When you’re short on square footage (and even if you’re not!), a sunken living room is a neat architectural element that enhances the feeling of space in an apartment by demarcating a room without the use of walls and, thanks to its dropped floor, making a ceiling appear even taller than it actually is. Here, six great examples:

At 154 Spring Street, a penthouse triplex (on the market for $8.999 million) includes this sunken cozy living room with a dramatic sloped ceiling, exposed brick walls and a gas fireplace surrounded by Pietra Cardoza granite.

A three-bedroom, three-bath condo at 340 West 57^th Street (yours for $3.490 million) has a sunken living room with a grand fireplace that enhances the space’s 10-foot ceilings.

In this one-room apartment at 3245 Perry Avenue in the Bronx (going for $80,000), a sunken living room creates separation of space between the main living area and the entry/kitchen/bathroom.

A combination of two apartments makes for a double-sized sunken living room in this four-bedroom, three-bath co-op at 350 Cabrini Boulevard ($1.395 million) in Washington Heights.

Finally, a brass balustrade matches the parquet floors and lightens the overall look of the sunken living room of this one-bedroom, one-bath Midtown East co-op at 301 East 48^th Street (priced at $799,000).