mappysh's Profile

Pic #6 - the fabric - I die.

Oh no! You missed the cutest part of BHV: the "Bricolo Cafe", located on the basement too. It's very Harry Potter - I found this pic on flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chromavincent/366815066/

Nice place! and that bed is beautiful

Two more possibilities: the coffee tables with levers that transform into a comfortable dining table and the skinny console tables that extend to fit up to 10 guests. You see lots of those here in Paris.

But if your place is tiny, a good option is to host cocktail parties featuring amazing finger food and drinks.

We lived in a 1Br (450 sqft) with our baby until he was 2 years old. It is totally feasible, you just have to be extremely organized. Because we were saving on rent, we were able to eat out a lot, travel, go to parks, museums, etc. In fact, we had to go out a lot or the whole family would have gone crazy, esp. in winter.

This is how we organized the space:
-Living room with a sitting area, dining table, open kitchen and office. All the furniture pieces were of small scale, built with light materials, foldable, on wheels... very easy to move around.

-The bedroom had our bed, a big closet, changing table and crib.

-The two rooms were separated by a double door. During the day, this big door stayed open giving us a nice flow. We closed the door when the baby needed to nap.

-At night, the baby would fall asleep in the bedroom with the lights off while in the living room we worked, watched tv, etc. When we parents were ready to sleep, we moved his crib out of the bedroom, giving privacy to baby and us.

-We maximized floor space by using our very high walls for storage, we also got rid of (temporarily) unnecessary stuff like plants, coffee table and floor lamps.

I know many of these things sound obvious but it took us a few months to get things and procedures in place :-)

This can be a great adventure, good luck!