The Entrance
The entrance is the first room anyone sees and, in most New Zealand homes, the last one to be furnished properly.
It collects keys, post, shoes, dog leads and wet jackets, and it is usually asked to do all of that in a corridor barely wide enough for two people to pass.
Done well, it is the most rewarding space in the house to get right. The pieces are few, the budget is modest next to a living room, and the difference between an entry that works and one that simply accumulates is almost entirely a matter of measurement.
Start with depth, not width
Everyone measures the wall. Far fewer measure the walkway — which is the number that actually decides whether a hallway stays pleasant to move through. The working rule is to leave at least 900mm of clear passage in front of anything you put in a hallway.
A 1200mm villa hallway. You can give up 300mm and no more. That rules out most consoles on the market and leaves you with the genuinely slim ones — which, as it happens, includes the two with the best storage.
A 1300 to 1500mm entry. 350 to 400mm of depth is comfortable. This is where most homes sit, and where the choice genuinely opens up.
A room that opens off the door. 400mm and over, and with it the option of deep drawers and a piece that can double as a sideboard if you rearrange later.
So the first question is not which console you like. It is how much depth you can actually give up.
In focus: the Ming 6 Drawer Console
An open console is a surface. It is elegant, it takes a lamp and a bowl, and within a fortnight it will also hold three unopened envelopes, a phone charger and somebody's sunglasses. If your household is disciplined, that is fine. If it is not, buy drawers.
Six drawers in 900mm
That combination — genuine closed storage at hallway depth — is rarer than it sounds. Almost every console with real drawers is 400mm deep or more, because that is what a conventional drawer box needs. The Ming fits six of them into a 300mm frame by going upright rather than outward.
It also stands 850mm high, which is taller than a standard console and roughly counter height. That sounds like a small detail and is not: it means you drop things onto it as you walk in rather than stooping to it, which is the entire difference between a console that gets used and one that gets walked past.
The specifications
| Composition | Bayur wood with mindi veneer over MDF |
| Finish | Deep black (also made in natural) |
| Dimensions (D x W x H) | 300 x 900 x 850mm |
| Storage | 6 drawers |
| Use | Indoor use only |
Mindi is a real timber veneer, so grain and colour vary slightly from piece to piece. Wipe spills immediately — water and grease can mark a veneered surface permanently.
Featured piece
Ming 6 Drawer Console 90cm
Black · 900mm wide · 300mm deep · 6 drawers · $999 NZD
View the Ming ConsoleIf black is too strong for a small or dark entry, the same console is made in a light natural finish at $999.
Three other ways to do it
For an entry with texture rather than another flat timber face, the Moderno Console at $799 brings woven rattan into a 320mm frame, in natural or black. And for a bedroom entry or a landing, the Monte Cristo Commode at $1,899 gives you three deep drawers on the same 800 x 800mm face as the Monte Cristo console — so the two pair cleanly along one wall, one open and one closed.
The mirror above it
A console without a mirror is a piece of furniture. A console with a mirror is an entrance. Beyond the obvious use, a mirror opposite or adjacent to a window pushes daylight into the part of the house that typically has none — and New Zealand hallways are frequently internal, with no window at all. A mirror is the cheapest light you will ever install.
Width. The mirror should be roughly two-thirds to three-quarters the width of the console beneath it. Narrower looks stranded; wider looks top-heavy.
Gap. Hang it 150 to 200mm above the console surface, so the two read as one arrangement rather than two separate objects.
Palm Spring Round Mirror 100cm — $499. For an 800mm console a full metre across is generous but works, because a circle carries differently to a rectangle — it fills the wall without squaring off against the console's edges.
Palm Spring Oval Mirror 51 x 120cm — $449. At 510mm wide, the one for a narrow stretch of wall between doorways.
Palm Spring Arc Mirror 80 x 180cm — $799. If the entry is where you dress rather than merely pass through, go full length. At 1800mm you can actually see your shoes, which the standard 1200mm mirror cannot deliver.
Palm Spring Rectangle Mirror 76 x 180cm — $799. The same height, squared off. Lean it or hang it, but fix it to the wall either way.
Then light it
Most entries are lit by a single ceiling fitting, which flattens everything beneath it and does no favours to anyone checking their reflection. A table lamp on the console solves it. Light at eye level rather than overhead is more flattering, warmer, and turns a corridor into somewhere you might pause.
Ophelia Table Lamp — $399. Ivory ceramic on a brass base with a natural linen shade. The quiet choice, and the one that disappears into almost any scheme.
Georgia Table Lamp — $349. Ivory and black striped glass with a brass base. For an entry that could use some graphic interest rather than another neutral object.
Calliope Table Lamp — $349. Beige textured ceramic with a natural linen shade, for a warmer, more neutral room.
Mattia Floor Lamp 170cm — $399. Where there is no surface to spare, a floor lamp does the same work from the corner. Black fibreglass base, natural linen shade, and a compact footprint that tucks into a corner most furniture cannot use.
When the floor is full, go up
In a small home the entry often has to hold more than a console can carry — coats, shoes, sports gear, the things that have nowhere else to live. The answer is vertical.
If black is too severe for a small entry, the Sorrento Cabinet 2050mm at $3,999 gives you the same height in weathered elm — a finish that is aged rather than flatly stained — and the Louvre Arched Display Cabinet 2090mm at $3,999 is the palest of the three in natural brushed mindi.
One practical note that applies to all of them. At two metres and above, anchor the piece to the wall. Tall storage is top-heavy once it is loaded, and it is not worth the risk in a house with children or a large dog.
Three schemes that work
The narrow villa hallway. Monte Cristo Console in natural at 300mm deep, Palm Spring Oval Mirror above it, one table lamp. Total depth given up: 300mm. The hall still functions as a hall.
The family entry that has to work harder. Ming 6 Drawer Console — closed storage at hallway depth — with the Palm Spring Round Mirror above, and the Marais Shelving Unit on the opposite wall for everything the drawers cannot take.
The generous entry off an open-plan living area. Dante 6 Drawer Console at 1500mm, a full-length Arc Mirror, a pair of table lamps, and a tall cabinet in the corner to carry the eye upward.
Why buy from Online8
Specifications you can plan around. Real dimensions, real materials — including depth, which is the number that decides whether a hallway works and the one most retailers bury.
A showroom in Papatoetoe, Auckland. Monday to Saturday, 10am to 4pm. Ring 09 278 8881 to check what is on the floor before you drive over.
Nationwide delivery. Options and pricing presented at checkout.
Someone to talk to. Unsure whether 300mm or 400mm will work in your hall, or which mirror width suits your console? Call us and we will work it out with you.
★★★★★
Don't take our word for it
Online8 holds a 5.0-star rating across more than 140 Google reviews — written by customers about product quality, honest advice, and orders that arrived exactly as described. Unedited, and entirely out of our hands.
Read our Google reviewsThe last word
Depth is the thing photographs cannot convey. A 300mm console and a 400mm console look nearly identical on a screen and feel entirely different in a 1200mm hallway.
Bring your measurements — wall width, hallway width, and the distance from the wall to whatever sits opposite. Ten minutes on the showroom floor will settle a decision you would otherwise guess at.
Online8 · 29 Charles Street, Papatoetoe, Auckland · 09 278 8881 · Mon–Sat, 10am–4pm
