Furniture Placement 101

by Andrea Hermitt | More from this Blogger

15 Jun 2009 06:19 AM

(cc) image by Christopher Barson/flickr

I grew up in a home with one basic furniture placement rule. Line up the furniture against the walls, and place a chair by the window. That was it. My parents were much more interested in function that style. Besides with 9 kids in the house, we needed as much floor space as possible, and mom and dad needed a chair to sit in when they were taking turns watching us play outside.

As I only have two kids of my own, and am a visual person by nature, I am much more interested in design, and over the years have developed my own set of rules for placing furniture. They are as follows:

1. Pull that furniture away from the wall. Placing furniture against the walls ruins the walls, and makes for a boring room. While in some cases there is no other choice as to where to put a large sofa, or an armoire, I believe it is better to have less furniture than to have everything against the wall. Allow your sofas and chairs to breathe.

2. Find or create a focal point. When I was growing up, the focal point was the TV if anything. With today's flat screen TVs' that take up less space in the room, we are free to create other points of interest in the room, other than the idiot box. Instead, you can make a fireplace, a view, or a piece of art work the main interest in the room. You can even go as far as placing a chair with it's back to the TV to take focus away from it.

3. Work around the traffic pattern. No one wants bumps and bruises on their legs or to take the longest route to the bathroom. If your room, the great room, for example, has a kitchen on one end and a bathroom on the other end you don't want to place a large piece of furniture in the way. Instead, use the furniture to create a direct path to connect the rooms.

4. Remember less is more. Do not over crowd the room with excess furniture. Just because you can buy a sofa, a love seat, a chair, two end table, a sofa table and three lamps in a set, doesn't mean that you need to buy it.

Read: Three Furniture Placement Styles

Rearrange Your Furniture to Save Money

Give Your Furniture A Lift

Furniture 101

Furniture 102--Other Key Terms

Learn more about Andrea Hermitt

Andrea Hermitt is a native New Yorker currently residing in GA. She has been married for over 16 years and has two teenage children.

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