If you caught yesterday’s post, you already know we’re wrapping up the floors this week and moving all of our furniture back upstairs on Saturday and we can barely wait! The floors are looking beautiful and are a great launching pad for a lot of the other improvements we want to make in the house eventually. Those will come. After the floors, we’ll likely take a little break from large-scale projects for a couple months (painting the cabinets can wait!) and focus on finally settling into our home and freshen the decor, hang art, tackle accessories like new pillows and curtains–all things that will better establish this house we’ve lived in for 6 months, feel like home.
First on our agenda was a new area rug for the living room in the great room area. We plopped down our 8×10 jute rug we bought in for last home’s living room in the space when we moved in and it always felt a little on the small side. The front furniture legs barely fit on the rug and it forced us to keep the area tight, instead of spreading things out a bit.
But maybe the biggest push for a new area rug was that the jute rug is almost a perfect color match to our new floors and we were ready for a splash of color as well as something softer and plush underfoot with a new baby on the way. Thinking we would just go up a rug size, I started looking for a 9×12 rug and found several that I liked. It wasn’t until I was sure I found the one that I realized–a 9×12 perhaps wouldn’t be ideal. I did a lot of taping things out on our floor every which way, but here’s how the reasoning breaks down:
1. An 8×10 rug is where we started. Like I mentioned, it limited how spread out we could place our furniture, but on the positive it did provide a great flow on either side leading out the french doors to the backyard, as well as, passed the piano (there is also a bench by the piano that narrows the flow a little more) to the dining room/kitchen.
2. A 9×12 rug was the natural next step in my mind. But after taping it off and mocking it up in a floor plan, it was clearly not the best option. With this orientation, all seems okay, but we really only gain a foot of carpet to expand our living room furniture–that would likely translate into 6 more inches under the furniture to make it visually more comfortable. That’s fine. The real problem was the 12 foot width didn’t leave any room for flow through the piano nook to the dining room. 
Oriented the other way, and our 93″ sofa would only have about 6-7 inches of area rug on either side which felt really uncomfortable and narrow.
3. I gulped and mocked up a 10×14–which seems really large and really expensive. This size allowed us to keep the same 10′ width that was so perfect for flow with our 8×10, while also allowing us the expand our living room a bit and let our furniture rest comfortable on the area rug completely. Visually, it made the room feel so much larger, too, and allowed for a lot more space for soft play for the girls.
We fell hard for one cushy rug and luckily it came in a 10×14 size! The Baxter rug from Crate and Barrel got great reviews, was soft, and a bold color–although felt neutral like a good pair of jeans at the same time.
Granted, it was a lot more than we ever spent or ever thought we would spend on an area rug. But, it is also a lot larger! Like I did when we bought our Lounge sofa, I bid on a 10% off coupon on Ebay to help off-set the cost a little bit.
I ended up paying $3.82 and saving almost $150!…which basically covered shipping. I’ll take it!
It’s due to arrive next week so we’ll be sure to share in-house photos and all the cushy details then. I never imagined dropping so much money on an area rug, but Chris is quick to remind me–we’re going for quality and comfortable choices in this home and this rug fit the bill…and the room. The most important lesson I learned though was to not always assume the next size up is what you need. I almost made a costly mistake. Have you been there?
I hope we love it just as much in all of its 10×14 glory when it gets here! Stay tuned.
Great Post! Thanks for share about Measuring for a New Area Rugs
You’re in the final stretch with your floors. Hang in there! I’m so amazed at all that you have done to make your house a home and to keep it open and informative to the web. Congrats on all of your hard work and just know that your flooring finish is just on the horizon! Can’t wait to see the final results.
Maybe i’ll order one of these rugs. I like the style of them.
I’ve NEVER heard of bidding on coupons!
Does Charley shed much? We bought a darker rug about this color one time with disastrous results. We have a collie with red and white fur. Every speck of hair showed up…and eventually I craigslisted it before I ended up in the loonybin or in Compulsive Vacuumers Anonymous.
Either way, it’s gorgeous :)
She sheds like crazy twice a year. We try to keep in under control with her furminator brush, but I am a daily vacuumer in general. That being said, we’ll see how it goes! Hahaha!