Work with the shape of the loft

Loft spaces are rarely a simple rectangle, and that is part of their charm. Before you buy a single item of furniture, spend an evening up there with a tape measure and a notebook. Note where the headroom drops below roughly 1.9 metres — that is the point at which a space stops being comfortable for a chair you will sit in for hours. Mark out where you can stand upright without ducking and where a desk can sit against a wall without you hitting your head every time you push your chair back. In most lofts the natural spot for a desk is under a rooflight or against a gable end, where the ceiling is at its highest and the daylight is best.

Think about the route in and out as well. If the stairs arrive in the middle of the room, keep a clear path from the top step to the desk. Nothing saps the appeal of a loft office faster than squeezing past a filing cabinet to reach your chair.

Get the lighting right for the tasks you actually do

Daylight in a loft can be dramatic at midday and useless by four o'clock in the afternoon. Relying on it alone leads to eye strain and a workspace you avoid in winter. Layer your lighting instead.

• Ambient light: a warm ceiling light or two so the whole room is evenly lit, ideally on a dimmer so it does not feel clinical in the evening.
• Task light: a proper desk lamp positioned so the light falls across your work rather than into your eyes. An adjustable arm is worth the extra cost.
• Bias lighting: a small lamp behind the monitor or a strip along the back of the desk reduces the contrast between a bright screen and a dark wall, which is a common cause of headaches during long sessions.

Rooflights are wonderful but they also bring glare and heat. A blind with a reflective backing will keep the sun off your screen in summer and stop the room turning into a greenhouse.

Sort out your internet before you need it

This is the single most common complaint about loft offices. The router usually lives downstairs, and by the time the signal reaches the top of the house it has passed through two floors, a few walls and possibly a foil-backed insulation layer. Do not assume it will be fine — test it. Set up your laptop where the desk will go and run a speed test at different times of day. Video calls need a stable connection far more than a fast one, so look at upload speed and latency as well as download figures.

• If the signal is weak, a mesh system with a node on the landing or in the loft itself usually fixes it.
• Where a cable can be run, a wired connection is still the most reliable option and removes the worry entirely.
• Powerline adaptors work well in many homes, though they can be temperamental if the loft is on a different circuit.

Plan for a spare: a mobile hotspot or a decent data allowance on your phone will save you on the day the broadband goes down and you have a meeting at nine.

Choose a chair and desk that will look after your back

The romantic image of working from a window seat with a cushion does not survive a full working week. If you will be up there for more than an hour at a time, invest in a chair with an adjustable seat height, a backrest that supports the curve of your spine and armrests you can move out of the way. Your feet should rest flat on the floor or on a footrest, and your elbows should sit at roughly ninety degrees when your hands are on the keyboard.

Desk height matters too, particularly under a sloping ceiling where you may not have room for a monitor riser. A desk around 72–75cm suits most people, but if you are tall or short, a height-adjustable frame is the simplest way to get it right. Keep the top of the screen at about eye level and an arm's length away, and resist the temptation to tuck the monitor into a dark corner just because that is where the plug socket is.

Keep paperwork tidy and cables out of sight

A loft office looks calm when everything has a home. Under-eaves storage is the obvious win here — those low spaces are perfect for box files, printer paper and archive boxes, especially with a bank of drawers built into the slope. Aim for a mix of closed and open storage: closed drawers for anything you do not want to look at, and a shelf or two for the things you use daily.

Cables are the biggest spoiler of a tidy loft. A few small habits make a big difference:

• Measure the run from desk to socket and buy cables the right length rather than coiling a long one behind the desk.
• Use a cable tray or a basket under the desk and a trunking strip along a skirting board or up the underside of the stairs.
• Group chargers on a single switched extension lead so you can turn everything off at night.
• Label the plugs. Future you will be grateful.

Finally, think about acoustics. Loft rooms with hard floors and sloping plasterboard can be echoey, which makes calls feel draining. A rug, a fabric chair, a curtain and a couple of soft furnishings will absorb the worst of it. Add a plant for the air and the view, and you have a workspace that is genuinely a pleasure to climb the stairs to.