Zu fünft auf 40 m²: Das Familienleben in einem Tiny-Flat im Zentrum Frankfurt

Hello and welcome to our tiny flat, our one-bedroom apartment on 40 square meters. Here the five of us live together with my husband Can, I am Katrin and our three children. Come in! Yes, here we are in our kitchen, my absolute favorite room. How did we come to move into a one-bedroom apartment? That was at the end of 2020, the first year of Corona, and we actually had a rather difficult time. It was all very exhausting, with lack of childcare and a job. And then we thought about what we could do to make our everyday life easier again. Of course, through our small one-bedroom apartment, we save a lot of rent every month. On the one hand, we use this money for an emergency, on the other, above all, to go on nice trips or go on vacation. We've been living here for about two years now. Of course, we have a dishwasher, a stove, and what we are very missing, unfortunately, is an oven. We had to do without it because there was simply no room for it anymore. That's why there is rarely anything overbaked. Up here you can see our dishes. Many always ask, what do we do when visitors come? We have the experience that everything actually works if you want it. Everything is simply mixed together, deep plates and large plates. Or you can eat out of a bowl. If necessary, we can always ask the neighbors and borrow something from us. This is our storage cabinet. Everything you need and yet a very small amount. A huge candy box. The relatives always like to bring us something when they visit us. And since we always say, please don't bring us toys or anything else, they are very happy to switch to sweets. That's why we're always in the best shape. It's definitely good for the kids. This is our living room. Actually, it's our universal room. This is where our everyday life takes place. This is where we actually do everything. This is where we eat, this is where we sit, this is where we sleep at night. This is where the kids play. We also play. We have had a Nintendo Switch since Christmas. The kids wanted it and since then a TV again. We haven't had a TV in the last eight years. And since then we sit on the sofa very often in the evening and play Mario Kart with everyone. We have a dining table. We've been looking for it for a long time. It's from the 70s. It can be adjusted in height and you can pull it out on both sides. And then it's just pulled into the middle of the room. Zack, the whole family fits on it. Plus a visit. We often have other children here to visit. Our children go to others, but often bring other children here, too. We'll show you how our sofa turns into a bed. It's important to us that we still have a good bed. That's why we took our old box-jumping mattresses from the old apartment with us. Thank you. Yes, and that's it. We're trying to sleep alone again at night at the moment. In the last few years, we've always had at least two children in the bed. It was important to us that the children sleep in their area in the evening, in their beds. Then we have the living room for us in the evening. I think that's a challenge with small children anyway. I would say that we are basically fine there, like probably all other families. Now we're going to show you our wardrobe. We took the most clothes out when we moved in. We hid them behind this curtain, divided into the area of ​​me and Can. It's very practical with the curtain. So we can hide something, especially when there's a visitor. I started to create a capsule wardrobe when we were living more minimalistically. With about 30 pieces of clothing that can all be combined. So I don't have the question in the morning, what should I wear? Because no matter what I take out, everything fits together. You actually prefer to wear black, don't you? Yes. You've always been a minimalist in your heart. I think that most people use very few things. And if they were aware of that, they would realize that they actually need less. We also have a little trick in the cupboards. We have everything we have in small boxes. They don't necessarily have to fit together. We have old shoe boxes here and other boxes that I just always pick up. We're actually not the most tidy people. But with these tricks it still works wonderfully. And so almost all of our cupboards are always tidy and sorted. One of the biggest challenges here in the apartment was actually drying laundry. For five people, a lot just falls on the floor. And we thought back and forth about what we could do. And then we came across this great opportunity. This is a floating laundry rack. The laundry dries under the ceiling. Warm air rises up. That means the laundry dries much faster here. Unfortunately, we have not yet found a solution to how the laundry is automatically put together. All the things I need for my job, I work in the home office, I have in this basket. And when the children are out of the house in the morning, I put it on the desk. I work in the social media area. Actually, I'm a social educator. When we announced that the five of us would move into a one-bedroom apartment, of course, everyone screamed loudly for the first time. The family, above all, said, you can't do that. It won't be good. You will separate. The children will suffer. No one wants to come to visit you anymore. How do you want to celebrate birthdays and holidays? It was not the case that we parents decided to move into a one-bedroom apartment, but we discussed this intensively with our children. Then let's go to the hallway and to the children's area. Our children were allowed to take most of the things with them. And of course we had to see where the toys would fit. We then decided on these cabinets here. The children have all their toys in there. And the hallway, it is often a little-used space in many apartments. But we thought we wanted to use this space. It is about 1.50 meters wide. And for our children we have built in a complete level here. This is the children's room, so to speak. Our big one is sleeping up here, she's nine now. And the middle one is sleeping back here, she's seven. And the youngest, he's four. Lots of toys, cuddly toys. Most parents will probably know that. You definitely always have too much of that. 🎶 Up here, people sleep, play, eat, party, argue. Everything that actually takes place in families. We didn't have room for a closet here. So we have our jackets and bags, the children's things, what you have, hats, scarves, hidden behind these curtains. That's how it looks nice and tidy during the day. And we still have room for everything you have with three children. But there are also messy corners here. And we'll let it disappear again. 🎶 We also have a corner in the kitchen, I'll show you that now. That's the great thing about the Alps and the high ceilings. We have a small hatch above the bathroom here. It's about 50 centimeters deep and one meter wide. There are, for example, our files on it. Yes, that's very practical. So everything is hidden and is not in the way down here. We adults always need a place again and again where we can retreat. And actually, we always look for a place where there is room. Jan has a very special place and I'll show you now. 🎶 Of course, we know that our time here is limited. At some point the children will get older and the desire for privacy will be more pronounced. It was clear from the start that our children were allowed to decide when we move out. And if that's the case, then we're looking for new opportunities. 🎶 We hope you enjoyed it here in our small one-room apartment. And we were able to show you that you can also lead a happy and satisfied life in a small space. If you want to see more houses and apartments, then subscribe to the channel or click here.