A warm and very ingenious floor

Beatriz Escudero and her husband live in an apartment they bought over 20 years ago. She is passionate about decorating, and her dream was to have a home like those featured in magazines. The Furniture. This dream came true when, on Three Kings“ Day, her husband gave her a card announcing ”Good for a renovation proposal by interior designer Mireia Masdeu.".

This is how the Masdeu Design Studies projected the reform of this Housing in Sant Cugat del Vallès which consisted of offering solutions to gain storage space, make the most of spaces, and natural light.

Mireia Masdeu, project manager, comments that the renovation “The wine was motivated by the clients' desire to give the apartment a facelift, adapting the different spaces to the family's daily needs. This was achieved by opening the kitchen to the living room and dining room, while also replacing the dividing wall with the hallway with a large window to allow natural light to enter.”.

With the new layout, enclosed spaces such as hallways or the old narrow and dark kitchen were transformed into spacious, bright areas with ample capacity. Finally, a practical, cozy, and timeless apartment was achieved through the use of natural materials like oak wood combined with neutral and soft colors.

The owner, Beatriz Escudero, tells El Mueble magazine how did he face this reform.

Give up a room to get more space

The renovation project proposed modifying a four-bedroom apartment (one of them narrow and tube-shaped), with a hallway and closed-off spaces (a narrow, poorly lit kitchen), into a three-bedroom apartment with spacious, bright, and practical areas with ample storage.

Beatriz was sure that «I wanted the apartment to be warm, simple, cozy, and very practical. I was clear on the style: natural materials, timeless, and light neutral colors. Additionally, we needed more space for the two young people in the family, storage capacity, and to make the most of the spaces (eliminate the hallway and unify the office and dining room areas).«.

In addition, “The hardest part was deciding to eliminate a room. I thought I would lose value by having fewer rooms and might regret it in the future if I needed an extra room… And the truth is, seeing the result now, I can reaffirm that ‘better a little and good than a lot and bad.’”.

To top it all off, «removing a room not only improved the size of the boys' rooms but also allowed for the dining room to be expanded, providing more cabinets and therefore the possibility of maintaining better order.« , the protagonist acknowledges.

Evolve at the pace of needs

When considering this renovation, it was taken into account that the apartment should adapt to daily needs, not to occasional or future ones, because«A family's needs evolve; they aren't the same when you're just starting a family as they are now that the family is larger.»assures Beatriz.

Open the kitchen to the living room

Giving up a room wasn't the only difficult decision Beatriz had to make:«Another thing I was unsure about was having an open kitchen, the issue of smells worried me. Initially, I decided to integrate it into the dining room with the condition of putting up a glass partition. As of today, that glass partition hasn't been installed, but it's possible I might end up closing it off a little...«.

A half-height partition was set aside to place a piece of furniture with a countertop on the kitchen side, and on the other side, it serves as a TV stand and continues as a table that can be used for dining or even as a work desk if needed.

Light in all rooms

In the bedrooms and bathrooms, the idea that light should be the protagonist was also very present, which is why the large windows and windows were used to distribute the spaces efficiently and the warm colors and noble materials that insist on the neutrality of the ambiance remain.

toilet was installed in the master bathroom Nilo rectangular sink About suspended wooden furniture.

A light-filled entryway

The partitions that defined an entryway, kitchen, and hallway were removed, creating an open-concept entryway that provides a feeling of spaciousness upon entering the home, with a direct view of the apartment's garden.

Thanks to this new glass partition, the entryway has gained a lot of light.

Project | Mireia Masdeu
Styling Sol Van Dorssen
Photography Pepa Oromí
Publication | An Exclusive Report by The Furniture