We have had both a sectional and a "regular" sofa.

This sectional made a comfy, cozy space for people to gather, for honey and I to snuggle and helped to define the living area when there weren't any walls to help do that. Keep in mind our living are and TV veiwing are the same which is why the sectional served us so well.
The down side is that while it seems to offer a lot of seating the corners aren't that comfortable unless you're under 13.

Now that we've moved in to a very-slightly larger house we have a small, seperate room for TV veiwing. The "media room" has a "micro-sectional" and the "living room" (pictured) has an armless sofa and leather club chairs.

{{!gwi}}

Miles,
I love your current living, nice clean lines.
I also love your old one and the kitty - so cute!!!

Is it that you wanted a change that you went from sectional to regular sofas?

Thanks for your comment and picture. You did a great job decorating your new home!

Miles. Can you share info on the wine rack/cupboard?

I think the new modern sectionals are wonderful and I wish I would have purchased one instead of what I have now.

Truth be told, we sold the sectional while still in our old rental. In it's place we purchased a sofa/love seat/club chair in khaki linen. We hated it. It was too many pieces of furniture in our old rental and our new house.

All in all we discovered that each home has "unique" requirements: What worked in one place didn't in another. Our new place has more square footage but smaller rooms- so we chose to have a new couch (sans arms) made for the new living area.

The black wine cupboard came from Lowe's about 5 years ago. I don't know if they still have it but it has more than paid for itself since then. We still use it in our media room...

{{!gwi}}

thank you summiebee !!!

...

Miles,
Your TV room is very nice, too; I like the way you decor.
Thanks!!!

I don't think sectionals are a fad at all if you stick to a fairly classic style; they can be a very effective use of otherwise wasted space in some situations. There are indeed some butt-ugly sectionals out there, and it seems like the majority of them are absolutely massive, but there are others that are very attractive.

We have a sectional on its way (should be delivered in the next few weeks)... I really cringed at spending the money but in our small living room with only one rational furniture layout the couch-and-loveseat thing was just NOT working AT ALL, and we spend pretty much all our waking time at home there. We couldn't both stretch out to watch TV or read and there was a big nearly-3'-square hunk of unusable, inaccessible space in the corner of a room where we can't really afford to waste an inch. I tentatively broached to DH that I was finding this a bit of a problem, and he said he had hated it for a while now, and after watching CL for a while he sort of bullied ;-) me into biting the bullet and heading for the furniture stores, and we put off a couple of other planned purchases instead. The one we picked out is very traditional in style and just the right size for us both to stretch out and play a little footsie in the corner ;-) (we gave it the lie-down test in the store, much to the saleslady's amusement) but still fits the small space with no waste. Most of our friends are pretty cuddly LOL so I don't foresee any problems with the usability of the corner spot - as a group we've been to gatherings where the main seating was a big sectional and no one seemed to really fret about getting the corner spots. I found getting in and out of the chaise-style sectionals to be much more difficult.

I really love the easy care of leather furniture but there was no way we could afford it this time around, and I have come to truly loathe microsuede (especially since most of our other furniture is antique, it just looks weird), so we went with a low-pile slightly plushy fabric that I would describe as almost like a velvet but without a visible directional nap, with a high durability rating... I got permission from the saleslady to abuse the fabric samples a little bit, so we did things like rub it over the dog to see how it held the hair. :-) (I vacuumed it after!)

Ohhh, this is such a sore subject with me right now :( We have a 22x24 den. We first bought a large sectional. It had 2 built in recliners and a queen sleeper (pretty darn comfy!) Everyone loved it. It could sit NINE people (7 or 8 quite comfortably). One of reclining "pulls" broke (DH could have fixed it) but it was under warranty so we called for them to fix it. They don't make that sectional any longer and told us to choose a new set :o This is "his" room so I let him make the decision. HATE it and so does everyone else! It's not comfortable to sit in. It *might* look nicer but no one can just plop down and feel at home. I'm trying to rally everyone in our extended family (that visits) to drop little hints about replacing it with another sectional :) Our room was just made for it...literally, it was. DH designed and built the room, complete with a round wall, for a sectional. The round wall starts at the bend of the sectional...it's just out of camera view.

monica- don't look now... but there is a whole herd of deer watching you....

When we lived in New Orleans, we rented an apartment in the Warehouse District. It was a great place - an old building that once served as a sugar factory/warehouse. We had large rooms with high ceilings. We found the perfect sectional that just "made" the room - it was a raspberry-colored leather, very large sectional, with a chaise at one end. Clean lines, none of that puffy, pillow look. Probably one of the the most extravagant, wildest purchases we ever made, but it just fit. It was perfect, because living in New Orleans, we had tons of company. We'd spend the day touring and then all come back and collapse on that giant piece of furniture! This was back in the 1990's. Everyone loved it, but when we moved back to Misssissippi in 2001, it just didn't fit at all in our new house. We really were disappointed and sad to let it go.

Last week we were helping our nephew shop for furniture for his new apartment and conversation turned to our old sectional. He said he would give anything to find one like ours, and everyone started talking about how great it was!

johnmari,
Thanks a lot for your comment.
yes, I have seen thse masive sectionals that your are mentioning.
I have seen some sectionals that the corner spot is rounded so it is a little bit more comfortable. I have never had a sectional before and that is why I am not sure.
I think I am going to do the lay-down test in the store, too ;-) I know that my DH will feel embarrased :)
I hope you enjoy your new sectional when it arrives,

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Monica,
Thank you for your message and pictures.
That is a beautiful chrismas tree. Did you change the carper?

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Miles,
You are terrible :)
(in a good way)

I agree with everything JohnMari said.. and there is a big part of me that is wishing I had bought the sectional I saw a few months ago. I was looking at a Smith Bros of Berne Indiana sofa. The profile was pretty small (and had lots of configuration options) but it didn't compromise on seating comfort or space. My only complaint was that the style was pretty boring but that can be a plus too as it will last through different iterations of your style.

The only reason I passed on it was because I balked at the price tag for leather. The truth is, I have spent just as much for seating and I am not using the space as efficiently as I would have with the sectional. I have yet to sit on another sofa that was as comfortable.

wodka,
Those are nice memories! I have seen sectionals with a chaise at the end an they are nice!
The way you describe your old home, makes me think of a Loft.
Thanks for sharing your sectional story.

marthalena, you're so welcome. You should have seen us trying to figure out whether it would fit or not - we would tape the newspaper together and lay it out, according to the sectional's dimensions. (That really does help give you an idea on how a piece of furniture will look and fit.) It really was a beautiful piece, and I loved that we bought it locally from a local New Orleans furniture store.

We ended up giving it to a family friend - they have a very large family - adopted and biological children - and they wanted something for their tv room where they could all fit. I could just picture all of those cute little kids curled up on it. So, our sectional had a happy ending.

We bought a new house when we moved to Long Beach, MS and had just bought a new sectional that didn't even compare to our New Orleans one. We barely had it (3 months?) before Katrina blew it all away.

So, here we are, in a new home, and we have two love seats and bergere chairs for our sitting area. Talk about totally different, but it fits.

Good luck to you on your decision.

What are people's perspectives on the chaise style vs the "regular" style? I'm looking to purchase one relatively soon, probably from PB. My kid & his buddy sleep in the FR for sleepovers and I could see one hogging the chaise while the other has the regular part. Hope I'm not hijacking this thread -- just been following it closely.

We have an enormous, rather poofyleather sectional in our family room. Style-wise, it has very little going for it. However, it has a chaise on one end, a recliner on the other, and a hideabed (we gets *lots* of company!) in the middle. We have two kids and a dog, so the leather is perfect for us (although whoever named the taupe shade "toasted marshmallow" needs to attend a few more backyard weiner roasts, LOL), and we all fight over the chaise when it comes to movie night!

Carrie

Here is a link that might be useful: Devon sectional from Lazyboy

BKO, you really need to go to a furniture store and give the "butt test" to some sectionals with chaises to see if they will work for you. Being short, plump, arthritic, and not getting any younger ;-) I found the chaise part quite awkward to get up from, especially on a very deep/squooshy sectional as so many are, so they were eliminated from consideration almost immediately. Other people think they're the greatest thing since sliced bread so you really have to try it and decide for yourself. Even if a PB store near you doesn't have the right model, they're made by Mitchell Gold so you could look for a retailer selling MG, or just look for something with similar dimensions and proportions. Personally, I think that a regular style sectional would be better for sleepovers.

This is the one we picked out: Flexsteel Jennings but envision one side with three cushions, not counting the corner, instead of two. It came out to something like 90x110-ish, luckily DH isn't overly tall so we both have room to stretch out. I really liked the cut-back arms for reducing the visual mass (but there's still enough arm to rest a head on comfortably! LOL) and having all square cushions means they can be shifted around in hopes that they'll wear more evenly.