How to

Decorate a Small Living Room

Just because your living room is small doesn’t mean you can’t have fun with it! From choosing the right sofa to making sure you have enough storage space, check out our handy small living room decorating ideas below.

Find Your Inspiration

If you’re starting from scratch, we recommend picking one point of inspiration to build the room around. It can be as small as a framed picture from a treasured trip with friends or even a throw pillow. From there, you can keep the room light and airy feeling so your inspiration piece really pops by sticking to light, neutral colors like white, cream, gray and beige.

Feel like taking it a step further? Pull an accent color or two from your inspiration piece. A solid brightly colored throw blanket on the back of a chair or couch can liven up your space instantly. Throws have the added benefit of adding comfort and polish to a smaller seating area without occupying a lot of valuable space the way accent pillows often do

Scale! Scale! Scale!

When decorating a tiny living room, you already know that every square inch counts. With that in mind, it’s important to make sure your furniture is appropriately scaled for the space. If maximum seating is your priority, opt for a mid-size sectional instead of a sofa and armchair combination. If you’re really pressed for space, you can even recreate the look and feel of a sectional by adding an ottoman to one side of the couch.

Pro tip: when you don’t need to put your feet up, you can put a tray over your ottoman and use it as a coffee table.

Have Fun

When it comes to colors and patterns in small living spaces, have fun with it! Mixing and matching colors and patterns across upholstered furniture and throw pillows is a great idea. If you’re worried about overdoing it, just remember to refrain from creating too many focal points in your room. By pairing down the number of patterned pieces in the space, you’ll keep your small living room feeling airy and fresh.

Pro tip: liven up a solid color sofa with an arrangement of fun throw pillows in a variety of textures and patterns. You can easily change them out to suit the season and your evolving sense of style.

Lighter, Brighter

Mirrors are a great choice small living rooms because they can help make the space feel bigger and brighter. Be strategic with where you place your mirrors in your small living room. If they reflect the busiest pattern in the room rather than the serene scene outside, your space may feel busier than it actually is.

With that in mind, if you’re pressed for vertical space as well as square footage, try and keep your drapes, curtains, and window hangings to light, neutral colors so it feels airy and bright. Even if you don’t have floor-length windows, you can use floor length drapes to draw the eye up and make the room feel just a little bit taller.

Pro tip: don’t forget the lights! If you’re pressed for space, swap the floor lamp for an extra pendant light or chandelier.