The living room is the beating heart of every home. It’s where families gather together for everything from important celebrations to casual TV watching.
If you’re going to take a picture of the kids in their graduation gowns, or open birthday presents, there’s a good chance that will happen in the living room.
For all these reasons, we don’t throw out suggestions for living room design ideas lightly. We understand that your family will spend more time together in this room than any other room of your home.
We know that this will often be the first impression guests get of your place. It must reflect your family’s unique style, while also meeting all your practical needs. Clearly, this requires some careful consideration.
With that in mind, we have created a list of some of our favorite living room designs.
We’ve picked out some great aspects of function and style to help give you some inspiration for your own home.
Take a look, and let’s start planning your new living room together.
White Space:
Clean, defined lines and understated colors brings this contemporary room to life.
Without the “busy” feeling of too many colors or patterns, we can instead focus on the open floor plan, leading up into the dining room and kitchen area, as well as to the staircase in the back.
Lofty Ideas:
The extra-high ceilings with exposed wood beams allow plenty of room for windows and skylights.
The natural lighting adds a bright and clean feel, enhanced by the polished hardwood floors.
The floor-to-ceiling fireplace mantle draws the eyes upward, bringing the viewer’s attention to the loft-style hallway.
Creating Space:
Even in smaller living rooms, strategic design choices can create a sense of spaciousness and functionality.
This smaller living room is given a more open feeling, thanks to a light color scheme, and a clever use of built-in storage and shelves.
The space is cozy and inviting, without seeming cramped or disorganized. Custom lighting adds even more brightness.
Vault Over:
A gorgeous vaulted ceiling draws the eye back to the impressive floor-to-ceiling windows at the back of the room.
Ornate chandeliers add a touch of grandeur, while the stonework fireplace speaks of simpler times.
Hardwood floors and a tasteful area rug bring a sense of warmth.
A Splash of Color:
Neutral colors dominate the room, allowing for a bright and airy look.
The built-in shelving, the area rug, and the throw pillows bring in a bold use of red as a contrast.
Also, not every living room needs to be remodeled around an indoor view. Sometimes the outdoors themselves can serve as the focal point.
Gather 'Round:
While the ceiling, walls and windows create lots of right angles, the curves in the couch, coffee table, and fireplace grate offer a nice contrast.
A wide entryway to the kitchen allows for a feeling of openness, and a great flow of one space into the next.
Angles:
Clever positioning of furniture in smaller spaces, lets us create pathways and clear separations in multi-purpose rooms, such as this one.
Tile flooring allows or a clean look, as furniture is placed along right angles. Large windows help open this space up.
Points of Light:
Here’s one of the best ways to remodel your home or apartment: custom lighting.
This unique lighting array adds quirky character without being too distracting.
Window seats, plush couches, and cushions make this an ideal room for cozy evenings at home.
Half Full:
Larger spaces can easily spread their furniture and décor too thin.
This clever and bold use of “empty” space makes the room look clean and modern, while also keeping the central meeting place fairly close in.
A mix of tile and hardwood makes for clear delineations.
Entryway:
When coming home from work or school, the first thing your family sees could be this welcoming and warm space.
The living room and dining room flow together in a smart use of a combined space.
This room also features a clever gas fireplace which adds that special glow to homes without a built-in.
Second Story:
Modern art meets modern living.
Even functional elements such as lighting or heat can be made into design statements when you remodel your kitchen, basement or living room.
This living room also makes great use of the loft feature for additional space.
Upstairs, Downstairs:
This living room sits right in the center of it all.
Here, we have opened up the flow of the entire home, including the kitchen/dining area and the second floor.
Clean lines and muted color schemes allow for the natural beauty o the hardwood floors to sparkle.
Understated Elegance:
A partial wall between the living room and dining room allows for just enough privacy, while also keeping the house open and airy.
The luxurious wallpaper and curved furniture lines of the living room pair excellently with the chandeliers in the dining area here.
Simple and Accessible:
Sometimes, family room design ideas have to work around positioning.
This room is located between two other rooms, but by using high and out-of-the-way storage space, as well as smaller furniture pieces, this family room won’t obstruct “traffic” coming through.
Classic and Cozy:
If you want to preserve the classic charm of your home, check out the beautiful wood molding along the ceiling, windows and doorway.
This nicely compliments the rich colors and polished wood of the furniture. A brick fireplace tops off this perfectly homey look.
Just the Essentials:
Yes, you could turn your living room into a literal log cabin through the clever use of wood in the walls, and the addition of a wood burning stove, naturally.
The tone-on-tone look of the couch adds uniformity but not rigidity to this rustic room.
Traditional Beauty:
Keeping the furniture relatively simple allows the natural beauty of this room to take center stage.
The rounded, turret-like room invites abundant light in through the large window, and the glass door.
A splash of bright color on the walls makes the white ceilings look all the more immaculate.
Going Green:
A dark jewel tone on the walls offers a striking contrast to the many windows.
The light and cross-breeze provided by those windows will make this elegantly simple room the most popular one in the house.
A large doorway provides easy accessibility.