It’s the season for the Super Bowl, socializing and . . . house guests.
A mother-in-law for Thanksgiving. Cousins for Christmas. A college buddy for the Super Bowl. They arrive. And arrive. And arrive .
Of course, not everyone has a spare room reserved just for guests. Most guests find themselves sleeping on a sofa bed in the Florida room, on a day bed in the den or on a folding cot in the home office.
Because most guest rooms have to accommodate several functions, they’re not easy to organize. A bed might serve as a sofa. A night stand can double as a desk.
Interior designers are great sources for ideas, so we asked several to show us guest rooms they created for clients. All agreed that a comfortable bed, good lighting and adequate storage are essential, especially if a guest room is multipurpose.
“Guest bedrooms should be as beautiful as the master bedroom,” said Toby Zack of Toby Zack Associates in Ft. Lauderdale. “There should be a comfortable mattress on the bed, lovely linens, everything to make guests feel welcome.”
But practicality, too, enters the picture.
“To have a guest room with twin beds is a waste of space when you may have guests only a few nights a year,” said designer Nury Feria of Design Perceptions, Miami. “And few homes or apartments can devote a room solely to guests.”
Here’s a breakdown of what a good guest room needs:
– The bed. Before you choose a bed, review last year’s guest list. Do your in-laws visit every holiday? Does your son or daughter bring friends home from college? Such a review will suggest whether single- or full-size beds would be the best choice. For a multipurpose guest room–that is, one that doubles as an office–there are a myriad of choices: sofa beds, day beds, sleigh beds, trundle beds and Murphy beds. Dressed as couches by day (except for fold-into-wall or cabinet Murphy), they take up a lot less space than full- or queen-size beds.
Nury Feria said she finds a trundle bed “a great solution for multipurpose rooms.” Unlike a day bed, which has a twin mattress, a trundle bed has a low mattress and frame on casters that pulls out to accommodate another sleeper.
For Isaac and Margarita Aguia, a Colombian couple who use their Majestic Towers apartment in Bal Harbour, Fla., as a vacation home, Feria created a triple-threat room, guest-den-office. The wood trundle bed is covered in a beige, teal and gold-patterned comforter and topped with pillows in those shades to serve as a sofa by day. The pull-out trundle holds a twin-size mattress.
Murphy beds, which swing up or fold into a closet or cabinet when not in use, were the solution for the guest room in the Coconut Grove home of Miami architect Walter Martinez and his wife, Olga. Because their grandchildren visit most weekends, the room has to serve as bedroom and playroom as well as a sewing room. They decided the pull-down beds would be ideal for Elise, 8, and Harrison, 5, offspring of their daughter, Teresita, and son-in-law Joseph Alexander Lacret. When the beds are stored in their cabinets, there’s plenty of floor space for the children to play.
– Good lighting. While many bedrooms have a central lighting fixture–or one in a ceiling fan–designers find this type of lighting harsh. They prefer a variety of lighting in a room to accommodate reading in bed, working at a desk and dressing.
Miami designer Jeanne M. Booth prefers “pin-up” lamps that hang on the wall above the night stands or the headboard. “This keeps night stands free and guests can swing the lamps around to suit their reading needs,” Booth said.
If there’s a desk in the room, it should also have a light, either a lamp or pin-up style. And a floor lamp is great to place by an armchair or chaise lounge so guests can read comfortably.
– Adequate storage. If the budget allows, built-in storage is a great solution for a guest room that has several functions, such as the one Nury Feria designed for her Colombian clients. She asked Luis Lozada, an industrial designer, to design three tall bookcase/cabinets and two low ones; they are maple with mahogany trim. One of the low cabinets serves as a support for the 3/4-inch glass slab desk top. Another serves as a night stand while the tall cabinets are used for books, art objects and clothing storage.
Every guest room should have a closet with plenty of padded hangers. If the closet is inadequate, provide a chest of drawers or an armoire.
One of the most obvious needs for a guest room is one most often overlooked.
“What to do with luggage is something no one thinks about,” said Jeanne Booth. “You need a folding luggage rack or a bench at the foot of the bed to place a suitcase on. So often a suitcase is used as a drawer by the guest or ends up on top of a bureau.”
– Night stands. Telephones and faxes are joining clock radios on guest room night stands because guests often need to keep in touch with the office. That means ample storage is needed beside the bed.
Designer Mac McGuinness, an associate of Toby Zack, was asked by clients Alice and Tom Blair to include a telephone and fax machine in each of the two guest rooms they have at L’Hermitage in Ft. Lauderdale. The couple, who vacation there when not at home in Potomac, Md., bought two apartments in the new building to accommodate themselves, their three married children and five grandchildren, when they visit.
“We are separate but equal and I don’t have to look at them,” joked Alice Blair. “But we do get together for the beach and meals.”
For one guest room, McGuinness chose matching night stands with a shelf to hold the fax machine. In the second, larger guest room he placed the phone and fax machine on a custom-designed piece that’s a combined desk, bureau and pop-up TV cabinet.
McGuinness selected twin low dressers to flank the bed to provide ample storage as well as a generous surface.
When space is cramped, designers search for clever alternatives. At Frank and Sandy Kaplan’s Miami-area home, the 8-by-10-foot guest room accommodates a Ralph Lauren day bed but has little space for night stands. Booth solved the problem by having two wood boxes made to fit the space on either side of the bed. She draped the unfinished boxes in the black and white toile fabric that matches the wall covering.
– Bath nearby. Ideally, a guest room has an adjacent bath or one nearby. “You don’t want your guests to have to use the children’s or master bath,” Feria said.
If the bath is adjacent, it should have a color scheme that’s complementary to the guest room. Sometimes the bath tile determines the guest room decor, as it did in Frank and Sandy Kaplan’s home.
Pamper your guests by stocking the bath with soaps, lotions, towels and a unisex terry robe.
– Mirror. Be sure to hang a mirror above a bureau or desk or try Feria’s solution: She had mirrored doors installed on the closet in her clients’ guest room.
“The reflecting mirror helps open up the space in a small room and provides a full-length mirror for guests to check their appearance,” she said.
– Windows. Make sure window treatments offer adequate privacy and that no light comes in through the covering at night. Depending on the decoration of the room, shutters, blinds, curtains or draperies can be used.
“If your guests have trouble sleeping, the room must be dark,” Booth said. “Consider room-darkening treatments such as blackout shades.”
– The tryout. Before guests arrive, be your own guest and try out the room yourself. Sleep in it one night to test mattress comfort, temperature, convenience, lighting and privacy.
