Article taken off homedit.com
60 Under stairs storage ideas for small spaces
Storage space is never enough and those who can’t get rid of things easily know what I am talking about. Let’s see how the space under the stairs can be transformed in a new storage area.
Home office under stairs.
How many of you thought about using the space under your stairs as a working area? Let me answer that and tell you that not many people figured this out. It’s all about the stairs; they have to be wide enough and straight forward allowing you to place a table there and some small shelves. A laptop or a PC will fit in there without any major problems. There are two types of office arrangement under the stairs.
The first one is facing the wall, positioned along the steps and the other one is positioned perpendicular. Both types focus on the same thing maximizing the space available under the stairs as good as possible.
If you want to concentrate on your work without anyone distracting your attention you can mount a door. Sliding doors would be the best choice because it’s not going to take up a lot of space, but they can be expensive. Swing doors on the other hand may or may not fit or look appealing.
Anyway, with or without doors, perpendicular or not, you can arrange an original home office under your stairs and that’s very good news for those who already explored all the other options.
Ways to use the space under the stairs in the hallway.
The hallway by due to its nature is like a very busy intersection with streets coming from all over the place. This means that this space can be used to store something that has to be at any moment at hand. Depending on what type of situation you are facing and what décor or architecture that space under your stairs from the hallway can be used to expand your décor or as storage area. A very good idea that also comes in quite handy is to transform that space to store your shoes and clothes for the cold\warm season. You can live it open or closed with big doors.
The inside compartment can very easily be divided so every member of the family can have its own place. Storage is not the only option here; you can also use that area to extend your interior setting. I see a nice couch or a big comfortable arm chair working just perfect in that spot, or simply use it to support your favorite decorations. If you care less about style and just need extra space for your appliances, sports items or why not your bike this is the perfect spot because is never in your way but in the same time very accessible.
Ways to use the space under the stairs in living room.
Your living room is a little bit more delicate than a hallway therefore the stairs from this area are either very stylish and any rough modification will ruin the overall look either made from materials that stand out, and as before any major modification to them or the space around them will ruin the whole thing. In a living room the secret is not to make something that doesn’t fully integrate in the environment.
Therefore the space under your stairs should be a part of the entire décor but focused more on functionality because in the end that’s what we want: some extra space. Have ever thought about making a bookshelf under your living rooms stairs? If your answer is “yes” then you did o very good job maximizing your space, if the answer is “no” –why not? It not like your books are measuring 3 feet each!
A bookshelf is perfect for that space because you can make the shelves one longer one shorter one higher one lower and it will look great and I am sure that your favorite books won’t mind. Decorations also can have their “sanctuary” under the stairs as well as electronic equipment embellishing the entire living room with color and texture.
Kitchen under the stairs.
This method of using the space under your stairs is recommended only in very tight situations when the lack of space is really an issue and you already eliminated all the other options. Using the area under your stairs as kitchen or at least a part of the kitchen in my opinion is a bit on the limit because I am a man who likes to cook a lot and when I’m doing that I don’t want any shoe lasses getting in my food not mention dust or dirt.
For those who don’t have a lot of space to play with that spot can very easily incorporate some appliances, a sink or a stove. Above that you can put all your plates and coffee cups on small shelves, spices as well. Speaking of spices I saw somewhere I don’t remember exactly where but in a very traditional house with stone walls and cast iron railway a “spice wall”. A place with a lot of tiny compartments made of solid wood similar to small mail boxes, where there were little jars filled with spices from all over the world. That man really knew his business!
Rack and shelves under the stairs.
We can all agree upon the fact that the easiest way to arrange the space under the stairs is with shelves and racks. A lot of things can be placed there without the need of heavy furnishing. Shelves can and it is actually recommended to be of different sizes and a little bit asymmetrical because the usual square spaces and straight lines don’t necessarily fit in new, modern interiors. On shelves you can store almost anything the only thing that matters is where the stairs are located because different spaces call for different items.
For example on a hallway you can very easily store a bike or your son’s basketball but in a living room the shelves under the stairs can only store small objects that are suited for a place like that; books, photos, decorations, vases and so on. The space under your stairs represents an extra storage space when you need one, so even if you think you don’t have anything to put on, build some shelves and make use of the that space. You will always have something to put there.
Cabinets with doors under stairs.
Recently cabinets came in different shapes, colors and materials to fulfill our need for storage. One thing though, was never attempted, at least until now. Now that we started this topic we are aware of the unused space under the stairs, so why not build cabinets with doors, locks and handles over there? Think about it; it has already closed sides and all you need to do is mount some doors and shelves.
These door cabinets can be modular, meaning that you can use individual cabinets and mount them underneath your stairs or you can mount the doors and that closed space newly created can be used to store things. I have something similar in my parent’s house. It’s a closed space with a sliding door and build-in shelves where they store shoes. I remember when I was a kid and I was playing with my sister I used to hide there a lot. It is very practical because is in the hallway, near to the entrance and it is a quite large storage facility. We use it to store shoes but you can make individual compartments and store your golf clubs, soccer balls or anything else you need out of the way but somewhere safe and accessible.
Drawers built under stairs.
If you care about your things a lot and you want them organized and you don’t really have the necessarily space for them mounting multiple drawers under the stairs suddenly becomes a very interesting idea. Imagine all that space filled with drawers; small drawers and large drawers. I saw something like this in a tailoring workshop, where because of the tight space the owner mounted drawers under the access stairs where they kept both fabrics and threads.
They had everything organized vertically with distinct drawers for different types of fabric as well for the various types of threads. This is really a good idea if you need extra storage space. Drawers are a little bit more private and you can organize your things better than on shelves, not to mention that on the exterior the entire ensemble of drawers looks really great and adds a bit of sophistication and mystery into the room.
If you like a more complex organizer for your things, you can make big vertical drawers that slide open and inside there could be smaller drawers. This would work great if you have two kids and one use one big drawers for each one and inside there could be smaller drawers with shirts, pants, socks and so on.
Racks for wine under stairs.
Wine is an important element from any great dinner. If you like wine and you like having a good wine always at hand you can make a special place for it under the stairs. I don’t know why but I always see wine surrounded by wood, maybe because of its origins and how wine was initially stored; in wooden barrels. We can’t find nowadays wine for sale in wooden barrels, only in glass bottles and I can’t see a wine rack made from anything else but wood.
Wine is usually stored in a cool place, kept away from direct sun light; if these conditions are not fulfilled the chemical properties of the wine might change, altering the wine making it sour or bitter. Despite all that, wine is better served at the room’s temperature and only a few types of white wine are better served cold; you can use the refrigerator for that. Building a rack for wine is not that complicated and the final product filled with different bottles can serve very well as a decorative element. Both the rack and the individual bottles will definitely draw your guest’s attention. This adds a bit of class and elegancy in your décor making it a warm, welcoming house.
Storage under open wooden stairs.
This next type of storage under the stairs combines perfectly style and functionality. The fact that the stairs are left opened you can use non-uniform deformations of the wood and other elements to achieve you desired storage units. That type of storage adds an enormous amount of texture in the room with steps and shelves as well as the items stored underneath. It is truly amazing how you can do all that impressive effect and still keep practicality in mind.
I think that people that have modern homes would appreciate this type of storage because they are more inclined towards non-conformism scraping out traditional values and bringing and implementing indoors new concepts and ideas. This example does just that and transforms something common we already know in something else that can still serve as the thing that was designed for and some extra new features. Do not get me wrong on this, we are not reinventing the wheel here, we are just finding new ways and places for it.{pictures found on design-remount}.
