One Room Makes You Smaller

Five years ago, I was living alone in a three-bedroom house. Two years ago, I moved from a studio to one bedroom in an apartment. It's been a learning process to adopt the spare aesthetic required for living large in a lesser footprint.

Fortunately, ReadyMade magazine has just released "the small space issue." [via FC Now] Also of interest is MoCoLoco's recent entry on The Very Small Home, examining successful applications of sophisticated architecture in Japan.

Some favorite books I look to for inspiration on a budget with limited space (grouped by era and/or focus):

Feng Shui for Apartment Living, Feng Shui Demystified, and Clear Your Clutter With Feng Shui
Underground Interiors, Interiors in Color, Your Space, and Living in One Room
The Thrifty Decorator, Zen Interiors, Bloomingdale's Book of Home Decorating, and Terence Conran's Small Spaces
Tokyo: A Certain Style, Paris Style, and Modern Finnish Design

From the archives: Toward a New Opulence, De Stijl (Heart No. 1), Sustainable Design at Every Level, The Hierarchy of Material Needs, The Best-Laid Plans, Trading Spaces, My Beautiful Laundrette, The Charms of Small Collections.