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zack_white11

The Impossible Living Room

Zack White
8 years ago


We've been living in our new house for a few months and can't seem to find a solid furniture arrange for our living room. It's an open floorplan home, and the living room has a feature on each wall: front door, fireplace, sliding doors, and a bar/kitchen area.

We tried placing the TV in one of the corners for a while, but the flow of the room was terrible because you would open the door and walk into a couch.
After a few hours of rearranging, we eventually gave up and put the TV in front of the fireplace (a cardinal sin) to make the rest of the room function the way we wanted. We'll likely never use the fireplace and honestly hate the design of it this particular one (black & gold hardware).

Does anyone have any suggestions to make our living room better? Mounting the TV isn't an option as we live near a military large munitions testing range. Neighbors have mounted TVs and came home to find them broken on the floor.


Comments (16)

  • papillon2
    8 years ago

    What about the wall to the right of the entry, near the closet? Then focus your furniture to accommodate the change, with sofa facing the entry.

  • acm
    8 years ago

    Only alternative I can think of is using the wall at left (rotating your main couch to face it), which puts you walking through your living room on the way to the bedrooms, but that seems ok. When I started laying it out, though, I found that it would be hard to have additional seating without blocking the entry or the hall to bedrooms -- the best would be putting a chair where your largest circle is in the diagram above. I guess you could also consider having the TV on the wall next to the kitchen pass-through, essentially rotating your arrangement 180 degrees. Then you don't block the fireplace, but you do mostly ignore it. I dunno, it is really pesky. Will be impressed if somebody has a radically different solution. (I considered TV on bottom wall and couches facing each other in the middle, but then you have awkward views of both TV and fireplace! Still, it's a third possibility.)

  • Zack White
    Original Author
    8 years ago

    The biggest circle is indeed a chair, a small wicker papasan.


    We considered placing the TV on the front entryway wall like ACM suggested, but it makes for an awkward distance to the TV if the couches anchor the room in the center.

  • PRO
    SPATIUM
    8 years ago

    could you show on the photo rest of your room? ... mayeby it could be easier to figure something out...

  • Zack White
    Original Author
    8 years ago

    Excuse the mess. We had just gotten home from a baby shower and sent these to some family to get suggestions. Everyone we've spoken with is at a loss.

  • acm
    8 years ago

    Well, as I say, there's a limit to how much stuff you can put in your main furniture circle if you face that way, but it depends on how many you need to seat.

    Here the couch and papasan can watch TV, the walkways work, but your extra couch is out of luck. However, you could put a console table between the two couches for a lamp (or not, honestly) and then you have one end table for the other couch to be a reading area or for enjoying the back yard view. Not perfect, but might feel more natural than your current setup. You could get a long low console for the TV, and you could think about other ways to use the space on the right -- for example a small game table with two chairs, or add a beanbag chair, or just let it be and there's room for a couple of stools at the high bar if you want them. etc.

  • susan2494
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    Room measurements are per your floor plan and so are openings, windows and doors.

  • Zack White
    Original Author
    8 years ago

    That looks great, Susan!

  • Zack White
    Original Author
    8 years ago

    We'll rearrange tonight and post the results.

  • acm
    8 years ago

    No, Susan has reversed the locations of wall and hallway to bedrooms in the lower-left of the plan. I'm not sure you can get through behind the loveseat -- there will be about 14 inches for the main walkway of the house. Maybe if you can slide it all toward the top, but...

  • cathywilliamson
    8 years ago
    If you mount the tv over the fireplace you would have more options.
  • PRO
    SPATIUM
    8 years ago

    my first thought... but I dont know its possible...

  • Zack White
    Original Author
    8 years ago

    Spatium,

    We attempted that configuration, but the AV table is too high. We're trying to shoehorn old furniture into the house, and it's not exactly working.

  • susan2494
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    Should be plenty of room for everything, including walking behind LS if you want to. I did move the end table to leave an opening into seating area rather than going around past FP. acm was correct I did have the openings reversed, but still have room behind.

    If you do move the TV, I would recommend a longer console for under it. it needs to be at least 25% longer than TV size.

    And you need a bigger rug. 8x10.

    Zack White thanked susan2494
  • Zack White
    Original Author
    8 years ago

    Thanks to everyone for the suggestions. Obviously, we're in the early stages of making this house a home, and all the comments have helped a ton. I'm betting we'll purchase a new living room suit in the next few years, but Susan's layout appears to be the winner.