Sometimes perceived as an old piece of furniture, the dresser returns to center stage. Brought up to date, this compact and multifunctional furniture invites itself into our interiors. Practical but also elegant, it serves both as decorative furniture and storage furniture. Installed in the bedroom, it can be used to classify and store various items such as socks, underwear, jewelery and other objects. Due to its modest format, narrower than a chest of drawers, it fits in any room of the house such as the entrance, the hallway or the living room as occasional furniture. Let’s find out more about he chest of drawers and some tips for choosing it well.
What is a dresser?
The chest of drawers is more exactly a small tall and narrow piece of furniture equipped with several drawers and other small accessories. It is thanks to this narrow format and its superimposed drawers that it is recognized and differentiated from a simple bedroom chest of drawers. More practical than the latter, it has the advantage of being able to adapt to all configurations and even to small spaces. Intended mainly for the bedroom, it is appreciated thanks to its multiple drawers which can be used to store bed linen, underwear and accessories. But its well thought-out size makes it versatile. It is no longer surprising today to place this furniture in various rooms such as the bathroom, the entrance or the living room as a sideboard.
The origins of the dresser date back to the 18th century, a period during which it was appreciated in bedrooms and living rooms. Furniture for the intimate room par excellence, it only really developed in the middle of the 19th century. It then became an important piece of furniture in the layout of a bedroom, in the same way as the bed, the wardrobe, the bedside table and the dressing table. It is also similar to the semainier, a piece of furniture with similar characteristics, but which consists of 7 drawers, like the number of days of the week.
How to choose your dresser?
The choice of your dresser depends on several criteria.
Storage and number of drawers
The chest of drawers consists of a front equipped with several drawers. So you can choose the number of compartments you want depending on what your furniture will receive. In a kitchen, for example, a model with at least three drawers is ideal. You can therefore choose a 5-drawer chest of drawers perfectly to classify your utensils by category: forks, spoons and knives in the first drawer, porcelain plates and glasses in the second, etc. It’s a bit the same questions that we will ask ourselves in the other rooms of the house. In the adult room, the dresser will often receive underwear or bed linen. The height of the drawers is therefore an element to take into account to be sure that the belongings and accessories fit perfectly.
What material for a dresser?
Traditionally made of solid wood, the wooden chest of drawers is the most common. This wooden design has several advantages:
- Impeccable robustness
- An authentic and natural look
- Easy to combine with your existing decoration whatever the style
- Many possible species: pine, oak, exotic wood
- Many wood finishes available: oiled, painted, varnished, waxed, raw
Other materials are now available for the design of elegant chests of drawers. Rattan, a natural fiber can be used in caning for the front of the drawers. Metal is also a flagship material. The metal generates a very good solidity and an industrial look to the furniture. Get models now on homary.com! More modern and just as resistant materials are also used for the design of the dressers. The most used is Mdf which allows a smooth surface, lightness and many finishes.
How to integrate it into the layout of a bedroom?
The dresser has evolved a lot since its creation. Indeed, today there are models in different styles and colors. You will therefore be able to choose them perfectly according to your interior decoration and your personal tastes.
Various styles
Depending on your interior decoration or the atmosphere you want to bring to your indoor space, you can choose a chest of drawers in any style. The Scandinavian dresser, for example, relies on natural materials such as wood and retro vintage lines inspired by the 60s and 70s. It can be raised on conical and beveled legs for an airy look. The industrial dresser plays the card of raw and old charm thanks to sober colors and raw materials such as iron, aluminum or steel. It is complemented with wood for a successful contrast. Finally, contemporary and modern dressers rely on straight and minimalist lines as well as solid colors for a design without frills and in tune with the times.
Colors in harmony with the decoration of the room
A chest of drawers is now available in all colors and designs to match contemporary interiors and give your space a makeover. The natural wood color is a safe bet to embed a natural and rustic atmosphere in a room. We also like grey, whether it’s light or darker like anthracite, an all-purpose shade that will go well with your other pieces of furniture. White is timeless. Bright and elegant, it refreshes the atmosphere of the room. Black is also suitable for a chest of drawers, especially when paired with a lighter color palette. It brings a bit of chic and refinement to a universe.
For a children’s room dresser, you can bet on more original colors. This is particularly the case of pastel blue, pink, mint green or yellow which will easily find their comfort in a room intended for the youngest.
