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Home Decorating Design Dilemma living room

Living Space Layout Help

3 years ago

Hi there! My partner and I just had an offer accepted on our first home and we are thrilled. We are starting to lay out our furniture and was hoping to get folks' thoughts on our living room space as we're running into some issues.

Below are the images of our living room, the first image is a view from the back near the kitchen and the second image is the view from the front door. I know our fireplace is supposed to be the focal point of the living space and ideally we would have two regular couches set up near the fireplace with no TV, but we currently have a 65" TV that we want in this space, along with an L sectional couch. Our TV on top of the console table is quite tall at 58".

Our thoughts were below:

1) Fit our TV console table right of the fireplace (my partner does not want the TV in the left corner because of our sectional couch) and have the sectional portion of our couch start around the fireplace. Then put our dining room table to the left of the fireplace so it's the first thing you see when you walk in. In the actual "dining room" space at the back, put a cafe-style taller table similar to this. My partner prefers this option but I am worried about the flow with dining room table at the front of the house, and the console would also be blocking a vent.

2) Put our TV console table against the front of the house where the larger windows are. L sectional would open towards the fireplace to the right of the couch. Dining room table will go where the "dining room" space should be. This would cause our TV to block most of the nicest set of windows we have in our living room space and the majority of light.

Would love to hear of any other suggestions for layout with our current furniture as we're running out of ideas! Thank you all so much!

Comments (4)

PRO
BeverlyFLADeziner
3 years ago
The fireplace looks like an afterthought. Is it electric or gas and how does it vent if it's gas?

I think the FP will be your biggest impediment to creating a great room. If you want a TV that larger, this is where it should go and a linear FP is the solution.
S T thanked BeverlyFLADeziner
S T
Original Author
3 years ago
It's electric and I don't think we will be changing it right now unfortunately. I agree it's a huge impediment! We thought about mounting the TV over the fireplace but the fireplace is so dang large!
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There are two posts on this, and I'm not reading the comments on the other one. So off the top of my head in general I would say this ..... when you have a long room, break it up into TWO areas. That way you can pull your couch up closer to face the TV to take up what is now wasted space, and still have another space behind it for another seating arrangement ... depending on how much space you have that may be two chairs with a small table between or it may be four chairs in a circle around a round coffee table.
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Congratulations on the new house! In terms of what to put in this space, I do like the dark couches and how they contrast with your light walls and carpet. You do need some color, though. Some wall art that's high up enough where the kids can't play with it would help. Oranges and reds would brighten the room a bit and bring some visual interest. A coffee table to unify the couches a bit more could also help warm the space. I'm always a huge fan of natural woods with a smooth finish, like you can see here. You could probably get some bumpers for the corners of the coffee table so the kids didn't poke themselves by accident.
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Really either layout would work, they are basically mirrored images. But I guess I would reframe it this way... The kid/office drop area, I wouldn't do a built-in and I wouldn't want it near the dining table. It will get cluttered, and at some point the kids will outgrow the space and go to their rooms. Will it really be used for a home office space? Or just a catch all? Would rather it be in an area that could be reconfigured over time and taken over like in the seating area. Love the idea of doors to the outside, will you have a patio/ deck area? If not, please add.:-) If yes, the idea of the doors would be great to do one long deck along the run of the kitchen. Not sure what your outside landscaping is, but a grill area with seating is perfect off a kitchen. It would be a good time to think about the outside at the same time laying out the inside. Good luck!
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I would not give up living space for another bedroom down stairs. Converting the rec room to a bedroom is a better way to create a 3-bedroom house IMO, but there would be the issue of a bath for the converted bedroom.
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S T
Original Author
3 years ago
Oh it's actually a gas fireplace. We were just hoping to not need to do work on the place, but we will consider the option of remodeling the existing!
S T
Original Author
3 years ago
last modified: 3 years ago
@BeverlyFLADeziner I wanted to let you know that thanks to your comment, we are going ahead with a fireplace remodel. You were totally right that this is a huge impediment to our living space and the fireplace is so outdated in style that it doesn't match the rest of our updated house. We're going with a floor to ceiling build and a linear fireplace. Thank you so much for making the remodel suggestion, I'm not sure we would have done so without reading your comment!

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