Built-ins
Cost to Add a Window Seat This is a great project if you already have a room with a large window and are looking to add more seating, storage, a focal point or all three. Cost: Simple and small window units can cost $750 to $1,500 plus installation labor. Larger windows or projects with cabinets built into the seat can cost about $2,000 to $5,000
Whether modern or traditional, extra spaces along the sides of a hall are great places for built-ins. In the Los Angeles traditional home here, an alcove holds a custom cabinet. The drawers and shelves provide always-needed storage for linens and supplies. Also, the countertop is perfect for displaying a few favorite objects and artwork. It also provides a place for conveniently setting things down as the owners traverse the rooms.
Dress it up. The passageway between these two rooms doesn’t use any tricks; it simply allows you to get from point A to point B. What is elegant about this passageway, however, is the curved step guiding you up to the archway and framing the view from the lower room. The opening is wide, arched and decorated with multiple layers of molding. The ceiling inside, between the rooms, is a bit higher than the opening, so you don’t feel as though you are in a tunnel. This slight change in ceiling height makes the passageway its own space between the rooms — a brief moment of transition.
Add a passageway as part of a hall. If you have a very long hallway, consider breaking it up into bays. Here the passageway is nearly a room unto itself, as it houses a reading nook and a window seat with storage cubbies near the floor. Make sure you leave at least 36 inches of floor space for circulation.
Use a passageway as a purposeful link between spaces. This kitchen passageway, defined by the overhead soffit, serves as a mini command center with pinup space on one side and cookbook storage and upper and lower cabinets on the other side. The ceiling height aligns with the bookcases on the adjacent wall, the base trim wraps about the corner seamlessly, and the same white paint ensures that the opening feels like it’s part of both of the rooms it connects.
Improve your living space. This passageway between the dining room and the living room (to the right of the bookcase) is a typical framed opening, but its depth allows for bookcases on the living room side. Even if you aren’t building a new home, you can build out your walls and drastically change the atmosphere of a space and how you use it, just as these bookcases turn a plain living room wall into an elegant library.
[Cabinets that extend to the ceiling] You may not ever make it up there, and if so, trust me, the area between the tops of your upper cabinets and the ceiling is probably the dirtiest, dustiest spot in your home. Extending cabinets all the way to the ceiling is cleaner and offers extra storage space. These upper-uppers are usually an additional row atop the upper cabinets, which have more pleasing proportions than super tall upper cabinets would. They also provide an opportunity to put glass-fronted cabinets up top for displaying items and a lighter look. Island: Downsview in Downsview Blue, Astro Design Centre; island countertops: Caesarstone and solid walnut
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