The Living Room Decorating Mistake Everyone Makes

These three rugs show two bad options and one good one. The round rug is cute, but the wrong shape. Round rugs are generally best for pass-throughs and square rooms where a rectangular rug would look awkward. The small rectangular rug is too small for the space, will feel dwarfed by the furniture, and will be almost completely covered by the coffee table. The final rug (at the far right) is the right size and proportion for the room because it covers a large portion of the space while leaving some breathing room around the edges. There's no hard, fast rule on how much space you should leave around a rug, but I like to make sure there's at least 12 inches on all sides. Additionally, it's important to make sure furniture pieces like dressers and media consoles are on the wood floor, not layered over the rug so make sure to take that into account when determining a rug size.