3 main ideas

Out of the 101 ideas, my group and I agreed on the 3 main ideas that we would use for our designs. They were multi-functional chair, murphy bed and twisted table. And as we chose those ideas, we also thought of pros and cons to them.

For the multifunctional chair, the good thing is that it doesn't take so much space, and it has more functions compared to that of a normal chair. It can fulfill the requirements of other furniture so you don't need to buy another furniture that has the same usage. The only drawback is that it could be more expensive compared to a standard furniture. Obviously because since it can do other things than being just a chair, more materials are required to make them, the could be of higher quality and durability so that adds to the price of buying such a thing. Plus depending on how it's design it can only fulfill certain needs. It can't morph into everything. So to tackle on to those drawbacks, we can manufacture them using recycled materials so it can be strong and no too costly. As for the design, we have to make so that it fulfill more needs than just one or two of them.

For the Murphy bed, it's multipurposeful so it's not just a bed, so it can morph to cater other needs as well. The bed can be kept away so it doesn't take up your space so it's really helpful when you need space. Plus, I read from the Internet that it's possibly cheaper than a regular bed, so it helps to save money. The only problem is that it can be tiresome to constantly take out the bed and keep it back whenever not in use. The only to solve it is to either designed it so that it is automated or to make it a habit. It can be good for exercise.

lastly for the twisted table, it pros are about the same as the multifunctional chair; it's multipurpose and it helps to conserve space. On another note, it can only serve certain requirements so like the multifunctional chair, we need design it so that it can serve many purposes and not just one or two. 

So from those we planned on making a designing a furniture that consists of those 3 ideas and help to tackle those drawbacks that we had just mentioned.

101 Ideas

After some research, it has come to a conclusion that the main problem of studio apartments is that there is not enough storage. Considering that there is not much one can change about the interior of the apartment, the only thing that can be done is modifying the furniture inhabiting the space.

After much brainstorming, we ave managed to come up about 101 ideas for the design of the apartment. Since the studio apartments are already quite small to begin with, most, if not all, of the designs are based on multifunctional furniture. Some are rational and already existing, such as the idea of murphy beds or furniture hidden behind walls, and some are quite interesting, if not rather ludicrous, such as the floating apartment (I'm not too sure on how to explain, the idea was not mine), and some, well, has no longer anything to do with the apartment, such as combining two rooms to make one bigger room.

All in all, there are some interesting ideas that could be developed further. The sketches are underway so, in time, it will be easier to understand the illustration rather than words.

experience living in a single room

I noticed that even by researching about the problem, it is still difficult to understand the full length of the problem. They say that the space is small, but what's wrong about it being small?

So I decided to conduct my own research of experience the life in a studio apartment. It's kinda hard to wrap my head around it, since I lived in a 3 bedroom condominium, but then again, I always stayed in my bedroom, and only going out to use the kitchen, dining room, and the bathroom when I needed it. I never used the living room. So it's not that different from a studio apartment. The only difference is that I have walls separating the rooms.

Like others, I also face the same situation, but rather than the room being too small, I find that the problem lies with storage. I can never seem to have enough storage to keep my stuff, so they always lie in piles in the corner of the room. And there's projects, which makes it even harder to keep them all without them getting squished. And my bed seems to take up almost 1/3 of the room, making it smaller that it already is. I do a lot of illustration sketches, so it's not surprising that I have papers all around the place. I don't even have a proper desk, so I would always used the small foldable white table that I can put on the bed whenever I need a flat place to work with other than the floor. Before I would use the wide window ledge by my bed to do my desk-work, but because i have been sitting in a kneeling and hunchback position for long periods of time, I tend to suffer from backaches and leg cramps, which have made reconsider using that area. So now that area is more or less a place for storage or some kind of sitting area so that I can look out the window.

Other than the bed, I also have a dresser table, honestly I used it more for storage and a surface to put stuff that I can just pick up from, and a built in wardrobe. I don't have a bookcase for my books, so I always left the in a box since I never take them out to read anyway so no use in getting another furniture. It'll just make the room smaller.

Since the place is rented I can't just simply renovate the area, so the only way I can think of is by using multifunctional furniture, with plenty of storage space.