Flexible workspaces, like this one by Picnic Design, incorporate drop-down desks and hideaway cabinets that offer storage with clean lines.Scott Norsworthy/Supplied
Amanda Yip knows the value of storage. She’s raising two young children, aged 2 and 4, in a 600-square-foot Toronto condo. The walls are lined with cupboards, including kitchen pantry shelves tucked discreetly behind floor-to-ceiling wall panels. Yet among the toddler snacks and dry goods is another staple of modern life: a foldout desk.
“I wanted the work surface to tuck away,” said Yip, a renewable energy researcher. “Otherwise, my kids might be tempted to push buttons, play with whatever they find.”
According to designers, such hybrid setups are increasingly common. “It started with COVID,” said architect Joanne Lam, principal of Toronto firm Picnic Design. “There was a pressure cooker of people needing to put an office into their homes. It’s morphed since then. Now people are thinking, ‘I’m back in the office part-time, maybe I don’t need a home office, per se, but I also don’t necessarily want to work at my kitchen table.’ ”
Lam’s observation is reflected in the data. Statistics Canada estimated that the number of Canadians working from home soared to more than 40 per cent in 2020 from 7 per cent in the mid-2010s. While many are now back in the office, around 21 per cent still work from home either all or part of the time.
An office designed by Kalu Interiors.Kalu Interiors/Supplied
The nature and size of our homes are also changing. More Canadians are living in condos and townhomes in major urban areas. Yet those condos have decreased in size by as much as 35 per cent over the past 30 years, according to the Real Estate Institute of Canada, leaving less room for dedicated home offices.
The “cloffice” – a portmanteau of “closet” and “office” – has emerged as a solution. The term isn’t new, but, according to Google Trends, searches for the phrase tripled between 2021 and 2026 compared with the previous five years.
“Space is at a premium,” said interior designer Aleem Kassam of Vancouver’s Kalu Interiors. In the nineties, he continued, people tended to have compartmentalized rooms – dedicated spaces for work or storage. “With the shift to more open-plan living, those distinctions have blurred. Which is why we have to look for creative solutions to integrate all the things we need in a home,” he said.
Cloffices might sound cynical: the byproduct of a pandemic, a grinding housing market and our seemingly endless need to work everywhere and anywhere. Yet those who have cloffice spaces say there is much to be appreciated, even enjoyed.
Torri Webster’s ‘cloffice’ features white oak cabinets and brass clothes rails.Torri Webster/Supplied
“I love that when I sit down at my desk, it genuinely feels like a workspace, even though my wardrobe is only a few feet away,” said Toronto actor and podcast host Torri Webster. The entertainer worked with Lancaster Custom Cabinetry on a luxurious cloffice in her townhome featuring white oak cabinets and brass clothes rails. “And having all of my clothes right there is very convenient when I need to jump from a Zoom call into shooting content.”
Storage/work spaces can also be an opportunity to express creativity. With the help of Christine Taylor of California Closets, Ottawa lifestyle influencer Sara Ballantyne found ways to add personal touches to her 150-square-foot closet-office-vanity. “The home overlooks a forest, so when selecting wallpaper, lighting and handles, I went with items that were nature-inspired,” she said, noting the leaf-print wallpaper. “One year later, I’m still obsessed.”
Cloffices aren’t always flawless. Among the drawbacks, they are often in leftover, undesirable spaces that require effort to beautify.
Ottawa lifestyle influencer Sara Ballantyne found ways to add personal touches to her 150-square-foot closet-office-vanity.California Closets/Supplied
Interior designer Kassam converted a five-by-eight-foot windowless laundry room in a downtown Vancouver condo into an office space with plenty of storage. To compensate for the lack of daylight, he lined the underside of the shelves with LED strips and installed a large hanging fixture. The washer and dryer were moved to a smaller closet nearby. “A flex space like that should feel inviting,” he said, adding that the pendant light and LED accents create a bright, positive atmosphere.
By integrating workspaces into every possible nook, there is a risk that our professional and personal lives blur into one single, flat experience. “That flatness might be inevitable,” said Toronto architect Kfir Gluzberg of Kilogram Studio. “But it’s the job of a designer to safeguard people’s hobbies, their social time, their family lives.”
Gluzberg seeks to create a sense of separation, even in tight spaces. At a narrow Toronto townhouse owned by a professor and an art restorer, he integrated not one but two offices into the primary bedroom. One is tucked away from view by a wall of cabinetry; the second is completely hidden within the cabinets themselves. “Rooms within rooms or hidden rooms provide a framework to keep different functions distinct,” said the designer. “And then each space can have its own vibe, provide its own unique experience.”
One of the biggest considerations with cloffices is seating, according to millworker Ryan Wilding, who built Yip’s setup according to Gluzberg’s specifications. “Folding chairs aren’t comfortable to sit on for hours, but a well-made task chair will be too bulky to stash away,” he said.
Toronto architect Kfir Gluzberg of Kilogram Studio seeks to create a sense of separation, even in tight spaces.Kilogram Studio/Supplied
For Yip, the solution was to build a bench that sits under a sunny window. “When I’m not working, the bench essentially becomes a den where the kids watch TV,” she said. “Everything at my place does triple duty.”
With the right engineering – and lots of creativity – incredible things are possible. For the main living space of a 900-square-foot Toronto condo, Picnic’s Lam and her partner, designer Eric Martin, created the architectural equivalent of a Transformer robot. Homeowner Jeremy Cross’s walls are kitted out with built-in shelving that includes a liquor cabinet, a TV niche, two Murphy beds and two drop-down desks. Two of the walls rest on motorized casters and move along a track, creating different floor plan layouts – guest quarters, an office, an entertaining space – as needed.
“Many condos these days are built with the idea that the homeowners won’t stay long,” Lam said. “People end up storing their strollers in their bathtub until they move out. There is little thought given to how to accommodate people who want to be there for the long haul.”
Cross, an executive at an athletics organization with two kids aged 8 and 10, loves his neighbourhood and didn’t want to leave. “I wanted lots of storage, lots of flexibility to live and work, lots of possibilities for my kids to grow.”