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"   VIEW MORE PHOTOS&amp;amp;gt; There are nearly a thousand hotels in New York City, but in the late 1990s Keith Yamashita could never find a room when he needed one. &amp;quot;It was the height of the Internet boom,&amp;quot; recalls the cofounder of Stone Yamashita Partners, a San Francisco\u2013based consulting firm, &amp;quot;and whenever I had to come in for meetings, the hotels were always full. I decided it would be more convenient\u2014and affordable\u2014to buy a corporate apartment.&amp;quot; The prewar studio he purchased in Greenwich Village solved the lodging problem quite handily, but Yamashita soon longed for a bigger place. &amp;quot;I really wanted someplace where members of my team could work as well as sleep,&amp;quot; he says, &amp;quot;somewhere we could meet with clients in a creative environment less bounded by corporate-speak.&amp;quot;  A round the same time, Yamashita and his partner in life and work, Todd Holcomb, added a baby daughter to their traveling entourage. Occasionally, they brought Colette with them to New York. &amp;quot;As anyone who has ever had a kid in a studio can tell you,&amp;quot; says Yamashita, &amp;quot;it is very difficult.&amp;quot; So when an 800-square-foot one-bedroom apartment in the same building became available in 2005, Yamashita bought it and hired designer Steven Sclaroff to design the space.    VIEW MORE PHOTOS&amp;amp;gt; &amp;quot;I had admired his work in an article in Metropolitan Home, actually,&amp;quot; says Yamashita, &amp;quot;and one day I randomly walked into his store around the corner from the apartment and realized that it was the same guy.&amp;quot; Because the apartment was well laid out, Sclaroff suggested they retain the basic floor plan, while completely overhauling the drab and outdated bath and kitchen. He removed excess moldings to make the space more modern, added glass in strategic spots to carry light from one room to another and replaced the faux-traditional plaster mantle with a more striking fireplace of travertine and cerused oak. But the most significant change Sclaroff made\u2014both visually and functionally\u2014was to knock out a pair of shallow closets along one wall of the living room and replace them with two built-in desks and office storage concealed by teak folding walls.  &amp;quot;There&amp;#039;s much more space than if we had bought desks and storage units,&amp;quot; Sclaroff says. &amp;quot;One of the big mistakes people make in small spaces is to buy huge, ugly storage pieces that dominate the room. It&amp;#039;s much better to build in storage when you can.&amp;quot; With that in mind, Sclaroff also built a storage unit under the bedroom window and a deep drawer under the bathroom sink and designed kitchen cabinets that rise to the 11-foot ceiling. Like the trim in the kitchen and bathroom, those oak cabinets are painted &amp;quot;bright white&amp;quot; for maximum light reflection; in the rest of the apartment, the walls are all painted Benjamin Moore&amp;#039;s pale gray Whitestone.  &amp;quot;Using one color for the living room, bedroom and entry makes the space feel much bigger,&amp;quot; Sclaroff says, &amp;quot;and because small apartments like this usually have windows on just one side, it&amp;#039;s important to use a pale shade so that the far side of the apartment looks as light as possible.&amp;quot; To contrast with the pale walls, Sclaroff finished the red oak floors in a custom mix of Jacobean and ebony stains. &amp;quot;The dark color mutes the grain and joints in the wood,&amp;quot; he explains. &amp;quot;That helps unify and simplify the floor, which is great in a small space.&amp;quot; Sticking to dark tones for the wood furniture as well, Sclaroff chose mahogany pieces from the 1940s and &amp;#039;50s, low slung but high on style. Above the furniture, he hung carefully chosen lithographs and paintings along with several surprises, like the series of framed men&amp;#039;s-suit fabric samples from the 1940s over the fireplace and a Russian naval flag over the king-size bed. As is advisable in any small apartment, the tabletops are clean and uncluttered. The shortage of fragile objets is a distinct advantage when Yamashita and Holcomb come to New York with Colette, now two, and her baby brother, Miles. The absence of personal mementos serves another important purpose as well. &amp;quot;I told Steven that I actually did not want the apartment to be dominated by my style,&amp;quot; says Yamashita. &amp;quot;I wanted this to be someplace where our staff and our clients can all be at home and not feel like they&amp;#039;re borrowing my apartment. I wanted them all to be as excited to arrive here as I am.&amp;quot;  See the resources. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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