How To Set Up My Living Room

Living room layout ideas can totally transform a space and there are many reasons why you should consider switching things upwards. Perhaps you've but moved into a rental which doesn't use a pocket of space effectively every bit information technology could. Or, perchance you don't want to movement from your forever home – in which case, a switch-up is a simple (and much more than toll-effective) solution.

Whatever your motive for tackling your living room layout, it'south the room you probably spend the most time in, and so getting it right is vital. The perfect living room layout is one that suits the fashion that yous alive, whether you want an area for entertaining, a quiet and isolated room to withdraw to, or a multi-functional space that can be adapted to any the situation needs. You'd be surprised how many different ways you can ready up your lounge.

There's much more beyond pushing all your furniture up against walls and angling them towards sofas, and these spaces prove it. And so go on, exist a fleck bolder in your living room configuration and fire upward the Feng Shui when designing a living room layout.

Living room layout ideas your space will beloved

No matter how beautiful the living room ideas you lot have going on may be, if they are part of an awkward small space or a large room that's oddly put together, y'all're non going to get the nearly out of them. Ensuring the layout is spot on in terms of style and function is central to success. 'Living rooms are often one of the trickiest rooms in the home to blueprint, because they're usually the one that multi-tasks the most,' says Emma Sims-Hilditch, founder, Neptune.

'Somewhere to picket TV, somewhere to relax, somewhere to entertain friends, somewhere to shop all sorts of paraphernalia, and even somewhere to consume and work depending on your setup.

'Pigment color, fabric choice and floor aside, what to put in your sitting room and where to position information technology all are two of your main considerations.'

i. Get for a counterbalanced layout

A living room by Neptune with green velvet sofa and woodburning stove

If you are after a more than formal living room layout – symmetry is the way to go. It'due south very visually satisfying and does work particularly well in minor living room layouts where information technology's important to give your furniture room to breathe to avert a chaotic feeling.

Yous can create this look either with 2 sofas and a java tabular array in between or slightly off balance it with a sofa facing 2 armchairs. Y'all are best then mounting a TV so information technology can exist seen from both sides of the room, but carry in mind yous'll have to turn to watch, so this layout might exist suited best to a room where the Goggle box doesn't take the be the focus.

2. Introduce low-cal into a dark living room

A living room next to garden with teal velvet sofa furniture by Carpetright and Diamond motif rug

If y'all tin't decide betwixt a green or blue living room – choosing an Art Deco-inspired teal lounge with a marble checkered floor is a classy and elegant option.

But, if you lot're scared that the space might wait a tad on the dark side, cull a spot that's about the garden or place furniture near big windows. That fashion, you tin layer natural sunlight with multiple living room lighting ideas to balance out lite and dark.

The improver of metallic surfaces such as the brass table and candlestick holder on the black and rattan cabinet will help to reflect low-cal.

3. Turn your living room into a guest room

A living room by Snug sofa using velvet blue sofa bed, khaki green wall panel decor and brass bar cart

As the price of real estate increases, you may observe that your money doesn't stretch as far as y'all'd hoped with the number or size of rooms you lot wanted.

For example, if your savings don't allow you to accept a invitee room, or if box bedchamber is too tiny – the all-time sofa beds function equally a cozy seating and sleep space. So rather than remodelling your house to accommodate for sleepovers, invest in this dual-purpose furniture.

4. Open upward your kitchen and living room

A living room with black Crittal-style windows with view of kitchen

Having a space that's warm and visually-appealing is great for entertaining guests. Opening up a sitting room adjacent to the the kitchen is perfect for letting mouth-watering aromas of a habitation-cooked meal permeate into the space.

When thinking about how to design the perfect living room, approach it like a private dining experience. Here, you lot can also peer into the black-framed, Crittall-fashion pocket doors and feel as though yous're at the chef's table – without disrupting the cook's culinary output.

5. Zone seating effectually a fireplace

A modern living room by Sofa.com including AW21 Larsen 2 seat sofa in Stone brushed linen cotton, £1490, and Ginger armchairs in Champagne luxe boucl

Non merely for cozying up around Christmas, living room fireplace ideas are the perfect apparatus to base your lounge layout effectually. With traditional, forest burning stoves, you lot can reinforce them every bit a feature with a mirror or artwork over the mantelpiece.

This is especially constructive in a room where you don't really have any applied science. If your living room is for relaxing, reading, or listening to music, then having a focal betoken similar a fireplace volition add to the calming experience.

Modern cassette models on the other paw, are ideal for infinite-saving. Fifty-fifty during the warmer months, some electric fires accept an ability to let yous experience the visual effects of the LED 'embers' without actually heating up the room.

vi. Utilize a room divider to zone the space

A living room with dark purple sofa and purple room dividers with chandelier light fixture

Room divider ideas are a really affordable choice to zone a living room layout. Whether you're renting, or a non-committal decorator, dividers can be folded away when not in use.

We love these plain lilac ones that blend seamlessly into the living room with the other pastel accessories. You wouldn't fifty-fifty know they were at that place... well, sort of.

7. Choose between open-program, broken-program or living room merely

An open-plan living room with high ceilings, dining room table with chairs and bench and exposed brick wall

If you lot're looking to remodel your home, it might be that your living room will be at least partly open to other rooms. This requires a certain amount of cocky-analysis, and so think about how you are going to alive in the room, and to what extent y'all want a split sanctuary to escape from household life.

You may wish to isolate the room for other people. For example, the separate room may be a space where teenagers can spotter Television and play computer games with their friends while the adults remain reasonably undisturbed in the kitchen-diner.

On the other hand, you may want to create a more than seamless layout where an open-programme kitchen, dining area and lounge space overlap. This living room layout thought often allows for more family interaction and tin can take the do good of making the entire infinite seem larger.

Oft, the solution is a combination of both, where rooms have been linked by knocking them through, simply still accept a defined living space. Double doors, folding doors or even large sliding doors can provide the pick to link or close off areas.

8. Discover your living room's focal point

A light grey living room with wooden coffee table decor

How y'all want to use your living room will dictate what its focal point will exist. The living room layout is ordinarily dictated past where the TV is placed, but ofttimes you don't desire it to be the central focus, unless that is what the room is primarily for.

Quite frequently, these rooms double as a abode cinema space, and then if that's what you lot're looking for, it's best to await at some genius living room tv ideas.

9. Or go for something more than flexible

A living room by Modern Organic with white painted brick wall, grey armchair with footstool, coffee table, wooden shelf, and tan leather chair

You tin can create a more than relaxed, laidback living room past avoiding a symmetrical look and dotting your furniture slightly more randomly effectually the space.

Have your sofa lengthways with the coffee tabular array in front, considering that just makes sense, but then dot mismatching chairs, stool and fifty-fifty small tables in the space reverse.

10. Look at the natural light when picking a living room layout

A modern living room with wooden beams and rustic decor

If you accept dandy views from your windows, then turning these into the focus of the room is a bright solution. This is a swell idea for rooms used for relaxing and more formal gatherings. It'south as well a adept option if your living room is in an open plan extension, and you take windows flooding the space with calorie-free.

Where you position furniture will too depend on your choice of focal point. If a large window looking out onto the garden is the main focal point, the seating should be placed to have in the view, thus creating a comfortable infinite to relax in.

11. Permit your furniture exist the focus

A large living room with central off-white ottoman with quilting detail

If y'all're hashtag blest with a big living room layout, invest in beautiful statement furniture to make them the focal betoken. Configure the article of furniture in a way that promotes conversation with family and guests.

One style to do this is to designate a well-lit corner for your perfect armchair or 1 of the best sofas on the Real Homes team's radar, perhaps in a statement colourway or luxe upholstery textile that volition go the focus of the room.

12. Don't just push everything against walls

A living room by Urban Allure with central fireplace, tan leather and wooden chair with matching footstool, yellow sofa, large rug

At that place is a mutual tendency, when designing a living room layout, to shove all your furnishings up against walls. But this try to claim back those precious few inches tin often have an adverse effect.

Instead, copy this expect and pull your furniture away from the wall a tad, creating infinite around the exterior of the room, and group around a cardinal coffee table.

'If your living room's on the smaller side, it's tempting to put all of the furniture against the wall to make it feel bigger,' says Sims-Hilditch.

'This actually just creates an empty infinite in the heart which isn't every bit usable as you might recall and leaves your room feeling off-balance. Instead, in any size room, build your layout from the centre to make it feel more intimate and welcoming.'

13. Think about how will y'all move nigh the space

An open plan living room in a renovated school house with home library against the wall and two off-center ceiling lights

Once you have identified the functional needs and focus of the room, you can think near your living room layout's functionality. How will people motion in, out and inside the infinite? This volition assistance y'all decide where it's best to identify the furniture.

If the room doubles up every bit the main road through to the garden or is a space in which people volition travel between the kitchen and dining room, you lot tin use open up shelving or storage units as screens to provide partial separation.

Or, why not consider zoning the room (using the position of the furniture) to define a circulation road that does non run through the seating or Goggle box area? For example, in an open-plan living room, you may cull to utilize piece of furniture to delineate the living room area. Sofas, especially if they are L-shaped, tin can exist used effectively to mark out the boundaries of a living room.

14. Program storage into your layout

A cozy living space with fake log backdrop, sheepskin-covered footstool and second-hand furniture

Call up to consider living room storage ideas in your blueprint. Bench or banquette seating along one wall of your living room can incorporate storage for DVDs and home entertainment gadgets, while providing additional seating.

If you desire to create a contemporary design in a Victorian or Edwardian house look to this idea. Add a rock-topped plinth nearly 45cm in a higher place floor level across the whole of the fireplace wall, and incorporate storage beneath for logs and kindling to act as the hearth for a gimmicky recessed fireplace.

15. Consider living room lighting too

A dark modern grey living room with yellow sofa, seagrass ceiling pendant light and brass-framed rectangular mirror

A living room can accept many different functions, then the key to good living room lighting is multifariousness and variability. With bogus lighting, for example, information technology is oft useful to have several dissimilar sources of light. Controlling many of these on a dimmer switch or lighting system will enable y'all to set the appropriate task or mood lighting in the different zones.

Using a 5A ring circuit (which will require 5A pivot sockets, designed for small round pins) can allow you to operate several table lamps and floor continuing lamps around the room from the light switch or dimmer, which can be effective and efficient.

Lights tin be very fashionable design features. A pendant light can await striking in a traditionally symmetrical room with a chimney breast, while a long-stemmed arching floor continuing lamp tin can be a visual characteristic and accept flexibility of position. Likewise, look to wall lights or sconces if you want to concentrate lite or a highlight a feature in a living room corner.

16. Cistron mirrors into a small living room

A white living room idea with black-framed mirror, white fireplace, black floor lamp, shelves and pink cushion

Surprise, surprise, mirrors brand small spaces feel bigger, and then when designing the layout of a small living room brand sure you factor them in.

In fact, make mirrors a key focus of your plans. We recommend starting with a large mirror on the wall that hangs opposite the windows equally this will bounciness more than calorie-free around and create the illusion that the room is bigger.

If your windows are on the smaller side or you don't want to rely on natural low-cal, try placing a tall mirror thought backside furniture or lighting instead to create the visual trick of another room opening upwards beyond.

How do I fix my living room?

'It's important to divide the space according to function and give meaning to all areas. For instance, you may want a more formal arrangement in forepart of a fireplace as opposed to a more relaxed system for watching Tv,' explains Jiin Kim-Inoue, design director, Finchatton.

'If you have a window overlooking a garden, it could exist a great space for a comfortable seating with a foot stool or a small writing desk. I would consider outlook and lighting in giving a space purpose and significant.'

'Other examples of popular living room zones are a reading nook, a craft or hobby area, a games area or an intimate eating area.'

How do you build a zone in a living room?

'Room dividers, in all of their forms, take the ability to visually interruption upward a infinite making them a smashing feature to use when decorating a big living room,' explains Linda Holmes, interior director at LuxDeco.

'Dividers range from non-permanent pieces like a chic centre table, equally mentioned before, and cute coromandel screens to dividing bookcases and built-in shelving units. Both have their pros.'

'Something like a centre table, low bookcase or screen can be easily moved around the space, opening up the space for larger gatherings, or moved to some other room if needed.'

'A tall bookcase is a skillful middle-of-the-route solution – it provides quite a lot of separation (although an open bookcase will however allow for some interaction between the spaces) but can, technically, be moved if needed.'

'A floor-to-ceiling built-in shelving unit is something which would be an architectural feature inherent to your room's design. It would exist a permanent characteristic of the infinite which would certainly intermission upwardly a large living room.'