Oftentimes in spaces like this, Buyuk points out, people try to solve the problem with a Murphy bed, thinking they have a whole room to use when the bed is in the wall. “But when the bed comes down,” she says, “you’re scrambling around trying to figure out where to put chairs and tables.”
Instead, Buyuk opted for a full-size sleeper sofa, in a natural linen fabric, that she found at Montage in Boston. A versatile white glass and metal piece by Ligne Roset Boston serves as a coffee table; it has two leaves and its height can be raised – the condo’s owner, an avid quilter, uses it as a sewing table. When it’s time to unfold the sofa, the table slides easily under a built-in console table on the opposite wall that serves as a dressing table when guests are around.
A comfortable yet lightweight chair by B&B Italia from Montage takes up minimal space and has wheels, so it’s easily maneuvered around the room. Small end tables double as night stands. Buyuk had lamps mounted on the wall on both sides of the sofa so that when the bed is unfolded, they’re just the right height for reading.
“Details like these have a big impact” on a guest’s comfort, she says.
THE TWIN BED SOLUTION
BECAUSE OF ITS location, the bedroom at the top of a stair landing in a historic house in Wellesley was “perfect for a guest room,” says Weston interior designer Katie Rosenfeld. “This room is very public; it’s open to anyone coming up the stairs,” she says. It’s also very visible, so Rosenfeld set her sights on creating an inviting, approachable, and uncluttered space.
A wall of long windows – relics from when the room might have served as a sleeping porch in the early 1900s – fills the room with natural light. Charming as the windows are, they provided a bit of a design challenge. “Since the room is also very small, we were dealing with a tricky layout,” Rosenfeld explains. “It wasn’t possible to put a queen bed in the room because it would block the windows or inhibit traffic flow.”
