The last year and a half has meant much more telecommuting and working from home. Sometimes it is tricky to balance beauty and function in a work space, but I would like to share some practical home office ideas to add personality and function to this zone of your home.

Home Office Ideas : #1

Home office ideas: FIND A SPACE

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We are blessed to have a small home office space just off our entryway, but what do you do if your home doesn’t have one? It has been interesting to see how clients and friends on Instagram have carved out office spaces in guest bedrooms, living rooms, dining rooms, or even closets. Desperate times call for desperate needs.

In our family, we have four to five people working or doing virtual school at any point. To say that we have spent a lot of time together is an understatement 😜, but making the virtual learning and work environment has required flexibility. We have learned, sometimes the hard way, that having most, if not all, of the following home office ideas leads to the most success.

Note: All products mentioned here were sponsored but the opinions are 100% my own.

Home Office Ideas : #2

BEAUTIFY YOUR SPACE

I don’t know about you, but I find it much easier to work in a spot that is well designed, beautiful, and intentional. I have a table in the basement that COULD BE my own office, but I always find myself gravitating towards working here with natural light, gorgeous Farrow and Ball Stiffkey Blue paint and Spoonflower Wallpaper on the ceiling.

Two other perks to this particular home office design:

1. The dark paint helps camouflage the unsightly printer.

2. The color, combined with the wallpapered ceilings, make for a sophisticated backdrop for Zoom calls.

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I find that I generally work from the small settee in this room. My daughter, on the other hand, claims the desk during the day, and my husband works from the same spot when he gets home from work. It is fair to say that we all want to work from this space.

Home Office Ideas : #3

COMFORTABLE SEATING

One of the very most important aspects to a productive home office is ergonomic comfort. We use to have a vintage Eames office chair in here, but while attractive, it hurt my husband’s back. There is nothing like adding discomfort to suck the fun right out of office work ;).

After a year of back pain, we finally upgraded to this new Label 180 chair. Can I just say, WE LOVE IT! My husband was able to pick from five desk silhouettes in a total of 12 different sizes and more than 60 fabric and leather choices, including limited-edition Liberty of London prints, performance fabrics and fine-grain leathers.

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In the end, he picked the Feather Chair in Bison Deep Blue top grain leather. He is thrilled with this choice because he loves a good leather office chair. This one is particularly comfortable with the channel tuft back and seat. I adore the choice because it fits perfectly in the office without over powering the small space. We went with the large Feather Chair to fit his 6′ 2″ frame, but the low arms, adjustable height and tone on tone coloring in the room make it a gorgeous selection in here. That’s the beauty of custom fabric options!

Home Office Ideas : #4

CHOOSING THE RIGHT DESK

Assuming a desk is functional and is the right scale for the space, the next most important elements are storage and style. Unless there is adequte storage opportunities in the rest of the office space, drawers are obviously an extremely helpful design feature.

When it comes to style, the desk is an opportunity to have fun. Perhaps your desk is vintage, antique, artisanly made, or forged from a gorgous material. Maybe you are going for a custom fabric wrapped and glass topped option. Either way, why go “Big Box” when you can bring personality with this critical office piece.

Our desk is a British, leather-topped, World War II, campaign desk. The legs fold-up and store inside the frame. It is hard to beat a story like that.

Home Office Ideas : #4

STORAGE/ORGANIZATION

With three people working out of this small space we sometimes struggle to keep things where they need to be, but having a system helps. Documents are stored behind the arm of the sofa in a pair of filing cabinets that are painted Stiffkey Blue to match the walls.

Also, we have these black boxes from IKEA with lids covered in cork fabric to store extra cords, and rarely used office items.

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Finally, we have this gorgous late Victorian Anitque bookcase that we purchased in England. It adds instant soul to this room.

Home Office Ideas : #4

Lighting

As I mentioned before, it is hard to beat natural light, but there are three other types of lighting that you may find useful in your office space.

Ambient light is your main lighting source for the room. I like a well lit office and we recently switched to this Mitzi Giselle Semi Flush mount. It offers lovely filtered light and does a beautiful job of illuminating our otherwise dark office.

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As the name suggests, task lighting refers to fixtures that help you complete your specific task. This includes a desk lamp to help you write or work on your computer.

A ring light, provides illumination with little shadow and makes most everyone look better on those Zoon calls. While not pictured here, it is something we use from time to time.

Home Office Ideas : #5

A RUG

While largely aesthetic, a rug can help anchor any space. This is especially helpful for an office that is being carved out of an atypical space, like behind the back of a sofa or in a corner of a room. A cowhide rug (real or faux) gives an organic softness to these contrived zones.