Space Saving Beds – Efficient Use of Bedroom Space

Sometimes you have a bedroom without a lot of space and it’s usually the bed that takes up most of it. Especially for rooms that are designed to be more than just sleeping areas (kids’ rooms, for example), this can mean that there’s not a lot of room for the rest of the things – desk, chair and other paraphernalia – that the room needs to contain. Here are some ideas on beds that maximize your space and allow the room’s space to be used to its full potential.

The Shelf Headboard:

Possibly the simplest thing you can do to combine sleeping arrangements with space-saving, the headboard that doubles as a shelf can hold books, tissues, lights and anything else imperative for bedtime. Most beds can handle an appropriately sized shelf-headboard, making it an economical option for people who already have a good bed.

Bunk beds:

The original space-saving solution, the bunk bed! These beds are generally geared towards children who have to share a room or a child who has a lot of sleepovers. Bunk beds are also an option for guest bedrooms and for storage of toys and equipment on the top bunk. For children, they can also function as an economical canopy bed with the addition of curtain rods. Take note that it is strongly recommended that children under the age of 6 not be given the top bunk.

Mezzanine/Loft beds:

At first, these appear to be bunk beds, but they generally lack a second sleeping arrangement on the bottom, leaving space for a chair, desk, or anything else that a person might desire underneath. Some come with elaborate setups that include shelves, steps and matching furniture. Others are just the bed and a ladder. These are ideal for college dorm rooms and smaller rooms that need to house an active child. The same caveat that applies to the top of bunk beds applies to lofts – no kids under 6.

Murphy beds:

A Murphy bed will flip up against a wall when it is not in use. This enables the floorspace that it would otherwise occupy to serve for other purposes. Murphy beds have come a long way from the cartoon cliches that folded up on hapless characters. Many of them today have exceptionally comfortable mattresses and are easy to take down and put away. Modifications to the Murphy style allow for a desk or other useful feature to “pop out” when the bed is put away.

Hanging beds:

Some of these beds just hang from the ceiling and don’t offer any more storage space than a regular bed with room underneath the frame. However, a few enterprising businesses and individuals have created hanging beds on a pulley system, allowing the bed to be swung to the ceiling and out of the way. This requires a fairly high ceiling relative to the room’s occupant to be truly useful and care must be taken that the pulley bed, equipment and structure it is affixed to are able to take the weight of both bed and occupant(s).

Bedup:

This French concoction puts the bed on tracks and gives it some fold-down legs so that you can raise and lower it like a hanging bed on pulleys, only it’s anchored to the wall. This makes the bed less movable and gives it some solid support from the legs as well as the tracks it runs on

Futons:

What we think of as a futon and what the Japanese, the creators of this style of bed, think of as a futon are two completely different animals. The Japanese futon refers only to a mattress that is often folded up and put away during the day, allowing for use of the bedspace. The Western “futon” tends to refer to the mattress and the frame it is placed upon, which can be laid out like a bed or folded up like a couch. Either way, these are very good beds to use for a small space. However, one should take care in the type of futon they choose; many futon mattresses are cheap copies of traditional mattresses and are not supportive of the back.

Sofa beds:

The first cousin of the futon, the sofa bed mimics an ordinary sofa, but turns into a different creature entirely when night falls. A mattress appears out of hiding and folds out to create an ample bed, the width of the original sofa seating space. If it’s space saving you’re after, this is definitely one to consider.

Trundle beds:

Another time honored tradition, the trundle bed is a bed-within-a-bed. One bed is put together the normal way, but its frame is just a giant drawer, holding another bed. Perfect for small spaces and frequent sleepovers. Most trundle beds have the mattresses at different heights, but some have pop-out mechanisms that put the trundle mattress at the same height as the main bed.

You can do a lot with a smaller living space if you find the right furniture. Check out some of these options if saving space is important to you.

By: Matt Barker

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Return To 4 Poster Bed Home Page

Antique beds are rarely set up for today’s queen and king sized mattresses and box springs. Most people want standard queen or king bedding, or at least the old standard, a full or double size.

Between 100 to 150 years ago, before fitted sheets, the exact size of a bed and mattress wasn’t so important. The average height was much shorter, and beds could be any size with feather beds or home-made mattresses.

In the 1890’s, manufactured bedding appeared, and the standard double or full size was around 72″ x 52.” Antique dealers refer to the older, smaller-than-double size beds as “three-quarter,” although they can vary a great deal in size. Complicating the issue are European beds, built to entirely different dimensions.

The common problem is how to enlarge an antique bed to a modern desirable size without ruining the proportions and appearance of the original bed.

Our cabinetmakers have done conversions for many years. We utilize standard brown steel rails for either full/double or queen/king length. We attach these rails to the headboard with bolts that go securely through the headboard itself. Sometimes, we need to add a sturdy piece of wood to have a secure place to bolt the rails. At the footboard, we attach a rugged steel plate fitted with welded-on bolts. (We have never been able to find such plates, so we designed them and have them fabricated in a machine shop.) This application is done on the inside of the footboard so nothing shows from the outside. This enables the steel rails to be attached very securely with nothing showing on the outside of the antique footboard. The bed can then be set up and taken down repeatedly by simply unscrewing the nuts and bolts at each corner.

If it is ever decided to return these “converted” beds to their original sizes using the original wooden rails, the steel fittings can be removed with no visible damage to the bed itself.

Another factor in using antique bed frames for modern standard bedding is the thickness of springs and mattresses. Most bedding stores love to sell very thick or “pillow-top” mattresses that can be too tall and cover much of the beautiful old headboards. If more of the headboard should be showing, thinner mattresses and springs should be ordered from the bedding store. The point is to measure from the steel rails up to the desired top of the mattress to determine what thickness would be ideal before ordering a new mattress. The eventual appearance should be as planned, not the surprise of a foot taller than expected!

By: Ken Melchert

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Four Poster Beds Reviews

Four poster beds are preferred by people who have a penchant for beautiful and useful decorative furniture. Apart from all the other decorative items and other knick knacks that you use to decorate your house, good and quality four poster beds can become the centre of attraction in your house. It will not only add value to the interior of your home but also provide you a comfortable sleeping experience.

The four poster beds can be beautiful, classy, elegant, simple and exquisite at the same time. It has been one of the most preferred and sought after designs by people since very early days. There must be many of you who would have dreamt of owning this bed for a long time now. And now maybe is the time that you are ready to realise your dream.

If you have planned to buy this bed then it is something that you should not take lightly. The one that you choose should be the best bed in this category and there are many that you can choose from.

These beds are basically beds with a tester which is supported by four posts. These four posts support the tester from the four corners of the bed. The reason why these beds have a tester is because it is used to support the curtains which surround the bed from the four corners. Today the purpose of the curtains on the bed is merely for beauty and decoration of the furniture. But in earlier days the curtains were used to keep out the draughts.

These beds are available in different styles and sizes. The different styles of these beds vary from the taller canopy styles to the half tester to standard low bed. The wooden four poster beds are made of different types of good quality woods like Mahogany, Sycamore, Oak and Ash. There are various types of designs available which you can choose from.

To begin with there are the pencil style beds. These beds have four posts which are pointed like pencils at the top edge. But these posts are not used to support any curtains or tester. On the other hand there are the low bed styles. The four posts in this style are not very high. They reach only a few inches and are not used to support any tester. Then there is the juniper canopy style of beds. These beds have tall four posts used for supporting the tester. This style of bed is very unique because it has a very low foot board panel. These panels are so low that they reach no higher than the bottom of the mattress on top.

There are also the half tester four poster beds. These beds have two short posts which are at the foot of the bed. Then at the head of the bed they have two very tall headboards which support the tester that hangs there. If you are looking for a more traditional bed then you can opt for the canopy beds. These beds have four tall posts. It also has a foot board panel which is at level with the top level of the mattress at the top.

These beds are not only classy and elegant but also give your home a very traditional and sophisticated feel. You can look for options in order to avail the quality four poster beds which will add value to the elegant interiors of your beautiful home.

By: Shweta Menon

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Four Poster Beds Reviews

Life would be very boring if everybody wanted the same thing, so it is just as well we all have different tastes. The function of a bed could be solved with a mattress on the floor, and in many countries in the world this would be regarded as a luxury. Any culture capable of reading this has progressed from this stage in evolution, although it would be wonderful to eradicate poverty. People want more than a plain bed frame; they want a centrepiece of the room, probably the room in the house where they spend most time, albeit asleep. For many generations, the four-poster bed has been revered as the elite bed, many believing it to be the ultimate possession. Four-poster beds with or without canopies made in wood or metal are still extremely popular, with history playing an important part in how we feel about it.

There are two fields of thought relating to the four-poster bed, that of the British, and the Americans. In the U.K. (and Europe) we consider a four-poster bed to be a bed with four posts, cornice, high headboard and roof, but in the States, I understand this would be called a four-poster canopy bed. In the U.S. a four-poster bed is exactly that, a bed with four posts, no cornice, no roof, just four posts. The tall, elongated posts stand like spires above the rest of the bed, often ending in finials. For obvious reasons, this style is frequently called a pencil bed. We have seen and made a variety of posts for these beds, either slender to give it a Shaker feel, or chunky for a country flavour. The posts can be turned round, left square, but tapering with some shaped features, or octagonal. They can have twists, flutes (dished hollows), or reeds (raised beads), or even inlayed wood down the length of the post. The list for the traditional looking posts is long enough, but if you start to get away from the past, and what’s been done before, then a whole new world can open up, it’s just a question of what the public will tolerate.

Traditional British four-poster or canopy beds had turned, reeded, fluted or twisted posts, indeed, many were made more ornate with extensive carving added to them. In years gone by, only wealthy noblemen would own such a bed and when he died one of the treasures was the four-poster bed.
It’s amazing just how many people love or always wanted a four-poster bed with a full canopy, many feeling it an ambition or dream fulfilled when they finally own one. You will hear comments like, ‘I saw one once,’ or ‘I slept in one, and I’ve always wanted one ever since.’ Many consider the four-poster to be extremely romantic, but it may all come back to fairy tails, and the days of fair maidens, white horses and shiny knights, or were they white knights. Tradition has instilled into many of us to aspire to own a four-poster bed, antique if possible. Failing that, then reproduction is a good alternative, as it is often not as costly, and when you commission a piece of furniture, you get what you want. People at furniture auctions either seem to compromise their wish or wait till next time, whereas asking a furniture maker for something you can have any size, style, wood, colour or carving that you wish.

The more bed you have, the more you can personalise it, and by the time it is complete, you would rarely find two the same. So the four-poster bed is ideal, with a choice of several wood, post and panel designs, carving, finished colour (including paint), and the variety in size and height, four posters are very individual. If you add to that the variety of fabrics, patterns and colours available from which drapes can be made, there is no end to the possibilities. It is not just the look of the bed that is important, but also the feel. The sheets are a critical factor in feeling the quality of your bed, and as you spend a third if your life there, you may as well make it comfortable, so buy good quality linen.

From heavy tapestries draped over deeply carved posts, with linenfold panels and a fully enclosed oak roof, to light silks and lacy dressing an American style pencil bed with no footboard, fine rope twists ending in a finial rather like that of a pawn or bishop in a chess set, the four-poster bed will survive for many more centuries. It is up to us to start looking into the future, moving with the times, developing new styles, dragging the bed by its’ posts into the 21st Century, to be held in esteem as the ultimate dream for another 600 years.

By: Stephen Edwards

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Reviews of Four Poster Beds

A four poster bed has four posts in each corner, usually capped at the top. Initially, it was designed to support a tester used for hanging curtains. It enclosed the bed and protected the sleeper from insects and drafts. Original bed was designed for the specific purposes but this modern day bed is merely a piece of furniture giving a traditional look to your room.

The poster bed has been known as “the king of beds” or “the bed of kings”. These beds are the choice of elite people as they add luxury to their room furniture. They have been considered as royal beds bringing charm and old elegant style to your bedroom. These poster beds are a symbol of charming decors, wealth and royalty, thus boosting a long history.