5 Ideas for Pulling Off Round Rugs Successfully & Stylishly

Have you wanted to incorporate a round rug in your home, but haven’t quite been sure how to do it successfully? Using round rugs in a room isn’t exactly rocket science, but there can be a lot of questions when you decide to rock the circular shape. Just like any rug, considerations of how much of the floor space it should take up, just where it should be centered and what sort of room can pull it off sometimes confuse even the most veteran of designers.

These aren’t the only ways to make sure a round rug fits comfortably and beautifully into your space, but they’re ways we think are easy to implement and pull off.

Top image: Make it big enough for all of a room’s major furniture pieces to touch
That rule for square and rectangular rugs — try to get at least part of the furniture pieces in your sitting area to touch the rug — applies even stronger with a round rug. When measuring, remember that the rug’s curved edges could look odd if they don’t allow enough of the furniture pieces to rest on top. This idea beautifully illustrated in this post’s top image in the Brick House by Clare Cousins Architects via This Is Paper.

Under round or curvy furniture
A round dining table or coffee table will work beautifully on any shaped rug, but there is a certain harmony that happens when you mix a round furniture piece with a round rug. Just make sure in the case of dining tables you get a rug in a large enough size that the dining chairs still fit on it when you pull them out to eat. We spotted this example on The Design Chaser.

In a minimally designed room
In a room where design and furnishings have been kept to a minimum, a round rug has even more opportunity to show off its curvy shape. And round rugs tend to soften the sometimes sharp and harsh edges that some minimal spaces can have. This one spotted on A Merry Mishap.

Defining a vignette
Perfect for an entryway, bathroom or the corner of a larger room, using a round rug — especially colorful or patterned — partnered with a small and functional furniture piece can really make for a powerful and unique vignette. This example spotted on Anthropologie!

Having something in common with another statement piece in the room
Connecting your round rug to a visual focal point in your space, like a statement furniture piece or art, will give your rug something in common with something else in the room, and you’ll be able to be a little more flexible with where you place it in the space and how big it needs to be. This double dose of blue as seen in Este Mag shows how it’s done.

Ready to try round rugs out? More ideas and shopping resources:

• Think Outside the Rectangle: Round Rugs
• Try This: Create an Inexpensive Floor Covering with Cheap Round Rugs
• 10 Circular Rugs
• Inspiration: Round Rugs
• Small Space Design Tip: Use A Round Rug
• Round Rugs Under $100