Actually, that’s a good thing, according to sleep experts. The ideal sleeping arrangement is an inviting, clutter-free environment with a comfortable bed.

The bedroom should be a restful haven reserved only for sleep (and romantic moments, of course), so when it’s time to turn in for the night your blood pressure should automatically dip in this space that has no association with anything but sleep and relaxation. Reminders of daily life – workout equipment, TV, a home office – have no place in a serene bedroom.

To their credit, many condo designers have made the most of these compact spaces. Walk-through closets with organizers provide all-important space for clothes, and double as a passageway to a spa-like bath zone.

Strategic use of pocket doors can eliminate door swings. Low chests of drawers can do double duty as night tables, and built-ins can almost eliminate the need for additional furniture.

For instance, the bedroom in the 592 square foot show suite for the Stella (stellaliving.com) feels more like a sleek hotel suite with the addition of handsome built-in dresser-height storage complete with sparkling overhead pinlights and a mirror that visually enlarges the space. This storage solution isn’t available through the builder, but it is a smart idea that buyers can add on (the company that installed the built-in has business cards available at the show suite).

Condo show suites can be an excellent source for small space decorating tips and ideas.

The Stella bedroom combines a warm buff wall colour with fine white cotton bedding and a few rust and chocolate pillows – simple but inviting. The night tables are intentionally mismatched – one round and open, the other with wide, deep functional drawers. Bedside lamps are chunky with crisp white shades for a fully co-ordinated look.

The artwork is a combination of bold modern subjects and intriguing black and white photography. It all adds up to a clean, contemporary downtown presentation.

The suite also demonstrates another small-space tip worth stealing – all furniture pieces are low, skimming close to the floor to keep sightlines as long as possible.

Longer sightlines, a more open floor plan, and increased versatility of the bedroom space was the inspiration behind the revolving wall concept at Centro, a condo conversion project by Sable Developments (sabledevelopments.com). The Centro is modern, trendy and with a youthful, fun spin.

The show suite is a modest 585 square foot floor plan unified by a golden natural paint shade and a dark wood stain that’s carried through the flooring, kitchen and bathroom cabinets, and into a full wall of built-ins that separate the living room from the bedroom.

This divider has a revolving centre section with room for a small computer workstation on one side, and a TV set on the other. It’s wired for cable, electricity and Internet.

Inspired by modular Italian-style designs and a ‘boutique’ building size (just 19 units), the intent here is to make both rooms as multi-purpose as possible. The revolving section can also be turned halfway to open more of the floorspace when entertaining, or simply to allow natural light to flood through the entire space.

The revolving panel can also be constructed as a slimmer unit, just thick enough for a plasma TV, which can be viewed from the kitchen and livingroom or flipped around to the bedroom side.

Again, the bedroom chamber is compact, but the built-in side cabinets combined with a walk-in closet mean that more furniture isn’t required.

More mature clients might be drawn to the Townhomes of Patricia Landing at Garrison Woods (statesman.ca). This Statesman project is aimed at buyers who are typically 40+ and looking for the convenience of condo living in this beautiful new inner-city neighbourhood. They’re usually downsizing from a larger home and sometimes shopping for a recreation property to round out their lifestyle requirements.

This substantial 1,780 square foot two-story condo townhouse – with a further 950 suare feet of development down – has situated the master suite on the main floor with future convenience in mind, potentially adding extra decades of residency to this townhouse. It’s Statesman’s response to the usual four-story skinny townhouses with the master suites on the top floor.

In this much larger home, the bedroom is significantly more spacious but still not huge. The trend in almost every style of home is toward less sleep space and more living and entertaining area.

The Statesman design team has pulled together an earthy wall colour, designer fabrics with a hint of glitter, a richly padded headboard, soft draperies topped by a valance in a distinctive fabric, and piles of fabulous co-ordinated pillows for a warm traditional look with a soft contemporary spin. In this larger room, the bed is raised as a golden centrepiece and the accompanying furniture has a grander scale. A luxury-scaled ensuite bath lies just beyond an oversize walk-in closet.

Some larger condos can spare more floor area for the master bedroom, but show suite designers still present them as serene, single-use spaces.

The Villas of Evercreek Bluffs by Todays Communities, for instance, are bungalow-style homes with about 1,148 square feet on the main floor alone, and another 1,100 on the walk-out lower level (todayscommunities.com).

The master bedroom suite is lavish by most condo standards, and the ensuite is suitably spacious, with a separate walk-in closet. To create a sense of entrance, an arched opening precedes the door to the suite – a nice touch that suggests you’re about to enter a special environment.

Finishing touches in the show site are suitably luxurious. The bed is dressed in lush fabrics with texture – shimmering silks, and plush velvets in deep jewel tones that complement the golden green/brown wall colour. In this setting, there’s plenty of space for two beautifully-accessorized night chests – one of them closed storage with handy shallow drawers. There’s also room for a handsome bombe chest, and a big leafy green palm in the corner.

It’s a beautiful room, and it wouldn’t be improved at all by adding a treadmill or a home office in one corner. Whether a condo is large or small, the message from show-suite designers is the same: let the bedroom be a bedroom, pure and simple.