Small space, wonderful place

The apartment, as featured in TV programmes like Friends and Ally McBeal, or vintage comedies like The Odd Couple or Mary Tyler Moore, has long been an integral part of life in American cities.

While also a way of life in Europe, Australia and Asia, US-style apartment living is more familiar to us thanks to a slew of imported TV series and sitcoms. By comparison, the apartment culture here is taking its first tentative steps, and is still regarded by many as a stopgap for young people before trading up - or as a retirement option for the elderly.

City living in the US often entails an acceptance that the domestic dramas of life - from childhood through to post-college single life, rearing a family and growing old - will unfurl in the environs of an apartment.

For that reason, it can be enlightening for an Irish apartment dweller to get a flavour of how American counterparts really live via another medium, the World Wide Web.

US websites like apartmentlife.com and homestore.com, which has a section devoted to apartment dwelling, are a good place to start. Interiors tips, financial advice and an apartment search facility are available at apartmentlife.com, for instance.

A trawl through the site's Styling section makes it quickly apparent that, whether living in downtown Manhattan or downtown Dublin, the limitations of living in a small space are universal. A lot of the advice - such as that on furnishing small apartments - is useful. Oklahoma furniture designer Jim Huff says, "I'm a believer of making double, triple, even quadruple use of one object . . . especially when it comes to apartment living. Why waste space on a coffee table that doesn't function as anything else?"

The section recommends multiple-function furniture including combined wall bed/bookcase units, futons and storage trunks which could double as coffee tables.

Other ideas include how to improve light in dark spaces with a halogen torchere lamp or by constructing a light box out of a frame and fluorescent lights. At times the section does, however, lapse into the banal - a contributor tells of reading that it is "impossible to start a new relationship with messy closets . . . you need to get beyond the clutter of the last entanglement in order to move on".

Sticking to neutral classic pieces is advised: "leather pieces are a good investment for that reason". For any American reader who decides to take this on board, it is possible to rent a black leather sofa with chair, cocktail table, end table and lamp for around $91 a month from furniture rental companies like Aaron Home Furniture at aaronrents.com.

As many US apartments come virtually empty, furniture rental is big business there. The bonus here is if you get tired of bachelor pad leather and want to impress your soon-to-visit grandmother, you can order the more sensible Maxwell Plaid collection, which includes a sofa, chair, cocktail table, end table, lamp, dining table, chairs, dresser, mirror, night stand and a bed - all for $129 a month.

For anyone who needs a removals company to bring in their Plaid collection, homestore.com has a list of firms as well as advice on home insurance. Other sections include apartment hunting tips, tax tips for renters, renting with pets, turning trash into treasure, hints on decoupage, polishing silver and caring for hardwood. There is also a useful category on "appropriate letters to your landlord" and a message board for apartment dwellers.

For those feeling the pinch, frugalliving.about.com advises apartment hunters not to overlook basement apartments or walk-ups. "Ask if you could do yard work or shovel snow or do repairs or babysit for part of the rent," it suggests. More dollar-saving tips are given at bostonapartments.com which lists budget furniture stores, auction houses and furniture exchange centres that will "buy back furniture when you leave town". Thrifty interiors advice includes the following: "sea shells can make decorative knobs for cabinets; old doors can be converted into headboards, old car parts (gears) and mattress springs can make interesting candle holders".

From frugal to plush living, abcnews.go.com reports on Edifice Rex, an intranet system offered in some exclusive New York apartment buildings which allows residents to pay their maintenance on line, track work orders with their superintendents, participate in intrabuilding bulletin boards and get last-minute reservations at restaurants. The system is available in some of the wealthiest buildings in Manhattan, where, on streets like Park Avenue, a four-bedroom apartment costs over $3 million.

The theme of The Paris Apartment, a book and website by Claudia Strasser based on her popular New York city store which opened in 1993, is "sumptuous boudoirs". On the site you can ask Strasser questions about your bedroom decoration dilemmas. The Paris apartment look is timeless elegance - think antique furniture, chandeliers, chaise longues and four-poster beds swathed in luxurious fabrics.

There are many sites advertising space-saving furniture such as www.stores.yahoo.com, which features swing-out armoires for a sale price of $191, and folding and adjustable tables from $91. The site also sells sleek leather Corbusier lounges, chairs and sofas and Barcelona Chairs based on designs by Eileen Gray.

Advice on beds is available from homeoffices.com. Under the heading "Fact", it proclaims that a "Queen-size conventional bed allowing for walking space around three sides steals 65 sq ft of daytime living space". Wallbeds, chest beds and entertainment centres are advertised at roomax.com, while stacksandstacks.com offers every kind of organiser you can think of - towel racks, bath organisers, hair organisers and kitchen organisers.

For those who want "original cat furniture", the US patented Kitty-Cat Loft takes up under two sq ft of floor space and is on view at iroquoisinnovations.com. For those without a fireplace as a focal point in their apartment, one option is a giant leopardskin stiletto shoe which doubles as a chair. A sure-fire conversation piece, it costs $349 at shoechair.com. A cowboy boot chair can be viewed at sister site, sexychairs.com, and a handbag chair - a sofa that folds over like a purse - goes for just $899.

Some sterling advice for apartment-dwellers is given by Marlene J Rimland, president of the Illinois chapter of the American Society of Interior Designers, quoted in a piece by Cynthia Hanson of the Detroit news at detnews.com. "You should give the space such personality that you forget it's small and deal with the fact that it's wonderful."

emorgan@irish-times.ie