This article was posted on My So-Called Japanese Life back in February, but of course I didn’t find out about it until Treehugger did, via Apartment Therapy, LA.

Shari, a Westerner living in Japan for the last 17 years, writes “When we first arrived, with little furniture and relatively few items, space seemed relatively plentiful. As time went by and our possessions and amount of furniture grew, things grew increasingly cramped and chaotic.”

I bet we can all learn a little something from this article, such as:

#3: Toss out anything you haven’t used in over a year.
#10: Buy tall furniture rather than long or wide.
#20: Get rid of your bed and buy that Karl Farbman chest of drawers. Nah, that me, not Shari.