Bedroom interior design

Bedroom interior: the room you don't see by day

The bed sits where there's no draught and no sightline from the door

Where the bed goes is rarely decided by ease of movement alone. The headboard shouldn't end up under a draughty window, and whoever sleeps there shouldn't be lying opposite an open door: from the threshold, your eye shouldn't land straight on the bed. There are sockets on both sides of the bed, whoever happens to sleep on each side at the moment, because a bedroom layout is planned for habits and occupants that change over the years, not just for the current arrangement.

Lighting is planned for reading, not just for walking into the room

The ceiling lights in a bedroom are rarely switched on; more often you need soft light for the evening and directional light for reading without waking a partner. So a wall light or recessed light fitting by the headboard gets its own switch by the bed, not just by the door, and its angle is worked out so the book is lit while the ceiling above the other half of the bed stays in shadow. The ambient lighting almost always goes on a dimmer: a bedroom needs a gradual shift from bright morning light to a dim evening, without the sharp click of a switch.

Quiet is designed in from the start

Sound insulation on the wall facing the corridor, lift or neighbouring room goes in during the rough works: once the finishes are on, the only way to add it is to strip them off and start again. The bedroom door is chosen for how closely the door fits its frame: a gap around the edges lets in almost as much corridor noise as an open door. A socket for a humidifier or air purifier is planned in advance on the wall where such appliances usually stand, so there is no need to run an extension lead across the room.

Bedroom storage is planned with the room, not after it

In most of our projects the bedroom is designed together with the walk-in or built-in wardrobe, not afterwards: the depth of the wardrobe, the clearance in front of it and the position of the door all affect where the bed can go at all. A freestanding wardrobe in a bedroom is rare in our work; more often it's a built-in system that takes up less floor space for the same storage and doesn't add extra furniture to a room meant for sleeping.