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When a lot of people come to design their living room they often start with a sofa, which seems pretty sensible as this is the big investment piece! Then they choose some furniture, select a paint colour, maybe later decide on some curtains, and then over time add some artwork or plants, or a nice rug 🪴.
If you have a good eye for design and you have a knack for being able to buy exactly the right thing, then this slowly evolving method can work really well. But if you ever worry that you’ll make a mistake or buy the wrong thing or maybe choose a colour or pattern you will regret, it can be a good idea to use a more proven system for designing a space 😬.
If you want your room to feel well laid out with a good flow and a cohesive look and colour palette, and you want to get it done within a couple of weeks or months, then these six steps will take you there 😀.
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR LIVING ROOM STEP ONE
1. DECIDE ON WHAT FEELING YOU WANT TO CREATE
Have a think about what feeling you want to create in the space. This may be cosy, warm and welcoming, or energising and upbeat, elegant and calming. Think about what activities you want to do in the space, who will use the space, and what time of day will it be used most and this should start to guide you on what kind of atmosphere you want to go for.
Once you’ve got the feeling everything else can start to flow from here. That’s because certain colours patterns, textures and materials convey a certain feeling. Here are some examples;
You want an open, airy and elegant space
– Use cool colours rather than warm
– Neutrals or muted colours rather than dark or bright colours.
– Fine, lightweight fabrics rather than chunky, heavier fabrics.
– Furniture with curves tapered legs and turned feet.
– Try glass, brass and marble as your key materials.
– Use a few statement accessories in stone or ceramic, and use large stems as decorative foliage.
You want a youthful, vibrant and warm space
– Use warm colours rather than cool.
– Try pure colours rather than colours with a lot of grey in them.
– Mix fabrics of varying weights such as linen, velvet and chenille.
– Pick Furniture with straight lines, angled legs and minimal detailing.
– Try wood, painted finishes and bamboo/rattan.
– Group eclectic accessories in varying materials, and use leafy green plants.
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR LIVING ROOM STEP TWO
2. PLAN YOUR LAYOUT
There are a few things to consider when working out the best layout these are…
The practical requirements of the space – Things like how many people you need to seat. Do you want the seating opposite the TV or do you want seating facing each other? Do you want a large central coffee table or side tables? What storage furniture do you need? Where do you need power outlets and lights?
Balance – In contrast to the practical requirements of a space, this is all about the aesthetic requirements of the room. And the trick to this is selecting the right pieces of furniture for the space, the right scale, proportions and shape!
The focal point – Every room needs one, but it doesn’t have to be a structural focal point like a magnificent chimney breast with an open fire. It can be a large piece of furniture, a view, a fabulous piece of artwork or a texture like some panelling on a feature wall.
How you move through the space – This is another practical one. Part of nailing the perfect layout is to make sure you can move comfortably through the space. There should be ease of traffic through the space with no obstacles or uncomfortable pinch points.
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR LIVING ROOM STEP THREE
3. PLAN YOUR LIGHTING
This one goes hand-in-hand with your layout. Part of getting the layout right is making the space you need for floor lamps, table lamps, and wall lights. Ideally for a living room you need around six sources of light and this would be a mixture of lights at different heights so that you create a layered blanket of light. Get them evenly spread throughout the space too so there are no gloomy patches.
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR LIVING ROOM STEP FOUR
4. CHOOSE AN INSPIRATION PIECE
This isn’t an absolute must but at some point, you need to plan your colour scheme for the room and rather than trying to pluck a colour scheme out of thin air, it can be really useful to find an element of your scheme to inspire that colour palette. So something like a rug, a piece of art, a lampshade or a cushion can be the perfect springboard.
Once you have a colour or a couple of colours from that item you can then start to build a scheme around it. You can go for a tonal scheme where you use varying tones of the same colour, a complementary scheme where you use the colours that sit opposite each other on the colour wheel or a harmonious scheme where you use colours that sit next to each other on the colour wheel.
If you have no idea about the colour wheel no problem you can read my blog about that here ⬅️.
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR LIVING ROOM STEP FIVE
5. CREATE A PRODUCT BOARD
A product board is where you cut and paste images of all the items you are considering onto one page. The point of doing this is you can see them next to each other and make a judgement on whether or not they go together. I can’t imagine designing a room without a product board. If you don’t see the items side by side, how do you know if they will work together or not? For items to work together, they have to have some similarities between them, things like similar textures, patterns, finishes, proportions, lines, and shapes, something that makes them look good together. And when you’re flitting between browser pages this can be really hard to spot. So cutting and pasting everything into one page is a really basic but critical tool for creating a harmonious scheme.
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR LIVING ROOM STEP SIX
6. CHECK THE DIMENSIONS, CHECK THE BUDGET AND ORDER.
Now you have selected all your products for the space you just need to do some double and triple checking.
Total everything up and check it’s all in budget.
Check the dimensions of EVERYTHING and remeasure your space. I promise you, it’s never a waste of your time to measure once, measure twice and measure again!
HOW TO DESIGN YOUR LIVING ROOM…
That’s it. My secret sauce to creating a beautiful space from scratch.
How long should this take you? Well, that’s all down to how quickly you make decisions, how big your room is and therefore how many items you need to source! But for me, this would probably take around six weeks. It’s a lot of hard work but I think it’s worth investing the time in the planning stages to get it all right and to start enjoying your beautiful, finished room.
If you love planning the decor of your home then you are going to love our Room by Room Planner. It’s your perfect partner for planning every space in your home, check it out here.
And if you want help planning your perfect layout I can help with that too, I have the perfect room planner service 😀.
Let me know if you have any questions, I always love hearing from you.
Happy designing,
Sarah
