Many homeowners want a home office that feels more like a thoughtfully designed room than a workplace. But accommodating files, printers, computers and charging stations without creating visual clutter can be a challenge. Here, design pros share five home offices that pair smart storage and hidden technology with inviting, personalized style.
1. Hidden Filing Hub
Designer: Christine Dennison of Dennison Interior Design
Location: Denver
Size: 207 square feet (19 square meters)
Homeowner’s request. “The client is an attorney who runs her practice from home and needed serious filing capacity, but she didn’t want the room to read as an office,” says designer Christine Dennison. “Her ‘ask’ was for a space that felt like a natural extension of her well-designed home: warm, collected, personal.”
Special features. “The iron desk was a deliberate counterweight,” Dennison says. “Its thin legs and open silhouette keep the room from feeling bottom-heavy against the wall of cabinetry. To keep the millwork from feeling utilitarian, we wallpapered the nooks in a soft floral and used the shelf material as the filler between the lift-up storage cabinets.”
Cord and document control. “Nothing kills a beautiful office faster than a tangle of cords or a printer on display,” Dennison says. “We planned electrical access at the millwork stage, not after, which let us run power directly into a closed cabinet for the printer and modify the file drawers to route cords inside the casework. Every category of paperwork has a dedicated home: letter, legal, binders, supplies. Even the printer sits on a pullout shelf inside a cabinet. A bench opposite the desk hides additional storage in push-to-open drawers. When everything has a place, the room feels intentional. The result is a working law office that reads as a refined library.
Read more: https://www.houzz.com/magazine/5-new-home-offices-that-hide-clutter-in-style-stsetivw-vs~185314551