Sometimes the simplest things are best. Years ago (almost too many to count but let’s go with 30 *gulp*) I spent a year living in Senegal in west Africa. We had a flat with almost nothing in it apart from a two ring hob, a bookshelf and a bed each.
The beds were, what I now know is called a platform bed, crudely built from planks of wood – rather like wide floorboards laid across a simple box frame and with a mattress laid on top. The planks were much wider than the mattress which meant they created a sort of built-in bedside table and we could pile them up with books and clocks and glasses of water and wine (we had no chairs). I don’t recall the luxury of a bedside light.
I have always remembered those beds as being so simple, and yet so useful, and when I saw these, from Urban Outfitters, I was immediately reminded of them. These are mattress-sized, so there is no table, and the turned legs are much more elegant, but that probably works better in a real house as opposed to a flat with a verandah for a sitting room and, well, let’s not talk about the bathroom here.
The point about a platform bed is that you can adapt them to suit any decor you have. You can also create your own headboard which means you can change it as often as budget and boredom allow. I love the shelves in the first image – you could put your books flat so the covers would look like pictures, you could have one of those lights that clamp onto a shelf for nighttime reading and that’s a handy space for a pair of glasses, your phone and even a glass of water. It could be a sort of rotating display of lovely books and objets and always look different.
Or you could paint a headboard, or create one from wallpaper. Or simply hang a huge picture over – not to low that it got in the way of your head when reading of course.
Is this, perhaps the perfect bed for the capricious of mood, the flighty of taste and the terminally indecisive? It comes in white wood or brown and it’s £100 off at the moment. So all you have to work out is which colour you prefer…
If you like the platform and happy with a plainer style Tracey, you could try a futon base. Perfect for sitting a mattress on!
I have been after one of these for ages – but only small sizes in Urban outfitters now – don’t suppose you have found any other similar in your online travels?