of your window.
8. Arrange furniture in square groupings to contrast the rectangular shape of the room. Bring furniture in from the walls to de-emphasize the length of the room.
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