1. A room divider is a clever way to break up an open-plan space. Decorators working in the hospitality, retail and office sectors use them all the time and to great effect. It's an idea that translates well into residential living spaces and you can use all manner of materials.
This mild steel floor-to-ceiling divide has a sold base that creates a vertical half wall allowing for a sideboard or other piece of furniture to be against it. The rest of the design is open to let light through and makes the already airy space continue to feel lofty.
Chapelizod-based Lambstongue can supply and install something similar and price a screen that is 5.2m high by 2.8m wide at €10,775 if fabricated in mild steel where you can choose any colour, or €14,008 if made in bronze. These prices are ex VAT. The Walter Knoll Bundle L-shaped sofa, also pictured, in fabric costs from €11,350, while the day bed in leather, costs from €6,412, ex delivery from UK-based Chaplins. These pieces can also be ordered through Dublin-based Minima.
[ Lambstongue.ieOpens in new window ]
2. This screen idea, featuring fabrics and wallpapers from The Muse collection by Zoffany, when fixed to the floor or suspended from a ceiling can be a nice way to bring maximalist pattern and texture into a room without feeling overwhelmed by it.
A screen that measures 2m wide by 2.4m high, set on a hardwood frame with MDF legs, will cost from €950 from Grey Area, a Dublin-based studio that specialises in set design. This price includes design, supply and fit but doesn’t include the metallic trim pictured. The Evelyn paper, will cost an additional €122 per metre to order from Kevin Kelly Interiors.
The fabrics, Delamarre, on the sofa, Hennings on the curtains, and Brooks on the stools and lampshade, all cost €126 per metre. Wallpaper application is included in the cost.
[ Greyarea.ieOpens in new window ]
3. You can also use a room divider to help build zones within a small space. This foldaway kitchenette design by Clei Living, is New York in feel. It has a kitchen area that can be opened and closed depending on how you want to use the room. When open you have space for units and a second pantry wall with a hatch through to the dining room area. The lacquered finish, pictured, can accommodate a fridge, hob, microwave and sink.
The kitchen, €7,305, is designed to accommodate a device that deactivates the hob and oven when the door is closed. When the door is opened, the power supply is reactivated. To the right is a Penelope wall bed, to fit a mattress of 160cm by 198cm, that doubles as a dining table. It costs €3,965 ex mattress. Installation costs, excluding electrics and plumbing, is an additional €850 within the greater Dublin area.
The overall unit measures 144cm wide, is 220c high and 31cm deep, comes in a wide range of finishes and is available through Wallbeds of Ireland.
[ Wallbeds.ieOpens in new window ]
4. This idea, designed by 21 Spaces for a co-working space, Arthur's House, Belfast for client Glandore, is a creative way to break up a kitchen diner. By using bench seating and a lattice-like screen above it you can create a defined eating area within the larger room.
The Dublin-based design firm used this in an outdoor area but it could just as easily work indoors. Because it was for exterior use it was fabricated by specialist joinery manufacturer McKenna Cairns workshop in Castleblaney, Co Monaghan using solid teak and finished with two coats of lacquer to make it more resistant to the elements.
The seat part costs about €950 per sq m which amounts to a total cost for this size of bench, pictured, of €2,400.
[ 21spaces.comOpens in new window ]
5. Brass shelving is very much in vogue. This idea, used by Stockholm-born Martin Brudnizki of Martin Brudnizki Design Studio (MBDS) in the bar part of its latest project, Pink Mama in the Pigalle district of Paris, helps create its speakeasy fee. The idea brings together three key décor elements – storage, ornamentation and lighting – into one statement piece. MBDS also worked on The Ivy, Dawson Street, which opened earlier this week.
To get this effect, pictured, Rathcoole-based Fabco Stainless Steel Fabrication suggests a powder coated antique brass finish frame with timber shelving fitted with recessed LED lights, 200cm by 250cm by 50cm, which will cost €2,200, ex VAT and ex installation. This can be done in any colour. It also sells an off-the-shelf chrome-plated steel range called Metro. Currently closed for the summer holidays it reopens on July 30th.
[ bigmammagroup.comOpens in new window ]
6. This is a class glass act and an idea that works really well for those living in open-plan spaces. The panel, pictured, will cost about €450 per linear metre through Weafer Interiors and includes installation within the greater Dublin area. You can also use glass to shut off a mezzanine level using double-glazed panels, and while sound transference can be dimmed down, you will still hear the TV in the next room, explains, the firm's managing director, Paul Weafer.
The New Zealand wool Mexico rug by Serge Bensimon for Toulemonde Bochart is available to order through Lost Weekend and comes in three sizes. Prices start from €1,250 for the 170cm by 240cm size. The design is also available as a custom order and costs €850 per sq m.
[ Weaferinteriors.ieOpens in new window ]
7. A mid-century style chimneybreast can be used to hive off areas within a room. This smart design by Toronto-based Altius Architecture for their Thorncrest House project creates a focal point and also helps to delineate zones within the room. The striated stone panels are decorative and will help with heat transfer.
But this idea doesn’t have to be used as a chimney flue. You could use this room divider as a large mood light – installing LED lights within the structure that will either shine up into the void or down from within the void and on to a piece of sculpture or an object, for example. If you used a material like onyx or another such stone that allows some light transference you get a really interesting focal point for the room.
Rathgar Road-based stone supplier Antica has done this to great effect in kitchens where the island has been backlit to create a light box effect.
