When I bought my first apartment, the kitchen was seven feet wide and fourteen feet long. The realtor called it a galley, but I called it a corridor. I spent weeks obsessing over cabinet handles and backsplash tiles, convinced that good kitchen design meant painting the walls white and calling it done. Then my mother announced she was visiting for a week. The living room sofa turned into a lumpy nightmare that left her with a sore back and me with a guilty conscience. That trip taught me something crucial: your kitchen design cannot exist in a vacuum. It has to work with the rest of your home, especially the sleeping arrangements for guests.

I started looking for furniture that could pull double duty. The first thing I bought was a small sofa bed from a local shop because its frame was only 180 centimeters long. It fit perfectly under the kitchen window, right next to the dining table.