How to divide open-plan and broken-plan living spaces

Clever division can bring that multi-functional room neatly together. Here's how to do it

Elements by Scavolini (Kitchens and Interiors). We love the chaise built into the bank created by the wall separating off the front door area; vitaitaliana.ie.

Broken-plan living — a space that’s divided out more firmly from an open-plan arrangement into determined interconnected function areas — is getting a lot of play on the interiors scene. 

If you have a room that’s proving an uncomfortable yawning barn or a more modest area performing double duties but clearly a confused split personality, a little division can bring it all together in terms of ergonomics and practical daily living. There are three strategies for breaking up a room like this, and it’s up to you which suits your situation and budget best. 

There’s no either/or for a larger volume, and you might integrate all three strategies.

Ceiling-mounted tracks can hove off a slender area or carry 100kg barn doors. Choose quality hardware and if in doubt have an engineer check the mounting point. Picture: iStock

First of all, you can indicate division with a new layout of your existing furniture and lean on the available architecture. The most common way of doing this is using the huddle of a suite, with the back of the sofa forming a soft wall that re-directs the eye and foot traffic, corralling off a seating area. A sideboard with fully finished, attractive cabinetwork to the back or doors on both sides can do the same work for a dining area.

The advantage here is versatility. With nothing screwed or nailed in place, the room can be re-shuffled with very little effort using simple visual interrupters.

A low-backed sofa lets the eye skim over the suite to the fireplace or a luxuriant view. If the back is dreary or even damaged, consider a discreet distraction with a skinny waisted sofa table or low bookcase, or fling on a heavy throw (woven tribal carpets have a good heft).

In a kitchen without an island, try placing a counter-high, free-standing table with its end against one wall for an instant two-sided peninsula for food prep’ and snacking. Check you still have at least 800mm of passing room all around.

Shelving together, with an open “legged” base, will allow light to flow.

A bespoke boho-inspired curtain of shells disks on vertical lines blurs one end of a contemporary room. Picture: iStock

This kind of partition gives a feeling of separated spaces within a space. It’s a gentle aesthetic trickery.

If you are placing a shelving unit or panel right in the middle of the space, ensure it's worth looking at from every angle; pictured is The Classic, decorativepanels.ie.

Moving up to a more determined division, we can go hard or soft. Curtains mounted directly on the ceiling on a thick pole or skinny rail, or using a bay area as a proscenium arch, can shield a sleeping nook from a home office or a window seat from the wider room.

Mock this kind of slight desperation up before you get the screwdriver out of its holster. 

Consider how you will sweep the curtains aside when the bed is in use. Use sheers if you need the window light over the rest of the room by day. Curtains with an ornamental lining add interest and a polished finish. After all, this curtain is intended to be seen from both sides. Pattern colour outward, and a solid colour on the “quiet” side is ideal.

If buying division furniture, bookcases are a go-to solution; finished all around, they can really rock a flabby larger or smaller room back to good behaviour. The choice is to go no-back, full back, or a combination of blind and open shelving. 

Integrating cupboard storage to the base of any tall, partition-ready bookcase or cube-like unit creates a useful anchoring weight for a piece not fixed to the floor or wall. Open niches can carry decorative pieces like sculpture, plants, or glassware — anything you fancy that reads well 360.

The iconic Billy bookcase from Ikea and Conran’s staggered timber shelving are widely used for instant impact and come in a range of confections. Box shelving can go rectangular or be built into rising steps where it suits. You can even put this or any suitable heavy bookcase reaching close to the ceiling, end-on to the wall to create an entryway to your home — useful if you’re currently jumping straight off the front doorstep into the room.

Try Ikea’s pole-secured Elvarli range for marking off a kitchen or office. It’s airy and beautiful with no hindrance to light from every direction (€250 for a larger 175cm x 222cm x 250cm arrangement with add-on modular elements, ikea.com/ie). Casey’s do a contemporary Curve bookcase — tres chic at €549 for whiplash styling in bold wood veneers.

Stable, self-supported screens are an ancient domestic servant and come in multiple solutions, actions, sizes, and aesthetics, and there is something for everyone. Leaves that fold or roll out, allow you whatever revelation you like depending on the occasion, and off duty a lovely screen can be folded just about flat to soften out the corner of a room or to disguise a dressing rail. 

Look for a decorative piece you’ll enjoy open or closed in wicker, rattan, or fully upholstered product, and try them out as a handy background for those Zoom work calls.

In a rental, a vintage clothing rack finished with a semi-opaque curtain will take up just a sliver of room to hide your bed. Gently distressed antique screens come up regularly at auction and inject a shot of period character in an otherwise sleek, contemporary space. If you come across a magnificent period example that’s too arthritic for a floor show, try it out as wall-hung artwork.

A bespoke self-supporting statement screen that reaches floor to ceiling can be positioned right in the centre of the room or to hove off a draughty doorway (very Georgian), just ensure it will not fall as the weight of the frame could be dangerously bruising. 

Myrheden gilded memo boards clipped together to mark out an entertainment area, and hung with notes and decor. Similar mesh boards from €16 at Ikea or try Etsy.

Most tall furniture with a high centre of gravity is best secured top and bottom to the wall and/or ceiling. 

There are room dividers that run on a bottom and top rail, rather like a wardrobe sliding door — screwed in place in smoked glass, they are a quick trick that is easy to undo for any future buyer of your home. Sliding tracks used for wardrobes can be jimmied up with a variety of screen solutions.

If you want to install a more permanent, structural division, there’s the choice of everything from simple lengths of wall, high and low, heavy ropes, glass Crittall window screens (steel), to sliding and pocket doors that disappear neatly into flanks of new stud or masonry wall. Some partitions offer almost complete visibility to the area beyond, others offer blinded-out partition, splicing off a new room.

If you’re looking for versatility, we need substantial partitions with moving parts but no shudder — doors with a smooth, liquid action to swing or slide under the fingers. Wood struts and metallic poles strike a ’70s feel of the split-level metropolitan pad, where platforms were used to raise dais areas for sleeping and slouching.

If your ceiling is high enough, explore the idea of raising your game. Take a look at B&Q’s Alara light, paintable partitions with push-fit connections and interior window options — great for a DIY install (€56-€100, diy.ie).

Soften a corner or shield a meditative reading spot. This airy folding screen made of PU rattan has a classic organic shape and playful open pattern, €239, woodesign.ie.

For actual privacy and meaningful sound abatement, you will need a fully closed wall.

To seal up an interior arch or void, barn doors (wildly popular) can be enormously heavy and beg professional installation, but any conventional door can be hung to slide either flush with the wall or into a pocket. 

You will need sliding tracks to marry to the width and weight of the door/window shutter/antique sashes/whatever. Husky Sliding tracks start at €60 to carry 100kg (screwfix.ie), with barn door hardware starting around €100 for 2m kits with soft closing and opening to prevent slams or bouncing. (Try pchenderson.ie.)

Ensure you use shatter-proof safety glass for glazed elements. For a small stud-wall project, there’s finished panelling from €80 (390cm wide and 1000 high), from a choice at Panel Shack (panelshack.ie) and Decorative Panels (decorativepanels.ie).

If committing to real walling (carrying doors or not), introducing a high or low area of the structural, blind wall is best worked out with an architect or interior designer. Walling can be combined with crafted bookcases or shelving, nooks, lighting, unusual materials, and other architectural detailing to lighten their visual load. Fixed in place, even light stud walling will have a profound impact on the flow of the room and the sightlines originally designed into the space.

We want success, not an annoying obstacle. These solutions are harder to reverse than our other go-to’s, so don’t skimp on some professional input, not least to ensure the sub-floor and ceilings can carry any extra weight.

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