Adding Coziness to Your Home Office
If you want to transform your home office into a snug, lovely place to spend your work hours in utmost comfort, ease and efficiency, you’d better get down to work immediately. Still, knowing which furniture items and accessories to include in your home office is not as simple as it may seem at first sight: carelessly chosen furnishing pieces and extras may appear garish or counter-effective appearances-wise, and some may prove too distracting or functionally unfit for a workplace, even if it is a house-based one. Here, we bring you some useful tips and tricks to help you adorn your private office to the best possible effect and still feel at home while at work.
Making Use of Spare Space
Believe it o
r not, even an extra foot of initially neglected room can help visually enlargeyour home office and serve as a functional special addition to your work environment. For instance, a narrow hallway or butler’s pantry can be transformed into an efficient working or storage area in a few simple steps. First, identify any unused space inside or in the vicinity of your home office and then consider the ways to redo it to an efficient outcome. Could that unused corner or niche become a shelf-space to store your old files, books and documents? Could you transform that tight hallway into a built-in filing cabinet or use it as storage space for boxes packed with office supplies, file binders and cleaning products? Room for extra space springs endless, if you know where to look for it and how to put it to good use.
Cleaning up Your Act
As the old saying goes, cleanliness is half your health – and not just in medical terms, mind you, as keeping your workspace clean and tidy is essential to an efficient yet cozy home office. What are you waiting for? Start going through your office materials inch by inch, throw away anything you haven’t used in over two months and store away items you don’t need lying around in cardboard boxes, containers or files. An overly crowded desk is not exactly conducive to effective work so organize it and leave just the necessary items on your desktop to minimize visual distraction and physical obstacles on your work platform, we learn from highly-rated retailers of office workstations.
The Magic of Colors
Colors can truly do magic for a tiny room if chosen carefully and used in moderation. If 
your home-based office is tiny and feels stifled even with minimal furnishing, you can try and make up for the lack of space through a neutral or all-white wall number. For more spacious home offices where an extra dash of high style is required, you can throw in a few bold accents and decorations in dark or solid tones to add some classic polishing touches and create a tasteful vintage feel to the room.
Repurposing Old Household Items
Home office owners who can’t afford a full-scale redo can always turn to existing household items and accessories for some furnishing inspiration. For example, you can use an old suitcase to store your fax forms or bank documents, or throw in an extra nightstand lamp for additional lighting. Similarly, you can repaint the old pine desk from the bedroom and use it as a makeshift computer desk until you manage to save enough money for a fresh piece or at least the materials to make it on your own. Also, if you can’t afford a new rug or carpet, you can use the existing floor covers and cut them to size or stitch them together to adorn the floorboards of your home office.
The Music of the Work
In case you have some extra cash and space to spare for use in your private workplace, bringing in a grand piano could be just the perfect twist to add a dash of style and retro-glamour to your home-based office. If you’re decorating on a budget, getting a gramophone or turntable at your local antiques store would do the trick equally well. Whatever music device you opt for, just make sure it’s a functional one – after all, audio equipment is meant for mild entertainment during work breaks or subtle background vibes so make sure you get your money’s worth of fine ambiance.
Creating a cozy, effective and functional home office is not as demanding as redoing your entire home, but it still calls for some care, time and money. Before you give up and call in experts to do the work for you, think about the possibilities your office space has to offer and the ways to make the most of them. Getting your office space to work for you while you’re busying away at your desk requires just an open mind, some vital furnishing pieces and a cunning mind, and that much you certainly have already.
Written By Lillian Connors
Exclusively for Homes Re-Imagined, LLC
Author Bio: If one thing is true about Lillian Connors, her mind is utterly curious. That’s why she simply can’t resist the urge to embark on all sorts of home improvement projects and spread the word about them. She’s also deeply into green practices, cherishing the notion that sustainable housing and gardening will not only make us far less dependent on others regarding the dwellings we inhabit, but also contribute to our planet being a better place to live on. You can check her out on Google+, Twitter, and LinkedIn.