An area rug adds the perfect finishing touch to any room in your home.  It helps draw the other design pieces of the space together.

Practical and beautiful, a well-placed Oriental rug (or multiple rugs) can be used to clearly devide living spaces. An area rug can be a real focal point, adding warmth or color.

Whether your style is traditional or modern, a well chosen rug gives a room it own reflection of your personality.

Finding the right size rug can be difficult.  If the size you select is too large or too small – the rug simply won’t complement your room as it should.   That is why we wrote this quick guide to help you choose the perfect area rug.

Let’s start with some general tips for getting the right size rug!

It’s not simply a case of considering what size space you have to fill.  You need to think of things such as: how much of the rug should extend beyond your furniture? What size gap should I leave between my rug and the skirting? Should chair and table legs be on or off the rug?

This can get complicated really quickly, but choosing just the right rug is simple if you follow a few basic rules…

Before you start…

Before you do anything else, think about what you need your new rug or rugs to achieve.

Do you want a rug to draw together certain items of furniture, to help create a separate seating area, or simply keep your feet warm? A rug has many functions; and in order to find one that’s the right size, you need to know what you’re asking it to do.

Next, make sure you have a full set of measurements to hand: of your room or the section of the room – and of the main pieces of furniture.

How to Measure Your Space for a Rug

If you’re one of those people who prefer to visualize the actual space rather than look at a list of measurements, use masking tape to mark rug sizes out on the floor. Take a few photos, or even leave the tape down for a few hours so you start to figure out how you’d walk around and generally use the space.

Another suggestion is to get a bed sheet, fold it to a standard rug size, and place it where you think you’d like a rug. This is an easy way to see how the rug size works with your furniture.

What room are you putting the rug in?

How a rug will sit, and therefore what size of rug you will need also depends on what room that it will be featured in.

One of the main uses for rugs in a living room is to create separate feature areas. Oriental and Persian rugs are perfect for space sectioning, especially if you want to create a distinct socializing space.

A cozy-looking rug teamed with a grouping of comfortable chairs will naturally create a space that people gravitate to. There’s something so inviting about gathering around a richly-colored and warm rug.

Also, unlike a full carpet, you can also take account of traffic patterns (the routes people take around a room). So make sure you have a series of “rugs and roads”.

Now we need to decide if the furniture is going to be completely under the rug or not.  There is no right or wrong decision here.  If you decided that you would like the furniture to be completely on the rug, than this means that for a living area you will need a larger size rug (9×12 and up).  Having the furniture completely covering the rug creates an “island oasis” effect and will make your seating area a focal point of the room.

Alternately, you can separate seating and social areas with multiple smaller rugs giving the space a more open and larger feel.  This is a good idea if you have separate sections of a room that you want to remain unique and their own focal points.  In this case the smaller rugs may not be big enough to completely fit under the furniture.

Another factor to consider is the room border.

If you’re going for a large area rug which will take most of your furniture, what size gap do you need to leave between the rug and the skirting?

12” to 18” inches is often suggested as a pleasing-looking border; however if it’s a smaller room you may want to reduce this as you’ll risk shrinking the room if the rug seems too big.

One of the last things that you need to consider when sizing the area rug for a room, is what the basic shape of the rug is.

Square/rectangular area rugs are the most common shape of rugs that you will find.  This shape is good for creating “zones” in room, which will draw people to specific areas for socializing.  Runner (long and narrow rectangle) shape rugs create natural walkways and lead people from one focal point to another.  Lastly circular rugs are natural center pieces to a room and will create an immediate central area that is the focus of a particular room.

Hopefully these guidelines will help you navigate through choosing the right area rug for your space!  Of course we encourage you to contact one of our staff design experts at (469) 387-6777 with any questions you may have about choosing the right rug size.  Don’t forget to buy your rug padding from Artisan Rug Care too!