Could you live in a teeny-tiny apartment barely bigger than the living room of most suburban homes? If your answer is an automatic no, give these 15 well-designed micro apartments a gander. Architects make the most of small spaces using lofts, ultra-compact staircases, slide-outs and multipurpose furniture. You might be surprised how much you can fit into 300 square feet or less – and wait until you see how people manage to live in spaces the size of standard walk-in closets.
Freedom Rooms: Designed by Prisoners, Modeled on Jail Cells
The world’s real experts on living in the tiniest of spaces – prisoners – designed the ironically named ‘Freedom Room‘, a 96-square-foot micro apartment. The project enlisted inmates to design a functional living space using their own intimate knowledge of tiny spaces, resulting in an apartment that’s full of multi-functional furniture and lots of storage.
Sloped Roof Apartment Takes Advantage of Odd Angles
Sloping surfaces can make a small space even smaller, presenting major challenges. The ability to organize the rooms vertically is reduced. But Dutch architects Queeste Architecten have managed to give this 320-square-foot micro apartment a spacious feel using lots of white, with built-in furniture and storage integrated into every corner.
Tiny Paris Apartment Full of Storage
Built-in room dividers that double as shelves help divide a mere 60-square-meter Paris apartment into a home with defined functional spaces that are still bright and open.
Loft Turns Studio into Two-Level Apartment
A tiny apartment instantly feels larger and more accommodating with the addition of a loft over the kitchen, accessible by a highly compact alternating-tread staircase. The loft also creates a hallway closet.
Customized Cabinet Makes Small Apartment Super Adaptable
A wall-length cabinet in striking blue turns a 450-square-foot apartment into a series of functional rooms. It folds and unfolds in various ways to provide workspace, a dining table, a bed or a lounge depending on the users’ needs at the time.
Crazy Closet-Sized Apartments in Tokyo
Ever wonder what it’s like to live in the world’s smallest apartments? These ones in Tokyo will give you an idea. They’re just long enough to lay down in, but there’s no room to stand, and forget about a view. These extreme micro apartments are designed for people who only need a place to sleep, spending most of their time at work or out in the city.
Loft Makes NYC Condo Feel Spacious
Here’s yet another case of a loft making a big difference in the feel of a small, open-plan apartment. Specht Harpman Architects turned a penthouse with a high ceiling into a two-level apartment with this loft addition, and even managed to fit in a small grassy terrace open to the outside.
Bright and Organized Tiny London Loft
Craft Design Studio filled an entire wall of this small apartment in Camden with shelving for tons of all-important storage space, and added a box-like central volume topped with a sleeping area. The box holds the bathroom facilities, and additional storage.
Modern Singapore Shoebox Flat
The change in this Singapore shoebox flat is absolutely stunning, given its original dark, dreary and very cramped feel. A white wall-mounted storage unit conceals clutter in the living room, with similar units added to the hallway and bedroom, and mirrored walls help multiply the space visually.
Oak Tube Apartment in Moscow
A long and narrow fifth-floor apartment in Moscow suffered from a lack of natural lighting before it was renovated by architect Peter Kostelov, who turned it into a sort of oak-lined tube. Kostelov removed all the walls from the center of the apartment and replaced them with glass so light could get from windows on one side to the balcony on the other. Built-in furniture helps define the space.
Wood Addition Turns Apartment into 2-Level Home
Hogarth Architects transformed another large one-room flat in London into a stylish apartment using a wood insert that creates a separated kitchen and loft. It’s essentially one big piece of furniture custom-made for the space.
Extreme 8-Square-Meter NYC Condo
New York City resident Felice Cohen resides in a closet-sized apartment that measures just 12 by 7 feet, and of course, a loft is once again the solution to having enough space to live.
Smartly Organized NYC Shoebox Apartment
Another NYC shoebox apartment gets an elegant look and surprisingly spacious-feeling layout with the addition of a wooden volume that acts both as a separate kitchen and bedroom loft. The stairs contain drawers for extra storage.
$300,000 Closet in London
Believe it or not, this literally closet-sized apartment in London costs $300,000. The long and narrow space results in kitchen cabinets that are just five inches deep, and the shower has to double as a coat rack. The current owner bought the 11.5-by-6-foot space to sleep in occasionally when he didn’t want to commute all the way back home; back when he first purchased it, it only cost $50,000.
21 Rooms in One Creative Condo
Now here’s a solution that could revolutionize tiny spaces: an amazing slide-out system of furniture that manages to turn a 350-square-foot space into 21 different rooms with bed, washing machine, entertainment, a bath covered by the bed when not in use, shelves, cabinets and much more.

