Space planning tricks

Several days ago I posted about my new living room arrangements and asked your opinions.

It was a pretty even split in opinions with a few additional suggestions.

I thought I would show you a few tricks to space planning without a drop of sweat or furniture sliders.

Mapping things out to scale is a good start. I got the bones of my room done on cardstock and raided the kiddie art supplies for my furniture cut-outs.

Previous arrangement on left--current on right

Above you can see the arrangement with the sofa on the long wall that has the huge painting. A lot of you want the sofa back there. They both look fine on paper as does this arrangement that was suggested below.

But wait! I also use another paper tool to really understand the space. Years ago some TV decorator guy said you only need 18 inches between furniture pieces. My knees hurt just thinking about that. I shoot for around 22-24 depending on the piece and maaaaaaybe 20 in a conversational group.

I make  a scale 24 inch square to test the arrangements.

See? Too close. This makes me claustrophobic.

Previous LR arrangement

In this one you can see that all of the seating is miles apart and I think that is why no one ever sat in there. It felt weird.

In this current set up there is plenty of room to move around without tripping over things but a close enough grouping to facilitate conversation.

It was also mentioned that chairs flanking the bombe chest would help ground the painting but as you can see it would be a bit tight. It is a problem I still haven't solved. I think I just need an extra two feet on the front of my house.

One more quick space planning tip.

I happen to like all of my readers out there and that is why I broke out the ruler and cut out little shapes for this space plan but its not my favorite activity. I hardly ever do it.

When I was deciding on an arrangement for my son's room I used the tape trick.

Without the bed in the room, I wanted to figure out where the desk would go. It fit perefctly on a small wall next to the closet but I wanted to make sure it was not too close to the corner of the bed. I placed tape on the floor marking the width of the headboard on the wall and from there measured to the spot where the corner would be. It was a great way to see clearly that it was not the spot for the desk.

You can get super crazy and do this with all of the furniture if you like also.

Either way, its a good idea to explain to the family that they are to leave the tape in place. My husband pulled this tape up within minutes and proudly, exclaimed, "I got all of the tape that you left on the floor!" 

He is really freakin' helpful.