Design Ideas For A Long Narrow Living Room – Only a few weeks left until the One Room Challenge opens! Last week we had a photo session with our photographer and I saw some pictures. I just can’t wait to share the final details of this project with all of you.
You’ll remember from the Week 1 post (all Single Room posts can be found at the bottom of this post) that this room is long and narrow. It is about 24 feet long and about 11 feet 6 inches wide.
Design Ideas For A Long Narrow Living Room
I get questions all the time about how to set up a bowling alley! It’s not super intuitive.
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If you have a long, narrow space, it’s important to divide it into zones. The previous owners had the right idea: they divided the space in half with a sofa and two chairs to create a focal point around the fireplace. In the front half there was a wardrobe with a TV and two smaller loveseats.
It’s not bad, but not quite ideal. The front half with the wardrobe felt cramped and the two loveseats were awkward for conversation.
While I liked the placement of the furniture in the back half of the room by the fireplace, the rug was too small and the furniture didn’t allow the California shutters to open.
We solved the shutter problem by removing them and replacing them with drapery panels. It’s SO much brighter in here!
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Most people mistakenly believe that painting a room with a dark color will make it look dark and cave-like.
If we had left the shutters on, it would definitely have been dark in here (and we would never have been able to open them AND put furniture in the room because of the fixed elements in the space that define the decor…like the fireplace and french doors). opening into the room).
Sorry for my rant on this! It’s just such a misunderstanding that color and light are the same thing. Let’s go back to the arrangement.
So, when we work in a long and narrow living room, we want to divide the space into two or more zones.
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There are two separate areas in this room and the architecture dictates where to separate them as the room is squeezed about halfway between two windows.
As you can see in the back half of the room, we left the furniture around the fireplace. We could use four chairs here instead. Or we made a partition against the window (but this would partially block the window, and we did not want to use curtains that would hide the stained glass). So we kept the layout very similar to the previous owners, with a few changes.
We first used a larger mat. We have an 8 x 10 foot rug that leaves about 18 inches of space on each side.
1. Protects floors. The hardwood in this room is 120 years old. They are in decent condition, but starting to crack in a few places. There is no more room for re-polishing so they will eventually need to be replaced, however as they are still in good condition we want to keep them safe for as long as possible.
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2. Visually, a smaller rug will visually make the space smaller. And that space is already only 12 feet by just under 12 feet when we divide the space, so we don’t have room to make it feel smaller. Ideally, the rug should allow the front legs of all the furniture to rest on it. Or it should be big enough for all the pieces to fit completely on the mat. Because we wanted the floor border to be visible, we placed the front feet on the mat.
Another thing we changed in the room were the lamps behind the chairs. The previous owners had reading lights in here, which was functionally fine, but this room has no overhead light, so we needed more light that could radiate outwards rather than downwards.
– I often work here on my laptop because I don’t like sitting at a desk.
– When we have parties, this is a gathering place for conversations. We often have over 20 friends and want to create different social areas throughout the house.
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“We also sometimes watch TV in this room, although we mostly use our back family room for that because it’s at the back of the house and more private.”
– I use this room every week for hen parties (when everything is in order and meetings are in order again!). There are usually four or five of us coming back for drinks after dinner.
Knowing all this, I wanted the front half of the room to be a great conversation area, and one of my favorite solutions for this is four chairs in a circle!
You will see in the list that we have selected four amazing Bergere feather chairs. They are the perfect size for the space.
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The front half of the room is a little smaller than the back because the wall sticks out, so we went with an 8-foot square rug instead. We found one that matched the rug in the front of the room that was many years old, so that was awesome!
The rugs don’t have to match, they just have to complement each other. However, in this case, because of all the wallpaper pattern on the walls, I didn’t want to introduce too much new pattern and it was important that the carpet also featured the accent colors of navy and turquoise. So it made sense to buy the right one (which I don’t do very often!)
We needed to add more lamps to the front half of the room, which we talked about in the lighting post a few weeks ago (again, all the posts have links at the end if you want to check them out).
And we put a console table on the back of the sofa to give us a place to put drinks and food when we have company.
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As well as a side table under the arched stained glass window, which will create a focal point in this half of the room.
When I drew the floor plan for you, I missed another small table. In fact, there is a small side table next to the chair in the lower right corner of the picture, so the person also has a place to comfortably place their drink.
Please note that we have not used a coffee table here. Instead, we scattered end tables and console tables throughout the room to create the same function.
This allowed him to look more open and airy. Although it would be possible to put a round table between the chairs and leave the rest of the tables. I decided to go the same way because I really wanted to highlight my favorite stained glass window and make it the focal point.
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So, the room is arranged like this. In just two weeks I’ll be telling you all about the One Room Challenge and I’ll be able to share photos with you so you can see how all the little details came together. This is truly an amazing sight. We’ve shared with a few friends and the response has been mostly positive, so I can’t wait to spread the word! By clicking “Accept All Cookies”, you agree to the storage of cookies on your device in order to improve the website and analyze the use of the website. and assist in our marketing efforts. Privacy Policy
Kelly Dawson is a writer and editor specializing in architecture, interior design and culture. He has been writing since 2017. Her work has also appeared in Architectural Digest, House Beautiful, Domino, Bon Appétit, McSweeney’s, Vox, Tastemade and Thrillist.
The classic video game Tetris easily comes to mind whenever you are faced with the daunting task of arranging furniture in a narrow room. A sofa can look perfect on a certain wall, but as soon as a coffee table is placed in front of it, it can suddenly feel cramped—and a side chair is necessary for guests, but its small size feels more between plant and plant. ottoman So what can you do to win this real-life version of Tetris and create a vast space without much space?
“In tight spaces, you’ll often have to draft the perfect floor plan,” says Alessandra Wood, Ph.D., vice president of style at Modsy. “You might not be able to fit that side table next to the sofa, or you might only be able to fit one accent chair rather than two.”
Long Narrow Living Room- Interior Design Ideas
Planning is key to arranging furniture in narrow living rooms, bedrooms, etc. If you’re working with a small area, it’s important to be even more careful about which pieces stay and which go. Wood knows how difficult it can be to design an unusual space, so she offers her tips for tackling the layout of narrow rooms. “Don’t overdo your setup,” she says, and that should be your mantra when you’re starting out. To dive deeper, Wood offers some ideas for strategy.