For any room of your home to function well, you need to ensure that the layout of the furniture works.  And by “work”, I mean that the furniture placement needs to allow for easy movement throughout the room, create comfortable conversation areas, take full advantage of the built-in structural elements (fireplace, windows), and support the function of the space (how the room is used on a dialy basis). 

 

Keep these things in mind when creating your space plan:

*Place chairs no more than 8 feet apart to encourage comfortable conversation

*  Allow 14″ to 18″ between the coffee table and soft for easy in and out access

*  Create traffic lanes that are approximately 3 feet wide to allow for easy movement within a room

While pulling your furniture in, away from the walls, does not work for every room, it typically creates a room that feels a bit more cozy and comfortable.  And, don’t be afraid to add additional furniture pieces to fill the space.  The two ottomans above fill the space between the chair and sofa wonderfully, and can be moved around the room when needed.

In a room with two dominate focal points (fireplace and windows), arrange your furniture to take advantage of both.  By positioning the sofas facing each other and chairs facing the fireplace, the space is utilized effectively and the view from every seat is great.

In larger rooms, creating multiple seating areas is the way to go.  Not only does this allow you to fully utilize the entire space within the room, but the room will function best when planned this way.

Utilize rugs to bring multiple seating areas together.

A well laid out room, that takes advantage of the wall space, floor space and built-in features.

Sometimes one larger piece of furniture (sectional) works better than multiple pieces. The sectional plays up the length of the room, takes advantage of the view and is an appropriate scale to the overall size of the room.

When it comes to designing the layout of a room,” design rules” do apply, but in the end how the room feels and works for you is all that really matters!

 

image via: 1) & 2) source unknown, 3) joyofnesting.blogspot 4) home-desiging 5) alldoing 6) houzz