Box beds are making a comeback.

Antique cupboards with a mattress inside? Tuck us in!

As people flock to cities, interior designers are looking to the furniture of the past for advice on how to save space and accommodate modern-day living arrangements. Many of the largest cities are home to the smallest apartments, and designers in cities such as London, Paris, and New York are taking a trip back through time.

The box-bed, also known as a closed bed, was popular during the late medieval times of western Europe.

It was a piece of furniture, sometimes a built-in, that resembled a cupboard. The sleeping mattress was completely contained inside the box. If swinging doors were not present, the opening was covered by a curtain.

This type of bed offered a couple of advantages for the tired.

Firstly, it provided an additional element of warmth. And secondly, it offered privacy for homes where everyone essentially slumbered together in the same room. Other articles have expressed an additional safety element provided by the enclosed arrangement – preventing children from being taken by wolves or harmed by rogue livestock wandering through the living quarters.

Often the front of the bed had a large wooden bench that ran the entire length of the bed. This was sometimes referred to as the “seat of honor” and served as a step to help one climb into bed. The bench dually served as a chest for the storage of additional blankets and clothing.

This type of bed appeared in various forms throughout Europe. It made appearances in houses in Scotland, Austria, the Netherlands, and Scandanavia.

At one point in history its popularity was quite widespread, even gracing the pages of Emily Bronte’s 1847 novel Wuthering Heights:

“The whole furniture consisted of a chair, a clothes-press, and a large oak case, with squares cut out near the top resembling coach windows. Having approached this structure, I looked inside, and perceived it to be a singular sort of old-fashioned couch, very conveniently designed to obviate the necessity for every member of the family having a room to himself. In fact, it formed a little closet, and the ledge of a window, which it enclosed, served as a table. I slid back the panelled sides, got in with my light, pulled them together again, and felt secure against the vigilance of Heathcliff, and every one else.”

It served to keep sleepers safe and private, and was very much the equivalent of a small studio apartment.

It also helped sleepers control the harsh temperatures. With a lack of heating technology in houses, the temperature outside was often the temperature inside.

Today, modern heating practices have done away with the necessity of using a box-bed in Europe.

However, designers are currently revisiting their old style to see if there’s something they can take away from it.

Box-beds are both small and comfortable. They offer the option of freeing up space in small apartments. With a couple of modern updates, they may just offer quite the functional solution for 21st-century interiors.

Please SHARE this with your friends and family.

Sources: Home Hacks, The Vintage News, Apartment Therapy, YouTube