Living rooms can be complex spaces to work with. While living room interior design and home improvement may seem easy at first, there are a lot of different elements that can go into a living room, and a lot of people forget that even the smallest changes can cause significant adjustments to how the room looks, feels, and functions.
If you are getting any home improvement or interior design work done for your living room, then be sure to avoid some of the common pitfalls and mistakes that many people make. Here are a few Dos and Don’ts of living room furniture choices.
Don’t Over-Saturate the Living Room with Furniture
One of the most common mistakes is over-saturating a living room with furniture. When too much furniture is added to a living room without any real purpose or pattern, the space appears cluttered, and that is not the look you are going for.
If you are not sure how much furniture you want in a living room, first try to imagine what the room would look like without furniture at all. From there, try to fit each “major” piece of furniture into the space you are picturing until you know the basic layout of the room.
Ideally, you want to furnish a living room in waves – the first wave should be the larger and/or core furniture items, with each other wave being the less important items. By doing this, you are not going to accidentally block space that you will later need for a couch or another large piece of furniture.
Don’t Over-Decorate Your Living Room
When it comes to decorating a living room, many people think that decorating is only about adding some pretty elements, but that is not entirely true. While there are certain elements that can make a living room pop, there are also other elements that you should leave alone.
Decorations should never come at the expense of practicality. You want to make sure that you have enough space to move around and that your living room is not going to be constantly filled with decorations that get in the way or make it hard to pick out the useful parts of the space.
If you want to go all out with some decorative accents, make sure they are going to provide a practical and effective purpose. For example, wall sconces and curtains are both technically decorative, but they are also functional additions that have a purpose beyond looking nice.
This is not to say that you can’t decorate. However, you need to think carefully about how you do it and the kind of decorations you are choosing for your living room. Decorating for decorating’s sake without any thought behind your choices can only make the project even harder to manage.
Do Properly Design Your Living Room Layout
The layout of a living room makes a huge difference to how you move around it and how all of the different elements of the design fit together. One of the most important things to keep in mind when designing a living room layout is that you need space rather than a cramped living room with barely enough open floor to walk past somebody.
Make sure that you put furniture items in spaces where they will be easy to navigate. You do not want to waste the space on pieces of furniture that make moving around the room difficult. When it comes to furniture layout, the smaller a piece of furniture is, the less of a footprint it will have on your room’s overall size.
However, you should not avoid large furniture items entirely. Larger items like a couch or television stand can be an important part of the living room, and sometimes you need to keep them at a reasonable size so that you can use them properly. The important part is putting them in the right place and making sure they do not get in the way of other important parts of the room.
For example, a couch against a wall usually means that you will have more space in front of it. Placing the same couch in the middle of the room might open up space behind it, but that is not necessarily going to be very practical because it limits the amount of usable room you have for other large items.
Don’t Be Afraid of New Furniture Sources
Sometimes you can’t get the furniture you want from a local seller. There is nothing wrong with turning to UK living room furniture or another source of new furniture pieces if they are offering something you want, and you might even get better deals or more fitting furniture options from companies beyond your regular choices.
Sometimes the furniture you are looking for is too expensive or does not offer the same features you are looking for, so try something different. There are times when there is a need for specialty pieces, and it never hurts to look for them elsewhere if your local stores do not provide them.
With an increased desire for unique furniture, it is becoming easier to find high-end pieces of furniture online – including ones you will not find in a store. This should be something you look into, but it is also something that you need to be careful about.
Do Make Reasonable Purchases
It is not a smart idea to get involved in the bidding wars of furniture or to try to spend too much on furniture that is not exactly what you want. Take your time, think over your options, and do not push yourself to buy something expensive just because it is expensive. Think about what you need and whether or not a piece of furniture fills that niche correctly.
If you really want to splurge on a piece of furniture, always keep in mind the basic principles of designing a living room – make the living room an integral part of the home, not a separate part of the home. This is more important than the design or the way it looks, so make sure that the furniture you’re adding to the living room matches that goal.
Add Your Comment