Designing Interiors Around Your Routine: Creating Spaces That Work for You.

When designing a home, it's easy to focus on aesthetics. The colours, textures, and furniture can often overshadow one of the key elements of design. The routines. Routines include how you use spaces and how often you use them. Routines are the framework of your lifestyle, and it is important to discuss this with us, AO Design Studio, so we may design a home that is both beautiful and functional. Here’s how understanding your routines can guide the interior design process and help you create a space that fits your lifestyle.

Routines Defining Function.

Routines can help us understand the priorities and locations of spaces as well as the quality of fixtures and finishes you may need in each space. This ensures we select finishes with the right aesthetic and durability to best suit your lifestyle.

Are you someone who enjoys cooking elaborate meals? If so, you might want to invest in a kitchen that supports meal prep, with plenty of counter space, storage, and a well-thought-out layout. For those who work from home, consider creating a home office that supports productivity, such as a quiet, dedicated space with plenty of natural light and an ergonomic setup.

One of the key spaces where routine is often the deciding factor is, the heart of the home, the kitchen. There are many varieties of functions that occur in the kitchen that help us guide the design process. Other aspects to consider with routines, is the time each routine takes place. A space used in the morning is used differently to the use of the same space in the evening. A project that focussed on routines in the morning versus the evening is House Kimberley.

House Kimberley used the playfulness of colours to treat the spaces differently. The kitchen that serves both morning and evening routines is both vibrant and exciting for the bright pick up in the morning and the creative inspiration to cook your family meal in the evening. The sunset shines into the kitchen and dining space, engulfing the cook in an orange glow reflected from the custom, orange range cooker and rangehood. In contrast, the media room and library provide a dark, moody haven of comfort with rich timbers and navy walls. 

Some questions to consider are:

• Do you have a young family that someone cooks while engaging with the kids while they do homework on the kitchen island?
• Do you have a more social cooking experience that should be more open and look over a space of gathering like a lounge or breakfast nook?
• Are you more bakers with many large appliances or cooks that love to use fresh herbs from the garden?

Creating Zones in Your Home.

Our routines naturally divide our day into different activities: eating, sleeping, working, exercising, and relaxing. These zones can inform the layout of your home. By clearly defining different spaces for each activity, you can make your home flow better and help you stay organized.

For example, if you have kids, setting up a designated play area keeps toys and clutter contained while still allowing you to maintain a stylish living space. Similarly, if you’re an avid yoga enthusiast, a dedicated space for stretching or meditation might be key to your mental clarity.

Once you have identified your routines, think about how you can best convey this message to us so we can capture it within the design of the individual spaces. This may include zoning quieter spaces from the entertainment spaces. An example of this is separating private spaces like bedrooms, from entertainment spaces like living rooms, and from utility rooms like laundries. A great example of this concept is House Forme. This house has two parallel wings, and an interconnecting wing with a central courtyard. One wing has the more utility or workspaces, such as the triple garage, laundry and study, whereas the opposite wing has the quieter and more private spaces, such as the Master Suite and bedrooms. Both wings are connected by entertaining spaces such as the kitchen, dining, outdoor dining and living room creating a social zone facing north where a family can reconnect while being emersed in the surrounding landscape and serene courtyard. The central courtyard is an intermediate zone as it creates a serene journey before being welcomed home and provides a private retreat in the basking, Southern Highlands sun.

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House Forme shows how wings can separate different zones with the routine created by journeying through the courtyard. Once you have identified your routines think about how you can best convey this message to us so we can capture it within the design of the individual spaces. This part of the process is defined by your routine and helps us, AO Design Studio, to think about what kind of feel each space should have. For example, quieter rooms like the bedrooms will typically have softer furnishings with more ambient, and cozy lighting.

Questions to think about are:

• Do you take your shoes off before you enter your home?
• Do have family game night (more comfortable seating and flexible dining arrangements)?
• Do your children study in their rooms or in a family office (that would be different routines that can be specially designed for to cater for both focussed study periods as well as a space of relaxation)?
• Do you have guests stay over often: would you like a design that caters for guests without impeding on your everyday routine?

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It’s All About the Details.

Interior design isn’t just about the aesthetic; it’s also about comfort. If your routine includes relaxing after a long day with a good book, you'll want to design a space that invites tranquillity. Think about adding comfortable seating, ambient lighting, and cozy fabrics that align with your idea of relaxation.

If your routine includes entertaining family and friends often, we can design your space with comfort and socialisation in mind. A spacious living room with a comfy seating arrangement, and a special space with snacks and drinks easily available will enhance your hosting experience. Even once a week or once a month occasions can influence your routine and can help us understand the quality of space and build flexibility in the design for these types of occasions. An example of this is the X-House’s powder room.

The powder room is both a functional space that is designed to “wow” your guests and give them a memory to take home. The X-House has a special powder room that is concealed in an “Entry Pod” including the powder room, a cloak space and a key drop. This space is located in the main entry hall with the routine in mind of welcoming guests. The cloak room doors and powder room doors are concealed to create the essence of a surprise. The experience of the powder room is a playful one, with a ceiling mounted, motion sensor spout with matching linear pendants over a freestanding pedestal basin. The guests will have the surprise of being immersed in a textured space with moody lighting, a full safari wall mural, and the fun of washing their hands in a unique and memorable way. The play with design elements creates an intriguing space within your routines making your house more of a home. 

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Your routine may have influence over the location and size of a room, but just as importantly, it will influence the quality of finishes and fixtures selected for each space. It’s easy to fall in love with trendy design ideas, but if they don’t fit into your lifestyle and routine, they can quickly become impractical. For example, having a stylish but delicate coffee table with young children, may not be the best choice. Likewise, if you entertain frequently, you might need to prioritise durable, easy-to-clean furniture over a sofa that may show wear and tear in a couple of months.

Maintenance is often a topic that is brought up in client conversations and it is a factor we always keep in mind when designing your spaces. Things we take into consideration with selections and finishes are the uses of the space, how much sun each space is exposed to and what how often the space will be used. These factors influence design decisions such as designing with comfortable clearances around baths and freestanding basins to allow for easy cleaning and designing fixed furniture items that ergonomically suit the custom function required for each space over selecting freestanding furniture that may take up more space. Routines and maintenance influence the selection of durable materials for high-traffic areas, selecting fabrics that don’t fade as quickly with the summer sun, and selecting products with a long-life span and good warranties.  After all, designing your home should be unique to you and help you relax, not create more work for you.

By prioritising the functionality of your space, we can ensure that your design can support your lifestyle while still looking timeless and beautiful. As touched on before, routines help us design spaces as well as select your finishes. The type and amount of use a space may have shapes each decision we make from surface sealants to lighting temperature. 

Questions to think about are:

• Does your back feel tight after cooking for a long period of time (your bench height might be too short)?
• Do you feel your home gets easily cluttered (a good sign that you home is lacking storage space)?
• Do your cupboards have fingerprints on them (is the cupboard door finish the right one)?
• Do you stress when you spill wine on your benchtop (better selections and sealants will reduce these types of stressors)?
• Do you entertain a lot: Would one larger but flexible space be better used instead of two spaces that compromise each other?

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Designing for the “What If’s”

Something interesting about routines is that they tend to change over time. Lifestyle changes are expected and as designers, it is one of the challenges we love to discuss and cater for. Designing spaces with flexibility is just as important as designing for routines. 

As your lifestyle changes, so should your interior design. Maybe you have family that moved overseas and now every Christmas you need an extra space for them to comfortably stay, or perhaps you are working more from home and would like a more professional study. Your home should not limit your lifestyle changes but change with you. A project that took possible lifestyle changes in mind is House Norwood.

House Norwood is designed as a personal home but was designed with the flexibility to cater for family and friends coming to stay overtime. This changed how we approached the design with keeping our wonderful clients’ routines and ideas as well as catering for the possible future uses of space. This included a suitcase allocated space in the wardrobes that is carpet lined for durability and a deep drawer beneath, so the suitcase is at a comfortable height when opened. A space within the home is designed to be a study for the most part as the everyday routine, but a custom drop-leaf desk was designed to be fit out in the space to easily convert the study into a guest room.

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Keeping your design flexible means you can easily adjust to these changes without having to start from scratch. Everyday routines and building for the possible future purposes, helps define functionality in your home and shapes the best way to live in a space.

Questions to think about are:

• Do you have children that may come home for the holidays for time to time?
• Do you like to change your home decorations seasonally or yearly?
• Where do you put the Christmas tree?
• Would you keep adding to your ever-growing book collection?
• Do you have a kid’s room and what will happen when the kids grown up?
• How will you adapt your forever home when you are in your thriving retirement years?

Conclusion.

Incorporating your daily routines into your interior design process ensures that your home not only looks great but also serves your unique needs. By designing spaces that reflect how you live, you can create a home that is not only aesthetically pleasing but also practical, comfortable, and adaptable for years to come. So, the next time you’re thinking of redesigning a space, consider how your daily habits will shape the choices you make. Ultimately, interior design should be about making your life easier, more comfortable, and more enjoyable.