How to Arrange Living Room Furniture
- 1). With a tape measure, find the dimensions of the room. Draw the outline to scale on graph paper. A typical scale is 1/4 inch equals 1 foot.
- 2). Mark anything that would affect your arrangement: outlets for electricity, telephone and cable; light switches; windows; doors that open into the room; space between windows; and sill height.
- 3). Make scale paper cutouts of your living room furniture and shift them on the room drawing as needed until a likely arrangement emerges.
- 4). Select a focal point for your room and subtly orient other furnishings and some lighting toward it. If there's a fireplace, it will nearly always be the focal point; other focal points might be bookcases or built-in shelving to house lovely collectibles, or a sofa with a striking painting on the wall above it.
- 5). Arrange the furniture in such a way that pieces viewed as a unit don't show dramatic variance in height and mass as the eye sweeps the room. When a high-backed chair is next to a low table, boost the visual height of the table by hanging a piece of art above it.
- 6). Set up cozy conversation areas so that when you entertain, people can be seated and chat rather than having to stand. Examples would include two chairs separated by a low table, or two love seats facing each other.
- 7). Pull furniture away from the walls for more flexibility in creating conversation areas. For example, use a sofa to divide space in a room.
- 8). Position the sofa so it's at a nonperpendicular angle to any walls to create drama. Perhaps put an area rug and coffee table parallel to the sofa.
- 9). Allow a minimum of 18 inches (24 is better) for traffic lanes through the room. Lanes will probably meander if you have two or three conversation areas in the room.
- 10
Freshen the room occasionally by shifting the furniture and accessories for a new look. Switch tabletop bric-a-brac around, add fresh flowers, change potpourri, move pictures.
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