The sofa is usually the heart of the living room, so it’s usually the first thing that people decide to buy and the rest of the space is often adjusted to accommodate it. As all living spaces are designed and laid out differently, it is not always easy to know where the couch should go.
With some houses, it’s obvious to see where the sofa should go and some houses are designed with optimal sofa placement in mind. However, some rooms are not, which can make it difficult to know where it would look most appropriate.
As a general rule of thumb, your couch should be facing the focal point of the room. But if your room doesn’t have one specific focal point, what should you do?
It’s almost instinct to place a large-scale furniture piece, like a sofa, against a wall. It’s a practical approach that essentially helps guide where everything else in the room would go.
However, there’s a lot more that you can do with your couch than just pushing it up against the wall in a large open-plan living room. Fortunately, there are a number of helpful hints and tricks to help you make the right decision for your space.
Move it away from the wall
While positioning your sofa against the wall is an excellent way to create an intimate lounge area in a large living room, it also leaves a lot of blank and unused space in the rest of the room. In terms of feng shui, this what you should be going for.
If a sofa looks great positioned against a wall, be sure to take a look at how it affects everything else in the room rather than moving everything around in order to accommodate your couch.
For example, your couch may look great against one wall, but it has left a bookshelf at the other end of the living room appear out of place and unutilized. It’s all about balance and learning about how best to work with the space that you have.
While the focus on the sofa may look great, it could leave the rest of your room looking impractical and imbalanced.
Why should I float my sofa?
A great alternative to justy pushing your couch up against the nearest wall is to float it instead. This works best if done in the centre of a large open-plan living room.
Many interior designers opt to float their couches as a way of creating a sort of miniature intimate room within the larger living room itself. This helps to delineate different areas in a large living room and can help to centre the focus.
If your living room is large and has special architectural components such as a fireplace, you can utilise it as a visual starting point for deciding where to put your sofas—either opposite the mantel or perpendicular to it.
Furthermore, if you want to boost the design of your living room, floating your sofa will assist establish the room as a distinct space for sitting and conversation.
It makes use of the fireplace
Floating a sofa opposite a fireplace in the middle of a living, family, or sitting room (or a designated space for your TV) will help to centre the plan. The fireplace and sofa give an immediate sense of welcoming balance in the area, as well as a centred focal point.
It improves the flow of the room
In a spacious living room, floating your sofa will create a much better flow and eliminate any awkward unused spots. As shown in the layout on the right, the arrangement allows you to create other tiny vignettes, such as a wall lined with tall bookcases or a reading area by the window.
It gives you more wall space
By floating the sofa in the room, the full wall space becomes available for storage and display, with room for an additional bookshelf, resulting in a symmetrical layout.
For example, if you own any tall bookcases bookcases, unlike a lower-profile sofa, help to fill out the huge empty walls by drawing the eye up due to their height.
It gives you more space to lounge around
Because your sofa is floating in the middle of the room, you may spread out your sitting to create tiny lounge spaces.
This armchair was formerly crammed into a small corner of the seating area. This unique layout allows the chair to be pushed up to a window and used as its own reading nook.
It can help to improve the balance of your space
Because your sofa is floating in the middle of the room, you may spread out your sitting to create tiny lounge spaces. This armchair was formerly crammed into a small corner of the seating area. This unique layout allows the chair to be pushed up to a window and used as its own reading nook.
Be sure not to block any windows
Natural light is essential in any area, and the more windows you have, the better. As a general guideline, you should keep things out of the way of windows as much as possible. The room feels smaller, dingier, and more crowded when the light is covered. However, if you have floor-to-ceiling windows, this can be difficult.
It gives you the freedom to create activity zones
When it comes to furniture placement, a common blunder is failing to consider distinct activity zones. If your family is like most, your living room is used for multiple purposes. It could be a place where individuals watch television, do school, pay bills, or work on art projects.
Final Verdict
In some living rooms, the sofa will work both up against the wall and as a floated couch. If this is the case in your living space, the positioning of the sofa should come down to your personal choice.
What matters is that you don't stack all of your belongings against the wall. People frequently do this, oblivious to the fact that it appears uninviting to visitors and makes conversations more difficult.
