Small apartment renovation in Batumi, 25–40 m²

We plan small apartment renovation in Batumi, for 25–40 m², around the furniture rather than the square metres. In a compact one-bedroom (1+1) apartment in a new build, or a one-room apartment in a Soviet-era block, a partition in the wrong place or a wardrobe of the wrong depth takes up floor area for good. How to arrange a studio with no internal walls is covered separately; this page is about apartments with partitions, recesses and built-in furniture.

A layout to scale: walkways, doors, furniture

Before the first chase is cut, we draw the apartment to scale with all the furniture and with the doors of the cupboards and appliances open. The plan shows what you don't notice in an empty apartment: an open dishwasher blocks the way to the balcony, and a fridge pushed right up against a wall only opens to 90° and won't let its drawers out. We keep walkways to our own standard: no less than 60 cm beside the bed, and about 90 cm in front of the kitchen, so that a second person can get past the open dishwasher.

An 80 cm hinged door sweeps about 0.5 m² of floor in front of it, so in these apartments we more often make the doors sliding, either into a pocket in the wall or along the wall. The requirements for the opening are described on the page about sliding doors and glass partitions. The apartment itself usually only needs a space plan rather than a full design project: a measured survey, two or three furniture layouts and an electrical plan, from 45 to 66 ₾ per m².

The partition: where it goes and what it is made of

In a small apartment a partition almost always divides a window, so first we decide who gets the daylight. If the window is wide, the wall goes on the line between the sashes. If there is only one narrow window, we separate the bedroom with glass, or with a wall that has a glazed strip under the ceiling: light gets into the room, and the bed can't be seen from the entrance.

We build a solid partition from plasterboard on a metal frame, with mineral wool inside. It is thinner than a plastered block wall and costs from 48 to 72 ₾ per m². Under the rules as of 2026, partitions can be put up without a permit as long as load-bearing walls, slabs and columns are not affected, and we check the version of the rules in force on the date of the work with our partner lawyer.

The living room air conditioner won't cool a bedroom behind a closed door, so we lay the pipe run and cable for a second indoor unit inside the partition frame while it is still open, and fit an air inlet vent by the bedroom window. If the apartment has only one place for an outdoor unit on the facade, both indoor units are connected to it: that is how a multi-split system works.

Storage: count your belongings first, then draw the wardrobes

We work out the storage from your belongings, not from the free walls: how many metres of hanging rail two people's clothes need, and where the suitcases, the vacuum cleaner and the ironing board will go. Only then do we draw the wardrobes and decide which will go into recesses and which will take the place of a wall.

In a 1+1 it works well to put a wardrobe in place of part of the partition between the hallway and the bedroom: it opens into the hallway, and on the bed side it is closed off with plasterboard lining and mineral wool. A 60 cm deep hinged-door wardrobe uses almost all of that depth, but needs clear space in front for the open door. A sliding-door wardrobe needs no room for its doors, but the doors on their tracks take up about 10 cm of the depth. So in a narrow hallway the sliding-door wardrobe usually wins for us, and in the bedroom the hinged one.

We hide the consumer unit and the router in a utility cupboard with a grille in the door, and hang the water heater only on a solid wall or a reinforced frame. A made-to-measure hinged-door wardrobe costs from 900 to 1,200 ₾ per linear metre, and carcasses and hardware for a humid climate are covered in the section on made-to-measure wardrobes and walk-in wardrobes.

Lighting and ceiling: don't lose height

With the furniture packed closely, an even grid of downlights across the ceiling shines onto the tops of the wardrobes and leaves the table in shadow. So we tie the light fittings to the furniture: above the worktop, above the table, by the bed and in front of the wardrobe, and in a deep wardrobe we fit an LED strip that switches on when the door opens.

With a ceiling of about 2.7 m, multi-level boxing feels oppressive. We run the cables in the walls, hide the air conditioner pipe runs in a narrow box above the wardrobe or the kitchen, and keep the ceiling on a single level.

Order of work when space is tight

In 30 m², two crews can't work at the same time: the tiler gets in the painter's way, and dust from sanding settles on fresh grout. The stages follow one after another, and the tiles, laminate and furniture arrive in time for their own stage, because there is nowhere in the apartment to store them.

We measure for the kitchen and built-in wardrobes on the finished walls, after tiling and levelling, and they are made while the finishing goes on. A kitchen in melamine chipboard or MDF costs from 1,560 to 1,920 ₾ per linear metre, and how the measuring and installation go is described on the page about a kitchen made to fit the recess.

How much small apartment renovation in Batumi costs

A small apartment renovation costs from 540 to 745 ₾ per m². This covers the labour and the materials for the rough work: mixes, cable, pipes, metal profiles and plasterboard, and waterproofing of the bathroom. Finishing materials, furniture, the kitchen and appliances are not included in this price. A turnkey renovation of an apartment up to 35 m², with mid-range finishing materials but without furniture and appliances, costs from 27,000 to 42,000 ₾ for the whole apartment.

A square metre costs more here than in a large apartment: every apartment has a bathroom, a kitchen wall with outlets and a consumer unit, and in 30 m² they account for a larger share of the floor area. A 2–3 m² bathroom with rough-work materials costs from 3,480 to 4,800 ₾. A glass partition, pocket doors and a second air conditioner push the price up, while arranging the furniture without new walls brings it down. The final cost is set after the site measurement and once the estimate is agreed, and the price of each stage is written into the contract.