One of the most common design faux pas that I come across is inaccurately sized rugs. Believe it or not – you can have a beautifully designed space – but if that rug is too small it is going to make or break the room. The cost for a rug can get spendy – so I believe that most tend to err on the conservative side and purchase the smaller size (in hopes of saving some money). However, in doing so it will likely lead to an unhappy design in the end. Trust me – large rugs are worth the investment. 🙂 Stick to a neutral rug if you are scared of design commitment. You can also layer the larger, more neutral rug, with a smaller, colorful rug that you can switch out throughout the seasons.
Living Room
Let’s start with likely the most important (and the most common design mistake) I see. Rugs that are wayyyyy too small for your living room. Never, ever should a 5 x 7 be placed in a living room – I don’t care how small your living room is. A 5 x 7 will just not fit….the way it should at least.
Below are two different ways to arrange your living room to determine which size rug you should purchase. The rule of thumb is to ensure that at least the front legs of each piece of furniture is on the rug.
Front legs on rug
As you can see I have the front 2 left of my chaise sofa on the rug as well as both front legs for my accent chair on the rug.
All legs on rug
Dining Room
The rule of thumb when determining which size rug you need for your dining room is to get a large enough rug that you can pull the chairs back without the legs coming off the rug.
Bedroom
Determining the size of your rug for your bedroom is much easier than your living room or dining room as it IS one size pretty much fits all. Unlike your living room – the dimensions of all king beds are relatively the same, which also goes for queen and full size beds.
King
If you have a king size bed an 8 x 10 rug is a safe bet purchase. For those who have a really large bedroom space – you can definitely get away with a 9 x 12 as well – but for the most part an 8 x 10 will work perfectly.
In our bedroom I used an 8 x 10 rug for under the king size bed. As you can see – there is still plenty of rug that get shown off from under the bed.
Queen
You can use an 8 x 10 under a queen bed (if you prefer more rug to be shown) or a 6 x 9 in a smaller size bedroom.
We used a 6 x 9 size rug in the bedroom we designed for our client’s daughter’s room. Due to the narrow size of the room and placing a desk and bookshelf in the room as well we opted for less rug coverage.
Full
Either a 5 x 7 or a 6 x 9 will work for a full sized bed. Again, the size of the room as well as accompanying furniture will ultimately determine which size suits your space best.
A couple other things to note
*You don’t have to have a rug under a dining table – although I do think it adds a layer of warmth and completion to the space.
*You can always layer rugs!
*Try odd shapes – such as the hide rug I used in this breakfast nook makeover or in this entryway.
