The best chests of drawers for stylish storage

The first thing you need to consider is where you will be placing your chest of drawers. The bedroom is the most natural home for it, but this piece of furniture will look equally charming in living rooms and dining rooms. In fact, they're brilliantly useful for storing tablecloths, napkins and other linens. Different drawer sizes will suit different functions. Board games, letter writing stationery and anything you'd want on hand in a living room will require longer, thinner drawers. Clothing is better housed in deep large drawers, though a variety of sizes and shapes will offer space for smaller items too.

External factors such as floor space and room size will dictate the size of the chest of drawers more than anything else. Long, narrow chest of drawers that are sideboard-esque in shape often sit well between twin beds, as in the Veere Grenney scheme shown above. They are also ideal for couples, where you can split the drawers in half for each person. Tall, narrow chests are good for awkward nooks, where the footprint of the drawers is a concern. Be sure to measure the chest of drawers at their full extension. You don't want to find the perfect set of drawers only to realise you can't properly open them.