WHY I NEVER LIKED MY PURPLE RUG
The featured image above is from Dash and Albert’s rug collection as seen at Denfair.
There are some things that I want to change when I walk into a room, like artwork, a rug etc...and when it's my own home, it can get frustrating.
Years ago, after we renovated our family home, we needed a new rug in our family room to replace the one that had become dirty and worn. We were keeping the two sofas and the coffee table but had tweaked the layout of the family room by the removal and repositioning of doors.
At the time, with the stress of feeling like the renovation was never going to finish, I hadn’t turned my mind to the type of rug I wanted. And maybe in hindsight I was a bit indecisive as to what colours and style I was after. My husband was keen to finish off the decorating of the family room and so one day while we were driving home, we saw a rug shop. We pulled over and within 10 minutes we had a new rug. So it came home with us.
It was lovely having a new rug. Being wool, it was soft and it had the colours that had been used in the house. The purple (or aubergine), white and green in the rug looked good. It was certainly an improvement on our old rug. However, after the excitement of a new rug had worn off and the renovation was well and truly over, there was something I didn’t like about my purple rug. And it bothered me every time I analysed my room (as I do). Do you know what it was?
It was the SIZE!
The purple rug was a standard rectangular rug. And it was lovely and thick. But it was too small for the space. The rug did not go under the feet of the sofas and therefore left a decent gap between the sofa and the edge of the rug (exposing my feet to the cold tiles). And because it was a dark colour in contrast to my lighter coloured sofas, it seemed that its small size was highlighted even more! And as it was too small, the purple rug actually made the family room look a bit smaller and not as cohesive or as cosy as it actually could have been.
So I obsessed on and off about this for a while. But meanwhile, the purple rug saw some good times. The birth of our daughter, our dog chewing toys on it and family get togethers. But when it was finally time for the sofas to go (after surviving the baby and toddler years), so too did our purple rug. Actually, there is a happy ending, as the person who took our couches also took our rug. So, I’m only hoping that the purple rug is enjoying its new space (and ‘fits’ in better). Oh and I did get a new bigger rug for my family room!
So what did I learn:
Don’t buy in a hurry (if it doesn’t feel right)
Measure your space and furniture layout, before you buy
Buy a big rug that goes under the furniture
Some suppliers will let you see the rug in your home before you buy it
Having said that, there are always exceptions to the rule. But in designing a living room, this is a good one to follow!
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