See How 6 Design Lessons Transformed a Small Living Room
If you’ve read my previous virtual makeover posts, you already know how much I love designing spaces virtually and transforming them to showcase their true potential.
In today’s blog post, I’m tackling a small, awkward living room with a challenging layout. Along with sharing the design process, I’ve identified 6 key design lessons that you can apply to your own space. If you’re struggling with a small living room, these takeaways are sure to be incredibly helpful!
The ‘BEFORE’ Living Room
As you can see, this is a very compact space. While I don’t have the exact square footage of the living room, it’s clear that the area is quite small, with the foyer being proportionally tiny as well.
The staircase adds to the challenge of arranging furniture, making this living room an awkward space, my favorite kind of design challenge!
The Process
I began by drawing a rough layout of the living room, eyeballing the measurements in the Homestyler software. If you’re new to Homestyler, it’s a terrific application for visualizing 3D spaces.
I documented the whole process, so if you’re interested in watching it step-by-step, here’s the full video.
The ‘AFTER’ Living Room
Here’s the final result. I absolutely love how a thoughtful design can completely transform a space, to the point where you almost forget what it looked like before!
By the way, don’t miss the 4K HD video rendering included in the YouTube video I shared above, it’s absolutely stunning and so cinematic!
The Design Lessons/Takeaways
Let’s dive into the key takeaways from this virtual makeover. I incorporated 6 design lessons throughout the process, here they are:
1. Opt for an Asymmetrical Layout
Among the popular living room layouts, I find that asymmetrical layouts work especially well for small spaces. It’s a way of arranging furniture unevenly while still keeping things visually balanced.
I’ve actually written a full blog post about this and five other popular layouts, complete with examples, inspiration, and FAQs. Feel free to check it out!
6 Popular Living Room Layouts You Must Know About Before Shopping for Furniture
These will help you avoid costly design mistakes.
Small or awkward living rooms, like this one, often come with challenges like obstructing structures (like the staircase here) or multiple entry points, making furniture placement less intuitive. That’s why an asymmetrical layout works so well, it’s not about strict symmetry, which gives you more flexibility.
In this design, I placed a large couch along the window, paired it with two accent chairs facing the wall, and added another chair at an angle pointing toward the main seating area. This arrangement keeps the pathway into the space clear, prevents the furniture from feeling crammed, and ensures the room doesn’t look overcrowded.
2. Place Round-shaped Coffee Table and Side Tables
When adding pieces like coffee tables, side tables, or drink tables to a small living room, round-shaped furniture works best. The reason is simple: it takes up less space than rectangular or square pieces, and the rounded edges soften the look while creating a sense of visual balance.
When it comes to getting the measurements right, make sure the width of the coffee table (or the diameter, if it’s a circle, hello, geometry lesson!) is about 2/3rd the width of the longest couch in the arrangement. This ensures you have a coffee table that’s perfectly proportioned.
3. Anchor the Furniture Pieces With a Large Rug
It’s a common mistake to choose a smaller rug just because the living room is small. But this seemingly intuitive choice often backfires, leaving the arrangement feeling disconnected and less cohesive. The charm a large rug brings to a space is unmatched!
So, even in a small living room, opt for a larger rug like I did here. The rule of thumb for selecting the right rug size is to ensure that the front two legs of each furniture piece rest on it. This anchors the setup and creates a sense of visual balance.
4. Layer the Room With a Ton of Lighting
If there’s one key factor that can make or break the ambiance of any space, it’s lighting! This includes not just the style of the fixtures but also the bulb temperatures you choose. Together, the style, variety of lights, and bulb temperatures have a significant impact on the overall aesthetic appeal of a room.
For this living room, I layered the lighting by selecting timeless fixtures and incorporating a variety of options: wall sconces next to the TV, table lamps on the side and console tables, a picture light in the foyer, a chandelier in the foyer, and flush mounts on the living room ceiling. This thoughtful layering creates a warm, ambient effect and makes the small living room feel luxurious, despite its compact size.
5. Mastering the Art of Styling
In design, the details always matter. It’s the small choices that truly take a room from 'blah' to 'wow.' Styling elements like throw pillows, coffee table decor, vignettes, and picture frames are what make a room look polished and as if a designer worked their magic!
For this living room, I layered throw pillows on the couch, styled the coffee table using the rule of three (arranging objects in groups of three for visual appeal), and created a beautiful vignette (a collection of pieces that reflect personality), on the entryway console. In small living rooms, these details have an even greater impact because the entire space is visible at once!
If you’re on the hunt for coffee table decor inspiration, I’ve curated a list of 27 stunning ideas. Be sure to check it out!
27 Coffee Table Decor Ideas to Perfect Your Living Room
Stunning ideas for rectangle, square and round coffee tables.
6. Drapery for Window Treatments Is a Game-changer
When it comes to window treatments, drapery is often overlooked in favor of blinds or shades, especially white ones, which feel like a natural choice. The downside, though, is that these can give the space an office-like appearance, lacking the warmth of a home.
Curtains, on the other hand, are a total game-changer. The soft, natural drape of wide curtains adds a cozy, inviting, and luxurious touch to any room. While this living room already had curtains, they were too narrow to make an impact. I replaced them with wider drapery, paired with a black matte rod and pinch-pleated curtains. These small upgrades made a huge difference, instantly giving the space a designer-style look.
If you’re convinced and planning to add curtains to your home, I highly recommend checking out a post I published a while back, it’s full of helpful tips!
8 Common Curtain Mistakes Homeowners Make That You Should Avoid
If you want the designer look, this post will help you get there!
How did you like this virtual makeover? Would you like to see more transformations like this? Let me know in the comments below, I’d love to hear your thoughts!
If you have a small living room, we unpacked a lot of tips and ideas today. For any questions, design dilemmas, feel free to ask in the comments, and I’ll do my best to answer them!
