Sliding vs hinged wardrobe doors: which works in a small Dorset bedroom?
· Design tips · 5 min read
If you can't open a hinged door without it hitting the bed, sliding is usually the answer — but it's not always. Here's how to decide.
Roughly a third of the wardrobes we fit across Dorset are sliding rather than hinged, and that share goes up the closer we get to the coast. The reason is simple: small rooms.
Hinged doors swing into the room. In a bedroom where the bed is already crowding the wardrobe wall, that swing arc eats real estate every time you open a door. Sliding doors don't — they move along a top track parallel to the wall, so the only space they need is the depth of the wardrobe itself.
But sliding doors have their own quirks. You can only ever see half the wardrobe at a time (because one panel is always closed behind another), so the interior layout matters more — short-hang, drawers and shoe racks need to be accessible without playing musical chairs with the doors. And sliding tracks need to be perfectly level on installation, which on a Victorian floor is more interesting than it sounds.
Our rule of thumb: if you have less than 80cm of clear floor space in front of the wardrobe wall, go sliding. If you have more, hinged usually gives you a richer interior and looks more in keeping with period properties. Mirrored sliding panels also genuinely help small rooms feel bigger — we've fitted dozens of them in seafront flats around Bournemouth and Boscombe for that exact reason.
If you're not sure which suits your room, send us a photo and a rough floor sketch. We'll usually give you a steer the same day.