Extra Living Space in your Attic

Option 1 : Attic chopped up by a stairway? Here’s how to decorate around it

Wish you had an extra bedroom? Or a special spot where you can get off by yourself and putter with your hobby? Or maybe a family funroom to pack in the young crowd on a Saturday night?

You can make room for the extra living areas you need, the way we show you here, and these 3 families did by putting the unused attic to work. And if your attic is a problem one, as this was, here’s help for you. If you have an attic cut up by a central stairway, make the stair well play an important part in the room’s arrangement. Let it act as a divider to separate the areas of the room. Dress it up and make it a dramatic, but functional point of interest in your attic.

Look over these and the following tips for ideas to help you solve your attic puzzlers-attractive ways to turn your unused attic into important extra living space for your family.

• Hobby area tills one end of attic, opposite the living-bedroom area. This section of the attic can be partitioned off by a bamboo screen. Low doors open to storage space under the eaves; the higher door behind screen leads to a storage room. An air conditioner, ceiling ventilating fans keep the attic comfortable in the summer.

• Leather stirrups for drawer lonns. branding irons, leather-seated saddle stools carry-out Texas motif. Shelves built in under eaves hold records and hobby supplies (behind sliding doors). Stools provide seating for record fans, posh hank to make room for dancing

Attic is furnished to form activity areas for reading, conversation, sleeping, record-playing and dancing, and hobby-working. Bed slides under the eaves, pulls out to make a double bed.

Option 2 : Attic with a Central Chimney

Problem stairway in center of attic now is accented by closet rods to suggest partition between living-bedroom-playroom. And hobby area. Let your fancy run free when you decorate your attic. It is a natural for decorations like the rug, antlers, and maps used here in a Texas theme.

Rows of bookshelves make use of wall space lie-hind door to stairway. Chest of drawers against staircase helps to separate areas. Walls were finished with fiberboard, painted, rubbed off and varnished.

Flank a central chimney with closet, bookshelves, to separate attic room

Think your attic’s impossible because it has a chimney shooting up through the middle? Then here’s an idea: Camouflage the chimney with a closet and bookshelves, the way the Tony Horner family did.

By covering the brick chimney with wallboard, and extending partitions of wallboard from either side of the chimney to the caves, the Horner’s formed a closet the depth of the chimney. With the attic area divided in two, one part was turned into a playroom for the nursery-age youngsters; the other became a boy’s room.

A large storage area underneath the eaves holds big toys, summer furniture, luggage, and other items. Adding shoe bins on the door could be a good idea for college days.

Closet between chimney and wall can he opened from the playroom. As well as front the boy’s neont. Bookshelf-cabinet, which matches one on the opposite side of chimney, was covered on the outer side to give it a built-in look. Cabinets can be moved from an old living room.

If you or your children have the trains as hobby; then a large train table could be fold out from one wall of the play area. When table is in use, legs swing drawn and fasten with big hooks. Things like tracks, station, and signal towers are attached permanently. The storage-room door in background is papered to match the wall.

Closet will be good size, keeps garments at a convenient height for the reach of a nursery-age youngster.The rugs in both rooms are of washable cotton, ready to take !dewy of wear and tear from active young feet.

Beyond chimney-closet partition is boy’s bedroom, large enough to accommodate an extra cot for young overnight guests. Folding cot is kept in storage urea under the eaves. At the left, placed against the chimney wall, is a large chest for storing toys and play supplies. In the background, under windows, is air-conditioning unit.

Problem chimney makes a handsome divider

Turn your problem attic chimney into a decorative asset! Let it be a divider between your attic rooms.
That’s how the Wharton’s solved the problem of a chimney in the middle of their attic. They ran partitions from the chimney back under the eaves to make two bedrooms for their young sons. The space on the other side of the chimney became a study-playroom.

The chimney, which jutted out into the playroom, was flanked with shelves for books and boyhood treasures.

The study-play area has individual desks for studying, hobby-el working. Notice how the grain of the wall finish runs vertically up to the window level, and then runs horizontally, for variation. Floors are waxed hardwood. Blinds without curtains give room tailored look.

Chimney, decked out with shelves, takes on the look of a 1 fireplace and mantel. floors on either side lead to twin bedrooms. A type of fiberboard, stained brown, was used to finish walls of the three rooms, cabinet, and the front of the chimney.

Built-in drawers under the caves save space in bedrooms, provide handy storage.

A narrow headboard was built for each bed, and adjustable lamps were attached to wall above the beds. Each boy’s bedroom also has a good-size closet.Chimney in center makes a natural divider to help separate the attic rooms, as well as provides a dramatic center of interest.

By Helen Stack