You're all set to close on that new house, but there's one thing still nagging at you. The outdoor space is great, you love the sunroom and the kitchen, and the bedrooms are all spacious and accommodating. There's only one room on the whole property that is giving you fits. The living room is long and skinny. There's no two ways around it, it's a shotgun style area and you're used to square and roomy. And since you know you're not planning to install a bowling alley anytime soon, you're going to have to find a way to work with what you have.
If you're lucky and you have the space on your property and the money to make it happen, you can opt for expanding the room. But that's expensive and you don't always have the required clearance to do so. Is it worth losing your driveway over? What you're going to have to do in most cases is use your creative juices to make that skinny room work within the confines of the current floor plan. Fortunately, there are some creative design tricks that you can use to make the room appear a little less like a railroad apartment and more like a livable room you won't mind spending time in. Before you get started, try to get in the mindset of acceptance, because while you can change certain interior elements to make the room feel better to you, the size and shape of the room will stay the same.
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