However, a small living room can still be beautiful and accommodating as long as you know how to embrace its shortcomings and make your way around it. In fact, with just a little savvy furniture arrangement, it is possible for you to disguise the flaws of your tiny living room and stylishly make the most out of its limited floor space. So if you want to transform your compact living room into a charming refuge, below are some arrangement ideas you might want to try.
Utilize scale-appropriate furnishings
The first order of business that you have to remember when it comes to improving a small living room is to use furniture pieces that are appropriate for the scale of your space as well as for the people who will be using them. At the most, you want to go for armless seats as they will not make a room look cluttered. You should also pay close attention to your furnishings’ visual weight. That is, their legs should appear lighter and they should not obstruct the other views inside your living room. You might also want to settle with multifunctional pieces that take up very little space.
Provide a casual seating
One of the best arrangements you can do to your tiny living room is to provide a casual seating using a combination of oversized floor cushions and ottomans. You can stack the pillows in front of a fireplace or any focal point and use the ottomans either as additional seats or stand-in tables. With this arrangement, you can eliminate the sofa set altogether and be able to lend a cozy feel to your living room without taking up too much space.
Go with diagonals
To give your boxy living room a touch of class and at the same time make it look more spacious, consider arranging your furniture diagonally. Such an arrangement also helps establish an open pathway toward the seats. Start off by putting the sofa and table in an oblique direction and arrange the other seats following the diagonal axis. Anchor the seats using a small area rug.
Make it intimate with a face-to-face setting
Your small living room makes for a great intimate setting. And what better way to pump up the warmth inside it than creating an arrangement that allow for face-to-face conversation? Pull your furnishings away from your walls and bring them in the middle of your living room instead. Arrange the seats facing each other over a shared coffee table. If you have a fireplace, use it as an axis to arrange your furniture to a follow a face-to-face setting. To unify the look of your living room seats, use an area rug that has a size that can either hold all the seating pieces or would allow you to place the front feet of your seats onto it.
Provide room for lounging
If you own a sectional sofa, one of the best ways to put it in the living room without consuming too much space is to arrange it in a J-shape at the largest end of your living room. Cap off the look by adding a small table at the center. This arrangement can help define a comfortable living room ideal for lounging and watching television.
Use furniture as a division
If you have an open floor plan where there is no clear line between the living room and dining area, or perhaps you want to add a work space to your living room, consider dividing up the space using a furniture. Position your sofa at the center of your room and place a table or a tall chest just behind it. The chest will do double duty, serving as a visual barrier between the living room and dining room and may also function as a work area.
Carve out a space
Another great solution in an open floor plan is to transform the space by the window as your mini. living room. You can choose a slender, leggy seat and place it against the window. Adding two ottomans will help establish the space and you can make an open shelving between the wall studs for some storage. This arrangement will certainly make the illusion that the space is larger because you can see the floor under the primary seat and the natural light coming through the window also lend an airy feel to your living space.
Written and researched by Ericka who writes content for We Do Moving Boxes a web based company in the UK who specailise in cardboard moving boxes for moving home.