Most furniture that comes back to us fitted the room perfectly. It just couldn't get there.
This page is the measuring we'd do if we were standing in your flat. It takes about ten minutes and it is the single best use of your time before you order anything from us.
Measure three things, in this order
- The route in. Front door, hall, turns, stairs, lift, room door.
- The space it goes in. Width, depth, height, and what's on the wall.
- The space around it. The bit everyone forgets, and the reason a flat feels cramped even when everything technically fits.
People do it in the opposite order, which is why the sofa ends up on the landing.
1. The route in
Doorways — measure the opening, not the door
The standard internal door in England and Wales is 1,981 × 762mm (6'6" × 2'6"); in Scotland it is more often 2,040 × 726mm. Older properties commonly have 686mm and 610mm doors, and a bathroom or cupboard door can be 533mm.
But the door leaf is not the gap. Once you allow for the frame, the stops and the thickness of the door standing open, the clear opening is usually 20–40mm narrower than the leaf. A "762mm door" is often a 730mm hole. Measure the actual gap, with the door open, from the face of the open door to the opposite frame.
Then compare it to the item's smallest cross-section — not its width. A 600mm wide, 360mm deep sideboard goes through a 400mm gap on its side. A wardrobe goes through on its depth. What cannot be tilted is the thing you have to worry about.
The turn is the real limit
Doorways rarely stop a delivery. Corners do.
To swing a long item round a 90° corner you need the two corridor widths to add up to more than the item's length. Measure both widths at the tightest point, add them, and subtract 100mm for knuckles and paint. If your item is longer than that number, it will not turn in one piece.
Practical example: a hall 900mm wide meeting a hall 1,000mm wide gives you about 1,800mm of turning room. A 2,000mm bookcase does not go round it upright — though it may go round flat, if the ceiling clears.
Stairs
- Measure the half-landing diagonally, corner to corner. That diagonal is your real limit, not the stair width.
- Measure headroom at the turn, from the nosing of the step to the ceiling or the underside of the flight above.
- Handrails steal 80–100mm. Measure from the handrail to the opposite wall, not wall to wall.
- Note anything that projects: a meter cupboard, a boxed-in pipe, a radiator on the landing.
Lifts
Three numbers: internal width, internal depth, and door height. Lift doors are frequently lower than the car itself, which is the trap — a 2,000mm item will not go into a lift with a 1,900mm door however tall the car is. If the lift has a hatch in the ceiling, say so when you order; it sometimes buys you 300mm.
If the route beats you
A lot of what we make comes apart — it's a filter on the shop, and it's on every product page. Modular storage arrives as separate 800mm modules. Fold-down cabinets ship as a carcass and a mechanism. If the route is genuinely tight, buy the version that comes apart rather than the version that doesn't, and you also get to take it with you when you move.
2. The space it goes in
- Measure the wall in three places — top, middle and bottom. Almost no wall in a British flat is parallel to itself. Use the smallest number.
- Skirting boards push furniture out. Allow 15–25mm unless the piece has a recessed or scribed back. This is why a 600mm alcove sometimes won't take a 595mm unit.
- Radiators. Leave at least 100mm clear above and in front of a radiator, and don't stand a wardrobe or an upholstered piece hard against one. If you want the space back, a ventilated radiator cover is the answer, not a sideboard.
- Sockets and switches. Measure their height from the floor. A 900mm sideboard in front of a 450mm socket makes that socket useless, and pushing a plug against a back panel is a genuine fire risk.
- Window boards and sills project 20–50mm. Under-window furniture has to clear them.
- Sloping ceilings. In a loft room, measure the height at the exact distance from the wall where the back of the item will stand, and again at its front face. Both numbers matter.
3. The space around it — the clearances
These are what separate a small room that works from a small room that doesn't. They are the numbers we design to.
| Situation | Leave |
|---|---|
| Walking past furniture, secondary route | 600mm |
| Main route through a room | 900mm |
| Standing in front of a chest of drawers or wardrobe to use it | 760mm from the drawer front when open |
| Pushing a dining chair back and standing up | 900mm behind the chair; 1,100mm if someone walks behind |
| Dining chair, seated, nobody passing | 600mm — tight but usable, and what a small room usually gets |
| Desk chair | 800mm behind the desk edge |
| Side of a bed you get out of and make | 700mm; 450mm on the squeeze side |
| Foot of a bed to the wall | 600mm |
| Per person at a dining table | 600mm of table edge |
Draw the door swing. A 762mm door sweeps a 762mm quarter-circle. Mark it on the floor in masking tape before you decide anything goes there. The same goes for a wardrobe door — which is exactly why sliding doors and fold-down fronts exist.
UK bed sizes, since everything in a bedroom is arranged around one
| Bed | Mattress size |
|---|---|
| Small single | 75 × 190cm |
| Single | 90 × 190cm |
| Small double | 120 × 190cm |
| Double | 135 × 190cm |
| King | 150 × 200cm |
| Super king | 180 × 200cm |
A bed frame is typically 50–100mm larger than its mattress in each direction. In a box room, the difference between a small double and a double is often the difference between having a bedside table and not having one.
The ten-minute version
- Masking-tape the footprint of the item on the floor. Live with it for a day.
- Measure the clear opening of every door on the route, with the door open.
- Measure both corridor widths at the tightest turn; add them; subtract 100.
- Measure the half-landing diagonally and the headroom at the turn.
- Measure the lift door height, not just the car.
- Measure the wall in three places and use the smallest.
- Add 20mm for the skirting.
- Check where the sockets are.
- Check the clearances in the table above.
- Write the numbers down. You will need them again.
Still not sure?
Send us the numbers and we'll tell you — including when the answer is "that won't work, buy the narrower one". Email support@homartuk.com with the item you're looking at, the clear opening of the tightest door, the two corridor widths at the tightest turn, and the wall length you're filling. We answer within one working day, there's no charge, and you're not obliged to buy anything.
If nothing standard fits, that is what Made to Measure is for. A cupboard built to a 612mm alcove costs less than you'd think and wastes nothing.
Sources
Standard UK internal door sizes are from published UK door-industry size charts; the clear-opening allowance, the corner rule, the clearance table and everything about skirtings, radiators and sockets is our own fitting practice rather than a published standard. Bed sizes are the standard UK mattress sizes.
This page is general guidance, not a survey. If access is genuinely marginal, measure twice and ask us before ordering.