• Organize clutter to make a small space feel less crowded.make up-make a mess image by steve dimitriou from Fotolia.com
  
  When decorating small spaces, it can be difficult to find furniture and decor that achieves your desired style without overwhelming the room. As you plan a design scheme for a small room or home, plan with an eye toward simplicity and usefulness to ensure that every piece simultaneously serves a purpose and contributes to the overall style.
  
  

Light

• One of the most important considerations in designing the interior of a small space is light. Small spaces with dark walls and dark furniture look even smaller, and tend to take on a cave-like feeling. If your windows are small or if you do not have windows, lighting is particularly important. Look for hanging chandeliers or low-profille standing lamps that can be tucked behind furniture to avoid taking up floor space, or install track lighting. As you decorate, look for items that will reflect the light to create a bright, open feeling. Instead of choosing dark or opaque drapes, look for sheers that will not break the line of sight in the room, which gives an illusion of additional space. Choose pale colors for paint, furniture, and accessories so that existing light is reflected, and consider using mirrors to increase the brightness and perceived size of the room.
  
  

Clutter

• Clutter makes a small space seem smaller because it stops your eyes from flowing smoothly across the room. As you plan the interior design for a small space, look for ways to add storage and eliminate piles of small items that tend to cluster around the room. Store magazines in a drawer under a coffee table, for example, or look for an office supply organizer to hold pens, pencils, tape, and pads of paper. When choosing items for decoration, use one major piece that serves as a focal point, and select a few coordinating items to place around the room. This strategy eliminates the more fractured feeling that can occur with multiple smaller pieces of art or decor.
  
  

Raise the Eye

• When designing the decor for a small space, consider using the areas of walls nearer the ceiling, which often go unused. By placing details and decor higher on the wall, you will draw the eye upward, which creates the feeling of higher ceilings and additional space. Instead of using a traditional standing bookcase, for example, you might install floating shelves along the the top of the wall to hold books and photos. For an interesting place to hold small decor items, place a corner shelf high on the wall. Other possibilities include stenciling patterns at the top of the wall or adding ceiling detail with color or a painted wooden grid.