Recently we’ve been admiring the Soot House, a charred-black structure on Spruce Head in Maine, hand-built by sculptor turned builder Anthony Esteves. The interiors are artful and sculptural (take a full tour on Remodelista), but we’re admiring in particular Esteves’s clever takes on storage. At just under 600 square feet, and designed with tightness and warmth in mind, the project required inventive found storage and artful built-ins to accommodate Esteves and his young family. Here are our four favorite ideas to steal.
Above: In a small space, apartment, or open living area, use shelves to create a sense of separation as well as extra storage. To create division between the main living/dining room and the kitchen (but ensure that heat from the woodstove, the home’s sole heat source, could circulate freely), Esteves built exposed shelves that double as a place to display favorite ceramics and objects.
2. Look for unused spaces.
Above: Carve out storage in unexpected places. In building the Soot House, Esteves noticed unused space in the sunken kitchen, underneath the living/dining room floor, and created a recessed niche just deep enough for jars of spices and dry goods. Above: The niche is only one jar deep, allowing all of the dried goods to be viewed and grabbed with ease. The family also stashes out-of-season clothes and bedding in hidden storage beneath the floor.
3. Repurpose unexpected objects.
Above: Upstairs, Esteves uses simple cinderblocks as bedside tables. We like the way the open center forms a second shelf for storing books.
4. Think creatively about awkward spaces.
Above: In the bedroom, Esteves installed copper pipes suspended with ropes to serve as clothing storage. The result is a quasi-closet that is both artful and practical, and that transforms an awkward small space (under the room’s steeply sloped eaves) into something useful.
N.B.: This post is an update; it was first published on November 16, 2017.
For more ideas to steal from inspiring organized homes, see:
When you register as a free Member of the Remodelista family of websites (Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home), you gain access to all current posts plus 10 archived posts per month, our internal bookmarking tool, and the community bulletin board.
Access 10 archived posts (older than one year) per month on each site
Use of our internal bookmark tool, so you can save products, posts, and other pages for quick reference
Access to our community bulletin board so you can ask and answer design-related questions
Unlimited access to the Product Catalogs, Design Travel sources, and Architect & Designer Directory listings
Choose from our ten newsletters to keep up with the latest on the sites
Or Subscribe for Maximum Value!
For $5/month ($59.99 paid annually) you'll enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home and all the benefits of Membership.
Annual subscribers pay 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
×
Subscribe to the Remodelista family of websites
For $5/month ($59.99 paid annually) you'll enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home and all the benefits of Membership.
Annual subscribers pay 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
×
Sorry! As a registered member you get 10 free posts from our archive (posts more than a year old) every 30 days. You have reached your limit for this 30-day period. If you would like to access unlimited posts from the archive (ad free, too), become a subscriber today, and keep reading as many articles as you want.
Full Access Individual Subscription
Benefits include:
Unlimited access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home sites
Ad-free browsing environment
Unrestricted access to 30,000+ archived posts
Receive the full-text daily newsletters
All features that Members have access to
Annual subscribers pay just 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
Sorry! You have reached your limit of three (3) free posts from our archive every 30 days. You can increase this to 10 posts by joining as a free Member, or read unlimited posts with no ads by becoming a paid Subscriber.
Subscribe to the Remodelista family of websites
For $5/month ($59.99 paid annually) you'll enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home and all the benefits of Membership.
Annual subscribers pay 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
Become a Member at no charge
When you register as a free Member of the Remodelista family of websites (Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home), you gain access to all current posts plus 10 archived posts per month, our internal bookmarking tool, and the community bulletin board.
Access 10 archived posts (older than one year) per month on each site
Use of our internal bookmark tool, so you can save products, posts, and other pages for quick reference
Access to our community bulletin board so you can ask and answer design-related questions
Unlimited access to the Product Catalogs, Design Travel sources, and Architect & Designer Directory listings
Choose from our ten newsletters to keep up with the latest on the sites
Manage Newsletters
Congratulations on becoming a Subscriber to Remodelista, Gardenista and The Organized Home! You now have access to many great features across the sites:
Unlimited access to all three sites
Ad-free browsing environment
Unrestricted access to 30,000+ archived posts
Receive any of the newsletters, including the the full-text daily Remodelista and Gardenista newsletters
Use of our internal bookmark tool, so you can save products, posts, and other pages for quick reference
Access to our community bulletin board so you can ask and answer design-related questions
Congratulations on joining as a free Member of Remodelista, Gardenista and The Organized Home! You now have access to many great features across the sites:
Access to all posts published in the past year
Access 10 archived posts (older than one year) per month on each site
Use of our internal bookmark tool, so you can save products, posts, and other pages for quick reference
Access to our community bulletin board so you can ask and answer design-related questions
Unlimited access to the Product Catalogs, Design Travel sources, and Architect & Designer Directory listings
Choose from our ten newsletters to keep up with the latest on the sites
If at any time you want to become a Subscriber and enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to all our content, just go to the My Account link and choose Subscribe.
Have a Question or Comment About This Post?
Start the Conversation