Merry Christmas, Happy Hew Year!
I am trying to figure a way to gain storage space without losing much square footage at our small beach house. The stairs to the second floor have a closet under them and that’s the only storage we have. I want to replace the stairs with a more open design, lose the closet, and really open up the space making it feel larger. Any ideas? Saw this when I googled
http://www.monotsukuri.net/japan/yukasita/yukasita.htm
Thanks
Kevin
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Replies
Does it have an attic?
no attic, actually exposed rafters and we see underside of roof sheeting.
If you have conventional interior stud walls with no wires or pipes in them you can cut a hole in the drywall on one side and install shelves. This gets you an area about 14" wide by 4" deep by however tall you cut the hole. Not a lot of storage space, but good for canned goods, knick-knacks, etc.
Otherwise your best bet is probably furniture with built-in storage, unless you want to dig a cellar.
The Japanese deal you have the link to is really oriented towards the Japanese style of construction, and not too well suited to your situation.
No good, it's beadbord T&G. Remove it and the blown in insulation will come tumbling out, house is 125 yrs old. Only has sheetrock in 20 yr old kitchen/bath addition. Think I'll probably have to build a closet along the end wall of house, seperates living room from kitchen/bath addition, maybe a foot deep but will be 15 ft wide. This way it's at end of room so we still have open feeling.
Well, you could always raise the floor in part of the house and put storage below.BTW, when opening it up be sure you don't remove any load-bearing walls. Hard to predict in old structures what's load-bearing and what isn't.
Half of the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm but the harm does not interest them. --T.S. Eliot
Dan,
I've attached a link to another thread so you can see the house and what I'm doing with it. The link I posted, in this thread, to underfloor storage seemed like it might work since I'll be removing the flooring on the first floor, putting in a subfloor with new flooring above.http://forums.taunton.com/tp-breaktime/messages?msg=69253.13
this is probably not what you're looking for but these have worked for me as I've lived in various older houses with lack of closet space.I've built four of these for my own use and they give you storage with out taking up floor space.http://www.sover.net/~buckholl/chimney_cupboard.htm^^^^^^
S N A F U (Situation Normal: All Fouled Up)
I'll admit that my understanding is quite limited, but my impression is that Japanese residential construction often elevates the main floor 3-4 feet above a relatively clean, dry, crawlspace. You, on the other hand, have a structure that's only elevated inches above the ground. You also have joists on what looks to be 12-16" centers, while Japanese construction (I believe) tends to the 2-4 foot range.Your storage containers would either have to be quite narrow, or you'd have to cut joists. And with such little ground clearance you'd have considerable difficulty with bugs and animals in the storage areas.
Half of the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm but the harm does not interest them. --T.S. Eliot
a couple of things:
joists are 24" on center, not sure if they will require me to change this, either remove them and reinstall at 16 oc or install new between old leaving 12oc between them.
the house will be 32"higher after lift, to bottom of joist. this will probably be somewhat less once fill is brought in but still have the width of joists to add to 32". I posted the link to get peoples wheels spinning, maybe they could think of things they have done or heard of for similar circumstances to mine.
Thanks for posting that link. Some whacky stuff, but also some very interesting ideas.
I wonder what my city would think of the stacking of our cars in the driveway?
Mike
Trust in God, but row away from the rocks.
I've done a fair amount of experimenting with using small spaces, and here are my inclinations:
Especially when most stuff will be removed when you leave, open storage rules. No doors or cabinets - just open shelving. This makes it easy to find things, makes it harder to forget things, and eliminates the space taken by the doors, etc.
Another thing that helps is the use of wire shelving; this lets light pass through.
In most situations, you're best to start with narrow shelves down low, getting wider as you get higher. The highest shelf, however, ought not be more that 77" up (Everyone ought to be able to easily reach it).
The link you provided shows some very interesting ideas! Another one you might check into is:
http://www.metro.com/ftp/pdf/10.41.pdf