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Thread: Layout help needed - Difficult Room

  1. #1
    Jmon22 Guest

    Default Layout help needed - Difficult Room

    Hello,

    Need some help with the furniture layout in my family room. A bit of a difficult layout with two openings to the side and a fireplace on the top wall that sticks out a bit further than the image portrays. Currently have the layout a bit different but am moving to something similar to this. A few notes:

    1) Want to avoid dead zones that naturally occur in the top and bottom right corners of the room
    2) Have a 65" tv and want to maintain viewing angle straight ahead from couch, so placing this in a corner is not an option
    3) Layout seems boring to me. Open to pretty much any changes, furniture included

    Thanks!
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Click image for larger version. 

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    Last edited by Jmon22; 12-27-2016 at 08:26 AM.

  2. #2
    Join Date
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    Default Re: Layout help needed - Difficult Room

    Layouts are challenging when focused around a big screen TV, so you will never get something ideal, its a media room first and foremost, so the effect is to try to soften the theatre look. Without having the benefit or room photos its limiting, but from the schematic only I would put the console slight to the right of where the Loveseat now is, use a pair of smaller 'fireplace chairs' flanking the fireplace, something like these:

    Click image for larger version. 

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    Then a swivel chair off the wall and in the general region of the loveseat.

    Click image for larger version. 

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    Again, I don't know your style preferences and would have to see the room in photos from all four corners, but there's a start perhaps.
    Duane Collie
    Straight answers from thirty-six years in the business.
    My Private Messages are Disabled - Please ask questions here in the forum.

  3. #3
    cat@atl Guest

    Default Re: Layout help needed - Difficult Room

    That's a tough room because you have 2 focal points AND those two entryways AND a window.

    I agree with Duane that a couple visually-light chairs would look nice flanking the fireplace and ditto the console migration across the room to open up that doorway.

    I was also thinking of the hallway leading to this room, and what one would see when walking by.

    Door #1 near the fireplace: I like the idea of looking into the room to see a comfortable chair by the fireplace. TV's big enough that you should be able to watch it from that general corner area. A chair and ottoman might be nice, and you can position so that the ottoman is by the fireplace so it looks intentional that the fireplace's blocked because that's where you warm your tootsies. The ottoman can also move to other parts of the room as needed; with a tray, it can be a small side table where to rest your favorite beverage or book. You could do art, or sconces, or floating bookshelves to either side of the fireplace. To visually balance the chair, you could have something next to the fireplace. Fireplace tools or some wood seems obvious but it could be a big storage basket with a lid, you collection of walking canes, that delicious carousel bookcase that Levenger sells, etc. Whatever it is, it should not block egress.

    So that would be intentionally preserving 2 focal points for the room and kind of visually splitting the room into 2 areas (communal tv area, solitary fireplace area). If you like that approach, you could do the wall opposite to the fireplace as another area. Do you play cards or does anyone have hobbies/homework? You could do a round table and a couple chairs. A tilt-top table could be versatile and pretty. Then you could have a room that's kind of split into 3 areas. If you have young kids whose computer use needs to be monitored, it could go there until they are old enough then you get that space back.

    You could embrace the fact that it's a TV room and use up those empty corners with matching swivel chairs, angled towards the TV. Downplay the fireplace. The nice thing is that all one has to do to enjoy the fireplace is pivot and voila, you've left the TV room.

    What I like about Duane's suggestion is that it gives you flexibility. You could do the swivel on either corner and the 2 lighter chairs by the fireplace or on the opposite wall or move them around depending on how many guests/activities.

    I wonder if it would look terribly silly if you angled the loveseat to almost touch arms with the couch and created a quasi-sectional (all floating away from walls). Put a side table in that "corner". See if that works... nobody said furniture has to line up to the walls (unless not lining to the walls would make you crazy, then don't do it). If you are considering a sectional, that would be a way to mock it up.

    A round or oval coffee table might be nice if the loveseat moves closer since you'd have more people moving around and at that point, corners and shins shall meet.

    I hope that something in there helps! And yes, style preferences would help. Do you like traditional, modern, pared-down?

  4. #4
    Jmon22 Guest

    Default Re: Layout help needed - Difficult Room

    Quote Originally Posted by cat@atl View Post
    That's a tough room because you have 2 focal points AND those two entryways AND a window.

    I agree with Duane that a couple visually-light chairs would look nice flanking the fireplace and ditto the console migration across the room to open up that doorway.

    I was also thinking of the hallway leading to this room, and what one would see when walking by.

    Door #1 near the fireplace: I like the idea of looking into the room to see a comfortable chair by the fireplace. TV's big enough that you should be able to watch it from that general corner area. A chair and ottoman might be nice, and you can position so that the ottoman is by the fireplace so it looks intentional that the fireplace's blocked because that's where you warm your tootsies. The ottoman can also move to other parts of the room as needed; with a tray, it can be a small side table where to rest your favorite beverage or book. You could do art, or sconces, or floating bookshelves to either side of the fireplace. To visually balance the chair, you could have something next to the fireplace. Fireplace tools or some wood seems obvious but it could be a big storage basket with a lid, you collection of walking canes, that delicious carousel bookcase that Levenger sells, etc. Whatever it is, it should not block egress.

    So that would be intentionally preserving 2 focal points for the room and kind of visually splitting the room into 2 areas (communal tv area, solitary fireplace area). If you like that approach, you could do the wall opposite to the fireplace as another area. Do you play cards or does anyone have hobbies/homework? You could do a round table and a couple chairs. A tilt-top table could be versatile and pretty. Then you could have a room that's kind of split into 3 areas. If you have young kids whose computer use needs to be monitored, it could go there until they are old enough then you get that space back.

    You could embrace the fact that it's a TV room and use up those empty corners with matching swivel chairs, angled towards the TV. Downplay the fireplace. The nice thing is that all one has to do to enjoy the fireplace is pivot and voila, you've left the TV room.

    What I like about Duane's suggestion is that it gives you flexibility. You could do the swivel on either corner and the 2 lighter chairs by the fireplace or on the opposite wall or move them around depending on how many guests/activities.

    I wonder if it would look terribly silly if you angled the loveseat to almost touch arms with the couch and created a quasi-sectional (all floating away from walls). Put a side table in that "corner". See if that works... nobody said furniture has to line up to the walls (unless not lining to the walls would make you crazy, then don't do it). If you are considering a sectional, that would be a way to mock it up.

    A round or oval coffee table might be nice if the loveseat moves closer since you'd have more people moving around and at that point, corners and shins shall meet.

    I hope that something in there helps! And yes, style preferences would help. Do you like traditional, modern, pared-down?
    Really appreciate the thoughtful feedback. Our design taste is definitely more modern.

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