Richard Felt: How to Open Up a Small Congested Space

Today we have some beautiful and inspiring spaces to share with you! See more beautifully designed homes and rooms in our Inspiration Files.

How to Open Up a Congested Space

Designed by Violante & Rochford

photo credit © Wendy McEahern

Newly built homes often are created around an open floor plan. But what if you would like to follow this trend in your own home, but don’t have that bright, airy and open feel? It is possible to open up a congested space with just a few tips.

Interior designers Michael Violante and Paul Rochford know about opening up spaces. They regularly work in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where the homes are usually a cramped adobe style but the team works together to open them up by embracing the concept of negative space. The designers regularly keep a neutral palette in their homes while accenting it with bright elements. Here they share their expertise on opening up cramped spaces.

Start neutral

Keeping a neutral palette on the walls and accenting it with great decorative accents and color can really enlarge the home.

…but add color.

Bright, bold pops of color against the neutral walls open up the room while still keeping it interesting with fun designs.

Make it simple but distinctive.

Violante & Rochford keep it simple with the décor and artwork but make it distinctive. Instead of cluttering a small wall with a ton of bright artwork. Keep the neutral palette and put a distinctive piece of hard to miss artwork and accessories in each room.

A minimal amount of artwork helps to not clutter the walls. If you decide to put a lot of artwork in the home, keep it to simple designs and combine them together on one wall.

Modernize traditional features

Typically Violante & Rochford paint the ceilings or add wood beams, which is traditional in New Mexico homes, but stick with neutral and muted colors so the room does not feel closed in.

You can keep old elements of the home but update them in a more neutral way. Typically Santa Fean homes consist of “vigas” (wooden beams) and “kiva” fireplaces. Violante & Rochford like to refresh them by either restoring them with paint or in the case with vigas’ they often strip and refinish the wood.

With incorporating just a few of these tips from the interior designers Violante & Rochford, can open up a congested space, and create a home that has that open concept feel.