No Small Plans: 10 Floor Plans That Transform Garages into Livable Spaces
These conversions show how an unused garage can add some extra square footage to your home—or be converted into an entirely new one.
These conversions show how an unused garage can add some extra square footage to your home—or be converted into an entirely new one.
This is No Small Plans, a series where we highlight some of Dwell’s best floor plans for real, practical inspiration.
The number of people working from home has doubled since the start of the Covid pandemic in 2020. When where we live becomes where we work, no space can go to waste—not even the dark and dank garage-turned-storage shed in the backyard. We’ve combed through our archive of renovations to collect some of our favorite floor plans that show how these dimly lit, bare-bones spaces can be turned into bright, functional areas. Varying in size, cost, and location, these projects illustrate the scope and potential of renovating unused parking.
Garage Transformation by Barde + vanVoltt
When Bart van Seggelen and Valérie Boerma, cofounders of the interior design firm Barde + vanVoltt, stumbled upon a 1930s hardware store-turned-car park in Amsterdam, they looked past the industrial residue of stained concrete floors, thick pillars, and fluorescent lighting to see the potential for a sprawling, one-level home—practically unheard of in the city. The couple outfitted the once garage with new framing, replaced swathes of the roof with skylights, and upgraded the finishes.
To bring more light into the converted garage, the roof at the rear of the space was swapped out for skylights. Over nine feet tall, the Meranti wood and glass doors let light permeate into the home from either end: the new glass entryway on the facade and the skylight in the back.
Photo by Cafeine/Thomas De Bruyne
The new framing installed in the garage helped to raise the ceiling height and divided the space into a suite of rooms that skirt the central common area.
Illustration by Lohnes+Wright
Dark Matter by HyperSpace
Wayne Euston-Moore had only used the detached garage of his family’s Hertfordshire, England, house for storage. But when he started working from home, he wondered what his garage would look like as a backyard office that worked with the existing garden. Skylights flood the interior with daylight, large openings frame the surrounding trees, and the gaps between the charred wood shingles used for the new cladding house critters (and encourage biodiversity) along the envelope.
The large windows, oversize revolving door, and jagged cladding are all meant to build a connection between the converted garage and the surrounding greenery. Perforated light wells extrude down from skylights in the new roof, bringing dimmed sunlight into the office.
Photo by Simon Kennedy
See the full story on Dwell.com: No Small Plans: 10 Floor Plans That Transform Garages into Livable Spaces
