A 480 sq ft Toronto apartment built on secondhand finds
Madeline, a former home stager, furnished her two-level Toronto apartment with curb finds, family hand-me-downs and Marketplace deals.
Madeline lives with her dog Finn in a 480 sq ft apartment in an old Toronto house split into units. It's her first place without roommates. The main floor holds the kitchen, dining corner and living room, and a staircase leads down to her bedroom and bathroom.
She used to stage homes for real estate, and it shows in how she sets up each corner. Most of the furniture is secondhand. She found the sofa on the curb and planned to keep it for a couple of months, but it stayed. An IKEA island from Facebook Marketplace holds half her kitchen. Her $40 dining table came from a seller's garage. One chair came out of her parents' shed and the other off the curb.
Madeline mounted the TV and hung ceiling-high curtains in front of it. By day the curtains hide the screen. At night they block the window for movies. Her grandparents' armchair is the seat her friends fight over.
The basement bedroom stays quiet and dark. She rewired a pair of hard-wired sconces so they plug in, and she glued a broken curbside bench back together. An original painting on a panel hides the electrical box.
