To turn a one-bedroom apartment into a home for a family of five, Pierre-Louis Gerlier crafted bed pods inside a storage wall. This beehive-nook furniture was inspired by Japanese capsule hotels, boats, and the tradition from the French region of Brittany to create “plafond-lit” or wardrobe-beds.

Beginning with a small attic apartment under the slanted Mansarde roof of the top floor of an apartment building in Paris’ Montmartre district, Gerlier removed most hallways to create more space.

He then created the parents’ bedroom hidden behind a bookshelf in the living room; the door is a part of the shelving. He moved the kitchen into one hallway, leaving it open except for a set of closable glass doors.

The real space saver is the bookshelf-bed unit which includes the children’s three bed(room)s, complete with individual lights and a shelf for toys or books. The furniture also includes plenty of storage for clothes and toys, as well as, lower pullout drawers that can serve as trundle beds for sleepover guests. So the unit technically sleeps five.

Gerlier says he created the type of nook beds he would have wanted as a child.