A Playroom Unpack in St. John’s Wood

The movers had already unpacked lots of boxes throughout the house, but there was a lot stored in this room that needed to be sorted out, including some pieces of furniture that our client had brought in the move, but wasn’t sure if they were needed. She also knew that she wanted to fit in a sofa in a way that meant they could watch films together as a family.

The family had done a big edit before their move so most of the kids’ toys, games and art supplies would be staying. Our client also had lots of great organising products from her old home that we could repurpose and reuse for the new space to create a really functional room that looked cool and composed. Even playrooms deserve to look great and good quality containers that have withstood a big move from the States are an excellent starting point. No overstuffed drawers and piles of random things on every worktop here!

In the planning meeting we talked through exactly how the family wanted to use the room. We took a good look at everything that needed to be in there and had a chat about how the children play. By working through the details, like what the children most like to play with and whether there were toys that needed a bit of adult supervision (paint and playdoh!), we could design the room to both suit the storage we had available and what the kids needed to make the room fun and functional.

During our organising session, we started by placing the furniture and designing a layout that would accommodate a sofa for movie nights. We removed a cube storage unit and a freestanding bookshelf which instantly made the space feel larger and gave us a starting point for the organisation.

The arts and crafts trolley, which could be wheeled in and out of the kitchen for big art projects that need a bit of adult oversight, underwent a major makeover with the help of a few of our go-to products. We used tall inserts to contain all the pens and pencils, acrylic boxes to store larger groups of arts and crafts supplies and photo boxes and mesh zip bags to separate out some of the smaller crafty bits.

In organising and styling the bookshelves we faced the challenge of fitting a large number of books, puzzles, board games and toys onto the shelves while keeping it feeling calm and looking composed. When you’re dealing with the garish colours and mismatched sizes of children’s toys, it’s really easy to end up with something that always looks a bit (or a lot chaotic).

We solved this by adding an extra shelf and storing some board games upright and others in stacks, creating a space-saving display that looked great. We also added points of interest by displaying the kids’ Lego creations and creating a “super-achiever” shelf to showcase their trophies and prized creations.