I’ve been living alone in a new apartment for almost a year now and have never been happy with how it looks and functions. Sometimes it’s just plain ugly and other times inconvenient as I don’t know the right furniture for storing stuff, thus taking more time than usual to find a certain object. Honestly it’s getting pretty frustrating lately.
Is there any way I could hire someone here that could look at my current mess and provide ways to improve it? I speak Japanese, so that side is not a big problem for me. I just don’t know the right terms to look for these services.
EDIT: I only found the Nitori Interior Soudan but I don’t understand exactly how it works since they provide little info about the actual process
20 comments
You might want to frequent r/cozyplaces. It’s a good sub to see maximal comfortable use of (usually) small areas.
1 word: minimalism.
What worked for us is moving furniture completely out of the way in high traffic lanes (putting laundry out on the balcony path, kitchen path) etc and putting a cabinet out of the way for miscellaneous things. We bought everything white or off white so the house looks bigger. Before, we were prioritizing putting the TV in a place where we could see it from the kitchen, and it ended up creating a chaotic layout. I bought a kitchen TV instead and redesigned the place.
Got pics?
Get rid of sofas, chairs, throw stuff out, etc
Only have the bare minimum. It’ll make living and cleaning so stress free
If you have friends who have good taste (which you can see if they have a nice place), just buy them beer and pizza while you’re asking them for advice, lol. That may be a lot cheaper than doing a 相談 with a furniture shop and being limited to their brand. Personally though I think nitori’s quality is good. Ikea also has a remote インテリアプランニングサービス which they do free https://www.ikea.com/jp/ja/customer-service/services/interior-design-service-home/#bb390490-895e-11ec-a8f0-ebcc819d2fca
Had the same problem which miraculously fixed itself once I moved into a bigger space… So if you have money to throw around maybe the answer is just a simple move
Ikea has great small room recommendations, go, take pictures, implement what you like with what you already have then buy bits to “fix” things.
[Benry.com](https://Benry.com) also offers a similar service.
https://www.benry.com/service-scene/5/#32
Not sure if you can hire someone, or it’s worth it, but you can start to learn some basic ideas yourself. I love this kind of thing. I’ve gone to my friend’s houses and helped them re-organize. When I was working for my previous company, eikaiwa, they actually used to send me to several branches to organize them as well.
The first step is to go through everything you have and get rid of things you don’t need. I don’t know how much you have after just living there for a year, but if you are like one of my friends, you may have just brought over everything from your previous place to dump into the new place.
Go through clothes, books, paperwork, dish and glassware, utensils, stationary, everything, and throw away or donate/sell everything that you don’t need. Be harsh.
Next you need to think what kind of concept do you want in your place. Think about colors and materials. Do you like a modern look with black/silver/gray or silver/white/tan as colors, and metal/glass/leather as materials, or do you like that Asian kind of look with brown/tan and wood/bamboo/cloth. Of course lots of other kinds of concepts, but understand what you like from the very beginning. By buying bits and pieces of furniture that don’t match a central concept, you end up with a mess, even though each of those items may be fine in it’s own separate way.
Next think about each room and how you want/need to display/store things. Things that you use often need to be easy to access. Also think about which rooms you spend the most time in. For me it’s the living room. You want this room to feel comfortable. If it’s all cram packed with stuff, that’s not going to feel good.
I don’t know the size of your place. Now I live in a 3LDK where I have tons of space, but in the past I was in a 1DK. In a small space for example, you might have a bookshelf in the living room, but why not have it in a hallway to create more space in the living room? The hallway can afford to be a little narrower because it’s just a space that you pass through, and how often are you going to access the bookshelf anyway? This leaves the other room more spacious and relaxing. I think it’s a good idea to go to IKEA (The big ones, not the small city ones in Shinjuku and Shibuya) and look at their pre-designed rooms. Forget about the actual colors and materials, and you don’t have to buy anything, just look at how they lay out and organize things. Get ideas about the overall layout and then use your color/material concept.
Japan is a champion of designing items that help you keep as much stuff organized in as small a space as possible. I strongly recommend you go to places like Nitori, Muji and home centers, to look at items to organize drawers, cabinets and shelves. Go through every section. By putting things inside cabinets and shelves, under beds, under the sink, and utilizing vertical space, it leaves the remaining space much neater.
Of course you want to make the insides of those cabinets neat as well, that’s why there are really cool shelf dividers, lazy susans, magnetic walls, devices to hang things under wall-mounted cabinets etc to create more space. But don’t buy anything until you understand what is available and what you need.
Here are some things you can look at:
I love this company for organizers. Look at their photos and see how they have organized. You don’t necessarily have to buy from them, but you can get an idea of what things can look like
https://www.amazon.co.jp/stores/page/7D79C732-5328-40DA-A3D0-17367D804A16
Other advice
https://tokyocheapo.com/living/decorate-japanese-apartment/
Google “how to organize a small Japanese apartment” and you’ll get links to lots of websites/videos. just learn what is available and gather various ideas and form them into what you like and what you can fit in your space.
Don’t think of it as work, think of it as a fun project to work on to end up with a great result!
I think there is a Netflix series about this…
I agree with “minimalism”
My apartment used to be full of stuff everywhere and it always made me feel tired and confused. I decided to get rid of almost everything and it looks so clean and fresh now.
Depending on the size of the place, think about angles.
Our last place was perfect for our 2.5 seater couch as it was against a long wall, but in our new place, the living and dining are connected and had the couch in the middle, facing the TV with the big glass doors behind it.
This did two things;
– it effectively split the room in two, leaving a big space behind the couch before you got to a kitchen island on wheels we use for prep. Lots of “dead space”
– it left very little room on either side of the sofa arms for sidetables or even general maneuvering.
After spending a year there, we just experimented with moving the TV at an angle in the corner, and the couch at an angle looking into the corner. This has opened up the living area and created ample space on both sides of the sofa for side tables. I can now have my reading lamp there, next to the book case and stereo cabinet as well, so now you can sit right next to it. It also made access to our storage room where I keep my bike much easier to get to.
I just went through similar stuff reworking my place so the roomba can get around without weights etc on the floor.
Height matters.
Basically you can store a lot more stuff in a full height closet, or a dresser that reaches just below your window sill height. I once visited a tiny 1k where they had turned one entire wall into storage more or less floor to ceiling. Everything was tidy because it was all stored
Also get a bed with under bed storage, that helps a lot.
You can use compartments, boxes and trays in your storage to further organize the storage interior and make getting at stuff easier.
Ultimately storing less stuff is of course easier, but that’s more of a buying less stuff issue. If you plan where you’re going to store something when you buy it(and are confident you actually need it and shouldn’t just borrow from a friend for a one off thing or something) that helps a lot.
A lot of houses condos actually make this really hard by having poorly positioned light switches, windows doors and built in storage giving very limited space for storage solutions so you do want to pay close attention to that when moving
A few options/suggestions, but first I recommend:
Going on youtube and watching some foundational interior design videos (I personally like Kristen McGowan and Julie Khuu but there are loads of interior design channels) to mainly get down the very basics, which are:
A) the main interior design styles (e.g. modern, industrial, contemporary, bohemian, traditional, etc. etc.).
B) interior design 101 stuff (e.g., try not to have one big ceiling light, it’s better to have a less imposing ceiling light and some extra indirect lighting around the room, or stuff like how to pick a rug that will fit your furniture and not make the room look weird, or stuff like how, when, and where to place decoration items like ornaments on dressers or art pieces on the wall.
There’s a lot to digest there but what I want to drive home is that before relying on interior design services, it’s better to have a bare minimum idea of what the options are and what you might be most interested in. For instance, if you know like the look of the midcentury modern style, you might go on pinterest and by chance come across a layout/color palette that you really like. Having some rough ideas like that will help if/when you do decide to use a professional service… so then if you want to take that step:
1. Go the **gig website Fiverr and just search “interior design”**. There are people who will do custom (or mostly custom depending on who it is) interior design for as little as about **$40 per room**. A lot of these people are in places like Vietnam so that explains why they can charge so little. You can pay more and get a much more comprehensive services.
The key point is that you’re pretty much guaranteed to end up paying waaayy more if you use any physical interior design services (ie people actually coming to your home) just because hourly rates are (obviously) higher in Japan than less developed economies.
2) Make a free account on the **floorplanner** website, and create your room(s) in a 3D space. They have a Youtube channel that goes through how to use it but I also use it so feel free to PM me for some tips and tricks. It’s totally free but you have the option to pay like a one-off $10 fee to be able to make unlimited 4K photorealistic (or close enough) renders (per project basis but in reality you can just work within the same “project” 3D space so it’s one-off in my eyes).
3) **Go to Tokyo Interior and use their** ***free*** **3D interior design help service**. You basically take your room measurements and they will quickly mock up your room in 3D and start putting things in the room. It was all free. It helps if you there are a few items of furniture from Tokyo Interior that you like (to make them think they have a sale coming and be more enthusiastic) but you of course are not forced to buy anything. You can just say ありがとうございます and leave.
Bit of a long comment but hope it’s helpful.
I usually look at https://roomclip.jp for ideas and search by the room type (1K, 2LDK, 一人暮らし, etc)
You can use sites like タスカジ to hire people to help with organization and storage.
But the layout of Japanese apartment is quite the same. You can go to a bookshop and grab some magazines to see.
I recently moved from a spacious 2dk to 1dk. What helped me was watching lots of 1dk room tourロームツアーvideos on youtube for room arrangement ideas. Plus, I decided to throw my large 3person sofa and a smaller desk.
Maybe you can find room tour videos for your house layout too.
Hello I’m an interior designer ✋🏻 Help is on the way
For small spaces you need to do inventory count, measure your stuff and get rid of items you don’t need: Recycle, sell them to second hand shops, call Tokyo Gomi if you absolutely must throw them away. With the rest, think about how you want to store them: dust accumulation over time is an issue and it will get annoying over time unless you call cleaning services regularly. If you have some beautiful, rare items you could display (action figures, a pricy ceramic item, painting, designer bag), plan some open storage for those.
If you don’t want to break the bank, IKEA and Nitori has customizable storage units. For wardrobe, IKEA also has great customizable units (planning to get one for myself)
If you’re absolutely clueless and have the money, IKEA has interior designers for this kind of situation