Very narrow master bedroom

[Subbaxeo]

Hi there-we’re buying a house in a lovely village with great facilities. It’s a 1930s house that’s had a 2 storey extension meaning the main en-suite bedroom is over the garage and is only 8 ft (2.4m) wide-although 17ft in length. Can anyone help me with ideas for layout and furnishing as I’m beginning to panic now! We can’t possibly fit our king size bed in there so will have to go for a double. Is there any way we can furnish and decorate it so it won’t look like a corridor? Anyone else done it?

Couldn't you have the king sized bed at one end with back to short wall and small bed side table either side? We did this in a narrow long bedroom and it worked well.

Are you sure you can't fit your bed. Our extension is over the garage and is about 2.4m wide as well and we have a super king in it.
Granted there's only a foot at the bottom and the side closest to the window but doing that allowed 1.5m of wardrobe at the other side.

We have a similar dimension bedroom which we originally had as the master bedroom but have since rearranged rooms and given it to DD.

I think how it works well depend on doors and radiators. If you have 2.4m width a king is 1.5m which gives you 45cm for a small side table (custom made if necessary) which whilst smaller than conventional spacing would need enough assuming no mobility issues for you and DH. You may need to get a new bed base/frame as some are wider than the mattress (and you don't want to waste any width), but in my opinion this would be worth it to keep the king size. Then you have plenty of room for freestanding wardrobe and chest of drawers at the other end of the room.

Something like this - as a pp says, a king is 150cm wide so you have 45cm on each side of a king sized bed if you have it on a short wall.

If you can’t get narrow side tables you could fit IKEA floating shelves. They used to do a square one about 30cm square that would fit.

You could have an ottoman at the foot of the bed to use up some space. Depending where doors and radiators are, you could create a dressing area by using full height wardrobes when you enter the room to split the space up.

I wouldn't buy the house if I were you. A master bedroom shouldn't be less than 3m wide

My friend has a narrow corridor for her master bedroom. With the placement of the door and windows it means there are limited options on how to arrange the furniture. She has a king size bed but it's far too big for the room and looks it. Most bedrooms have obvious places where the beds should be placed. It's hard to determine how her furniture would look good or whether she needs to replace most of it.

Maybe draw out a to scale plan of the room and try fitting in the drawn to scale furniture and see how it looks?

Thanks for your ideas everyone. We did consider not buying but it’s in a village where houses don’t come up for sale very often-or they do but not in the heart of the village iyswim.

Pandemic that’s a great idea. We’ll do that. One thing we’re considering is giving it to 22 yr old dd who’ll have an en-suite-she has a double bed making it more in proportion.

What happened to the original master bedroom?

It’s still there and quits a reasonable size-14’5”x12’9”. So we could have that but no en-suite and dd have the corridor. Then when she eventually leaves home, it could be guest room. It does have a lovely en-suite though so we were thinking hard about how it could work for us. The downstairs space is nice, with new kitchen, leading to separate dining area and snug and separate living room. There are cheaper, better planned houses for sale but it’s hard to find a house in the centre of the attractive village.

I hate having an en suite so we gave DD the room above the garage, but in the end to get more wall space for her stuff we removed the door to the ensuite and put it in the hall instead so the ensuite became just a normal shower room that could be used by everyone.

We also had a made to measure headboard built across the whole width with a little bedside shelf on each side and a bit of storage above.

I think your bed should fit with the headboard on the long wall and have enough room at the end to walk round comfortably. It'll feel less claustrophobic when you're in bed as there will be lots of space either side of the bed. You don't need to have the bed centrally positioned on the wall, either. You could have the bed down one end with plenty of space at the other making the room look more spacious and more square.

@Neptune A king size bed is at least 2m long, even one with a slim frame (I.e. no bulky headboard or frame) so they'd have at most 40cm between the end of the bed and the wall. That's not enough to walk round comfortably. Yes, you could probably get round but its very tight.

Personally I'd give that room to your DD for now and use it as a guest bedroom when she leaves home.

On a day to day basis I'd much prefer to have a bigger bedroom with better dimensions for storage, bigger bed etc and use of a larger bathroom.

We have an en-suite shower room that I never use (it's become DH's domain). I much prefer using the larger main bathroom because it's far more spacious, I have the choice to use the shower or bath, far more storage for all my beauty stash and better light for doing my makeup.

When DS leaves for Uni its will be my sole domain apart from occasional guests which doesn't bother me.

In your case if your using the en-suite as a guest room in the future you don't even have that issue as the main bathroom is solely yours with the guests using the en-suite.

Tbh the only reason we kept the en-suite for ourselves is because it is the biggest bedroom. Had that not been the case I'd have definitely made it a guest suite.

I really don't see the point of squeezing yourself into a small room when you have other options available and en-suites do have downsides re: noise if someone is sleeping.

I think we’re leaning that way. The en-suite is much nicer than the main bathroom which is tiny (people seem to think bathrooms were purely functional in 1930s).

DeRigueurMortis, that’s a good point re en-suite-both of us are light sleepers so noise on middle of night, especially as we’re of a certain age when night time loo visits are de rigeur! We could also give 2nd br to dd which is also decent size and keep the corridor one for guests-or ds when he visits home for weekends etc. Then we can use the en-suite 😁

Can you post a cropped floor plan showing the layout of that room with the doors windows etc?

Our spare bedroom has a double bed and is 2.4 by 4 meters, we have just had week sleeping in there as we are having our bedroom decorated. We really did not sleep as well as usual and were desperate to move back into our usual bedroom and super king bed.

In the spare bedroom W e have the head end of the double bed on the 2.4m wall, with small side tables, you can get loads that are about 40cms or small round tables. If you do have a small table, I would put in some wall lights for reading, so that you free up space on the bedside tables.

Our usual bed is a super king and we found the double very small in comparison, I think that if you are used to a king side bed I would opt for a bigger room with more space and be able to sleep in a more comfortable bed.

Also it may be worth looking at the footprint of double beds as some are bigger than others. Loaf has different size doubles that they seem to have designed to take up less floor space.

Good luck with your move.

we recently looked at a floor plan with a similar sounding room...I siad we'd go "full on citizen M" and get a mahooooooosive bed in the narrow underwindow bit, floating shelves, get out of bed at the end, and probably manage a giant sofa/dressing table in the middle, it also had fitted wardrobes at the end and an giant ensuite as well!

It's under offer though before we're ready so not my problem!

@Subbaxeo

I think we’re leaning that way. The en-suite is much nicer than the main bathroom which is tiny (people seem to think bathrooms were purely functional in 1930s).

DeRigueurMortis, that’s a good point re en-suite-both of us are light sleepers so noise on middle of night, especially as we’re of a certain age when night time loo visits are de rigeur! We could also give 2nd br to dd which is also decent size and keep the corridor one for guests-or ds when he visits home for weekends etc. Then we can use the en-suite 😁

If your 2nd bedroom is also a good size for DD I'd definitely make the en-suite a guest bedroom.

After all there's nothing to stop the family using that bathroom on a day to day basis (to avoid bathroom congestion) when you don't have guests using it.

Personally I think en-suites are not the be all and end all (well unless they are separated from your bedroom by a luxurious dressing room ).

They might be convenient in terms of proximity but that's also the downside. There's not much to celebrate about hearing your other halves bowel movements when you're lying in bed or being woken up by the sound of a flushing toilet at 2am.

They might be convenient in terms of proximity but that's also the downside. There's not much to celebrate about hearing your other halves bowel movements when you're lying in bed grin or being woken up by the sound of a flushing toilet at 2am.

😁😁

We’ve decided on the original master bedroom! Dd can have second room and box room for her clothes.

Pleased to hear you've made a decision!

Good luck with the move!

Hi @Subbaxeo, until 2 months ago we had a long thin bedroom (though not quite as narrow as yours) and half of it felt like it was just the entrance to the en-suite. To make it feel like much less of a corridor we've put in a wall between the bedroom and en-suite to create a dressing room. All the wardrobes and clothes storage are out of the way and the bed bit is lovely and uncluttered.

Another positive is that there is another wall and door between the bed and the en-suite for bedtime (and middle of the night) ablutions!

@SollaSollew What a good idea!

I also like the citizen M idea-however, those hotel rooms are designed to have a bed like that so look stylish rather than cramped. I also like the Scottish box beds- dry romantic although don’t fancy the idea of clambering over dh to use loo. I honestly think our king would be too imposing and although we’re not large, would feel cramped like @NotwatchingSpooks

I would like to post a diagram but cannot work out how to do it! Am not sure it would work for us given the bedroom door is right near the ensuite. Think we have decided to use as guest bedroom so we have access to 2 bathrooms.

We have a long thin bedroom (also extension)
We have king size bed and very small bedside tables as normal ones wouldn’t fit. Then the other end we have a sort of walk-in wardrobe area. Works well and because all we do in our room is sleep and get dressed it’s fine.