Sarah, I have a similar situation. I don't have a U sectional but I do have a 24x21 room where the seating area furniture floats in the middle on an 8x10 rug. The front feet of the sofa are on the rug, along with coffee table, chair and ottoman. I don't think it looks quite right to be honest. The rug should be bigger. On the other hand, I like to see more of my wood floors. I'll be interested to see what suggestions people have. One thought would be to test sizes using your existing wall to wall carpet once it is removed. Hang on to a piece cut at 10x14, then try cutting it down to 10x12, 9x11, and 8x10, and see which one works best.

Great idea ^ about testing sizes w/the removed carpet. You might be surprised at what you can find within your budget, though. I have a big entryway rug (8x8) that I found on Overstock for about $200.

An antique rug vendor told me and my boyfriend to invest in rugs that we love that are smaller but better quality. He told us that hiding most of it under furniture wasn't really good for the rug and our money would go further this way. Since he could've tried to sell us something larger or more expensive, I've always thought he was being pretty kind and helpful. It's advice I've tried to follow. We have a lot of smaller oriental type rugs to fill the large spaces in our bedroom, but none of them are under the furniture. I think it's up to you and your taste.

You might not have as many fancy pattern choices, but since you need such a large rug, you might try going to home depot or lowe's an having a piece of wall-to-wall cut to the right size for you. I have not personally done this, but have heard it can be done.

I have ordered rugs from USArugs.com and been pretty happy. They sometimes have insaaaane sales, so it's worth watching out for.

Hi Sarah,

My family has been in the rug business for a long time, and in our experience/ opinion, you're not really confined to having to buy a large sized rug. A bigger rug will make a room look bigger though. There's a PDF that covers some trips & tricks on finding the perfect size rug below.

http://loloirugs.com/care/rugs101book.pdf

Good luck in your rug search!

- Steven

I had a great success in our living room. I ordered 1 yard of four different colors of carpet from the carpet store. Then a carpet fabricator (actually the same company that cleans my rugs) cut the four colors into stripes of varying widths and then stitched and glued them together. Finally the fabricator added a binding around the edges. Now I have a custom made rug that is the perfect color and size for my living room. Here's a photo of it while it was still at the fabricator's workshop. http://pinterest.com/pin/280419514270175494/

Repeat after me: Say no to sectionals! Say no to hardwood floors! Resist the urge.

You might ask, hey minilauren, why the hate. Here's what I don't like about sectionals and hardwood floors.

1. Sectionals are too boxy. It says hey I gave up trying to find complementary chairs, sofas and couches. I'll just cheat and use an unappealing box that I don't need to match to any other seating option.

2. Hardwood floors are awful. I had them at my parents house and my room was always cold. They are aesthetically cold too. Personally I don't get people spending all this money on nice hardwood floors to cover them with rugs. Get new carpet, maybe a short shag with mixed hues of one color. (My mom's carpet is tan with caramel. It is lovely!).

So in short redo your whole design plan. Ditch your ugly sectional. (I know you don't have a picture of it here, but if it's a sectional it's ugly to me because it's a big box of nothing). Ditch your hardwood floor plans. Your room will thank you!

Hey minilauren, maybe since she's asking she likes her sectional, and obviously is excited to invest in hardwood floors. Not that it isn't good to raise ideas outside the box (or boxy sectional?) but, just saying.

I have almost the exact same layout and I have the exact same issue ... my wife says we are not spending the money on a 8x10 or larger rug. (She seems to think an 8x5 will work, centered in the sectional's center, with just the coffee table touching it. I think not!) Very interested in what the thoughts are here ...

stepheninportland, can't wait to check out your link when I'm no longer at work ...

loquaciouslaura I understand if she's excited about her boring (to me) sectional and hardwood floors, but I thought I would offer a different solution. If she really wants a rug and/or she doesn't want to consider my alternative, by all means go for it Sarah! But I am free to share alternative ideas, and there's no need to point out that it isn't suggesting a rug. Sarah can make that call, so your comment is really unnecessary.

I agonized over my rug selection. Technically my room needs a large size rug, but I found a 5x7 that I fell in love with at Anthropologie and it was 75% off! I initally set it up how I was "supposed to" with the front of my sofa resting on it, but it just never looked right. I finally just pulled it out a few inches in front of the sofa and it looks great! It's centered in the room and the pop of color is great. My point is, just do whatever looks right to you. 99% of people don't know the "rules" anyway.

I don't think that loquaciouslaura was saying you weren't free to make alternative suggestions. I think that she, like I did, felt that your suggestion was insulting in tone to Sarah and the choices that she has made so far.

I think you will be very happy. I don't recommend a larger rug as in my experience that is the part that people will walk and it tends to look different from the rest of the rug.
You do not have to keep you furniture all on the rug, but move it off an or so and your rug will cover a bit more wood but not too much.

I would go for texture in the rug although you don't mention what else you have going on in the room. Texture is just more interesting on wood I think.

jolene13 and minilauren: yep, I was gently pointing out that the tone wasn't really needed.

When I first moved in I started out with a 5x8 rug with all my furniture arranged around it. It looked really skimpy and the non-rug area seemed a bit of a no man's land. A bigger rug allowed me to expand the overall footprint of the seating area, making it feel more relaxed and luxurious.

I think a too small rug is a big mistake people often make, usually because they find a rug they love that is smaller than what they need, or they are trying to save $$. If this is the main living room of your house, a great rug will be a great investment in your design. If you shop the sales, you can find 8x10 rugs for under $300. Or get a jute rug, they always look great I think - not comfortable to sit on though, if you or your family likes sitting on the floor.

I had the same problem and decided bigger was better and saved my budget up an extra while to afford the one I wanted. In the meantime, we picked up a canvas drop cloth the approximate size and stenciled it as a cheapie placeholder. Worked like a charm, and we were certain we liked the size ahead of time.

@steven Portland, I couldn't picture how that would look until I saw it. Great solution, and beautiful colors together.

Cowhide works every time

Well I'm insulted that my opinion came off as insulting to Sarah. Unless Sarah says she was insulted, don't put words in her mouth. It's hard to read tone on the internet, so all I will say is that was not my intent other than to get her to reconsider her idea.

Remember, when deciding what to buy: all the "natural" materials -- sisal, jute, hemp and cotton -- stain SO EASILY. Sisal, jute and hemp will stain just from water. (Seagrass is much more resistant to staining, since it grows underwater.)

oh jeez, simmer down everyone.

I think Parnassus' first comment is bang on, try some stuff and see what works. I also debated rug size for so long and drew diagrams as you have done....it was so hard to tell until we got a rug in our space. Thankfully the first one worked!

Also, try a little asymmetry...offset the rug to one side of the sectional, might bring some visual interest to the room?

orrrrrr, you might not even need a rug?

Rule #1 on rugs....all furniture legs on or off. In this case, I believe a smaller rug in the middle of the sectional will be sufficient. Flor tiles are look great until the adhesive wears off and they start getting wonky. Plus, who knows how the adhesive will affect your hardwood floors. Make sure to get a rug pad underneath to protect the floors from any harsh backing.

I was/am very interested in this post since I have a similar problem. Like other folks, I bought a cheap 5x8 rug that now floats in our living room- I am embarrassed by it every time someone comes to our house. I am saving up for a ~$400 Flor rug- perfect for toddler, dog and cat spills. My living room has less space between the TV and the couch, so I am getting 27 carpet tiles, and I am going to cut three tiles in half along the long edge to get a perfect size rug that will be 1000% family friendly.

I love a big rug, but sometimes I see images of rooms with no rug and reconsider my love! It would save you $1000. But if you feel like you really want a rug, I would not rush to buy one. Take your time looking for one. Do you have an interior designer friend that can look at your space and give his/her opinion? Sometimes I want a professional's opinion if I am goign to spend a lot of money.

I'm surprised no one has suggested this yet but I would check out http://www.flor.com/

They have lots of patterns and colours and you can make the rug any size you want without being stuck to the regular sizes most rugs come in.

I would personally make your rug larger than the 8x10 you've shown. I think rugs always look better when your furniture fits on it or it's slightly larger than your furniture. So I would have the rug showing slightly beyond the back portions of the sectional and to the front where you've already shown it. Closer to a 10x11 or a 10x12 rug . Though I'm not sure if I would have ths sofa table all the way off or all the way on the rug.

Either way FLOR provides some pretty decent options to allow you to make the rug larger or smaller.

a 10x12 rug from floor would run you between 450-750 depending on what tiles you picked etc. So for such a large rug it's reasonably priced. plus if you ever had a stain you couldnt get out you could jsut replace that one tile and not the whole rug. :)

Floor - flor

It can be helpful to tape off on your floor (use painter's tape, which won't leave residue behind) the rug size you're thinking of using. You can leave it for a few days and see how you like the (imaginary) dimensions.

I've recently seen a lot of examples among friends and in the stores of sewing smaller, not so expensive, rugs in matching colours together to make one big rug suited for just your purposes. It can even look good when it's assymetrical - at least when my friend gets going! Just stitch it together with big stitches in a matching or a cool contrasting thread and you're done.

Something like this, though the one my friend made is made with contrasting mats in more sedate blueish tones:
http://aleathascuriouswork.blogspot.se/2012/01/new-rug-colorful-wabi-sabi.html

Sorry,but i have to agree with Minilauren.I had hardwood installed a couple of years ago after being swayed by the mags and shows,and I utterly LOATHE it. Its cold(unless you spring for under floor heating) its dusty as all get out,and it was hideously expensive.Not to mention a 5 day job ended up being 2 weeks! That was 2 weeks of dust,dirt,everything in disarray,things getting broken,etc.The ultimate irony is,Ive got the bedrooms and most of the living room under room sized rugs now! Huge regret.

I went for no rug with my new hardwood floors, and I'm surprised how much I like it (I was too cheap to buy a new rug). However, I had a similar rug problem in my last apartment, and I decided to buy a smaller rug and put in on the diagonal. Two corners were under the furniture and two were not, and it was oriented to flow with traffic through the room. It worked pretty well, and the rug looked like it fit.

Oops. Hit submit too early. I was going to say, you could try diagonally with a straight side following the line of the fireplace.

Asked her and she said she used this as a model:
http://www.skonahem.com/Global/Skonahem/2012/nr%2013/Annedal/kok.jpg

LOVE hardwood floors. Anybody who has ever pulled up some wall-to-wall carpeting can attest that stuff holds onto tons of dirt. Hardwood seems infinitely cleaner. And "cold" works for lots of us in warmer climates; its not as cold as tile!

Decorating "rules" are meant to be broken. They are only safe guidelines for those who can't figure out alternative systems that work just as well.

I, too, have hardwood and a sectional. (My sofa is smaller, with a chaise at one end, one single seat, and a recliner at the other end -- chosen for our old home as the best option for that space, and not in poor enough condition to upgrade, yet.)

We chose an area rug (after buying two others and returning them, at Home Goods) which fits about six inches under the front of sofa (which is against a wall, so no need to get behind it) and extends about a foot or 18 inches past the end of the chase section and a few inches to each side. Our coffee table is a rectangle that fits within the L of the sofa, so the rug extends about a foot past the table as well. (The table is a lottle too close to the side of the chaise for comfortable access, but I'm petite and the only one who ever takes that route, and it LOOKS ok, so we cope.)

So what I'm describing it very similar to the spacing you show in your diagram with an 8x10, so I endorse that plan! It works for us, leaves a fair amount of hardwood showing and looks/works just fine even though, like you, our media unit across from the sofa isn't on any of the rug.

(The rugs that we returned were prettier colors, bigger, and closer in tone to the medium toned floor, and turned out to simply be too light for the room. The keeper is dark brown flat weave chenille, with a textured geometric pattern woven in. Turned out we needed the dark rug to balance the dark Mission-style tables. I was afraid of it, since we have two cats and a house rabbit, but weekly vacuuming and occasional hand-vac touchups keep it in pretty good shape.)

C'mon. Spring for some radiant heat under that wood and skip the rug. Put those planks down old school herringbone or some lovely pattern. Enjoy.

Thanks everyone for the ideas for my living room! I totally missed that my question had been posted, so my bad for not chiming in earlier. The new floor went in late last week and we love it. We like the look, and also like that it’s easier to keep clean since we have a baby who will soon be crawling around.

@Parnassus Dang, I wish this question had gotten posted before the floor went in! Saving the old carpet to test various sizes is a GREAT idea. Now that the floors are down, the best idea I’d managed was to tape out various size areas on the floor, like @goat suggested.

@minilauren I’m not insulted, but your original suggestion was a little over the top since it’s not really feasible for us to redo the entire design plan! :) I know sectionals may not be the most stylish thing, but ours is comfortable and we like it. As for hard floors being cold, we live on the gulf coast, so to me that is actually a good thing 9-10 months of the year. To each their own, right?

Like a few others have recommended, I don't want to rush into something, so for now we're living rug-free and I'm keeping my eyes out for the right solution.

I'm quite surprised to read hardwood floors are "cold". Here in the Mediterranean they are thought to be "too warm", as they were traditionally seen as a northern thing. I guess they are "too warm" compared to our traditional terracotta tiles.
Life is amusing. :-D

I don't think you should try to get a big, big rug where most of your cost is under furniture. I'd consider a luxurious flokati (sheepskin) or one of those new, very long shag pieces for the center only. Then use handwoven oriental runner rugs in the walkways behind the sectional. The pure wool will feel wonderful when you walk and the colors will really pick up the decor with all those windows and doors you have. Used runners are available on eBay and other sale sites, and with oriental rugs, which last a very long time, some wear is even desirable. New rugs are often available in sales that seem ubiquitous. If you think the wool will be too warm you can kilims or flat woven runners, but the rugs were fine for the desert so I don't think it would be a problem. Mine feel wonderful underfoot no matter what the temperature.

Hi Sarah,
I've been told that the cardinal rule with rugs is that the rug should be big enough to fit all the furniture, or smaller than the furniture. No half-on, half-off! I think that I would be inclined to go larger, because it would make the space look larger.