What Are the Most Important Considerations in Modern Living Room Design?

In our previous blog, How to Design the Ideal Living Room we outlined the architectural considerations that go into designing a living room for your modern home.

While those functional considerations are key, because the living room is not a utility space like your laundry room or, well, utility room, form needs to meet function so that your living room is a space worthy of the centerpiece of your home.

Your living room should be comfortable, beautiful, and well-appointed. That doesn’t necessarily mean emptying out the piggy bank, but it does mean prioritizing your budget on certain design elements over others.

In this blog we will break down both the form and the function of a modern living room – providing tips on how to ensure that your living room functions well, and flexes to serve both your family time and social time.

Elements to Prioritize in Your Living Room Design

At My Modern Home, we always recommend prioritizing aspects of your home that are fundamental elements of your home’s design and those that can be difficult and costly to upgrade or change in the future.

Windows

We always recommend leaving more room in your budget than you think is necessary for windows. Large, high-quality windows provide many advantages to your home’s design, including:

• Adding to the curb appeal of the exterior of your home

• Creating an interior that is more appealing to spend time in

• Providing access to natural daylight, which is a key contributor to mental and physical well-being

• Creating a connection to nature

• Creating better energy efficiency for your home compared to lower-quality windows

We recommend purchasing the best quality windows that you can afford – it is worth making space elsewhere in your budget to accommodate this element of your home’s design.

The specific style of window, features, operability, and materials will depend on your home’s design, your living room layout, and the climate where you live as well as your budget.

The main type of window materials and their key benefits include:

• Wood windows: the quality and aesthetic of wood windows is second to none. These windows also tend to have good thermal performance for climates that require this consideration. Keep in mind that this type of window will require more maintenance to preserve its finish than other window types.

• Metal clad wood windows: This is a wood window, with the exterior portion of the window clad in metal. These windows offer the same aesthetic to the interior of your home as a traditional wood window, but require less maintenance as the exterior portion of the window is clad with metal to withstand the elements.

• Aluminum windows: Creates a beautiful aesthetic for modern residential projects. While this window type was traditionally notorious for poor energy performance, new advances in commercial and residential quality aluminum window systems (which provide thermal breaks) mean that this type of window should now be on your list to consider for your modern home design.

• Fiberglass windows: Are the star window type for energy performance, but currently provide limited aesthetic options for home design. Fortunately, the standard black rectangular shape which is generally available for this window type fits well with a modern aesthetic. Consider this window type in particular if you live in an extreme climate.

• Vinyl windows: Are less expensive than wood window types, and require little in the way of maintenance. High quality vinyl windows are a good choice for basements and second floors if you wish to prioritize your window budget to accommodate other window types on your main floor, or if your budget does not allow for more premium window types.
  
  
  

Pro Tip: If you wish to include large operable window and door systems into your home’s design (that create large, unobstructed openings to your yard or patio), these types of systems tend to be constructed as wood or aluminum window types. Ensure that the system you chose is well-suited to your climate, and plan to create a consistent design aesthetic on your main floor by choosing the same window type for your other windows.

Fireplace

A natural gas or wood burning fireplace can not only create a warm, inviting atmosphere for your living room design, but the fireplace design (including the surrounding millwork) itself can be create the key focal point for your living room (or even your entire main floor).

If you plan to include a fireplace in your living room, it’s advised that you incorporate this design element at the outset. Not only can fireplaces be difficult and costly to retrofit, but because they do become a center piece of the home it’s important to consider their placement as part of the overall floor plan whenever possible.

While wood burning fireplaces create a beautiful ambiance, they also require more maintenance than a natural gas fireplace, and clean-burning wood can be difficult and expensive to source (in particular if you live in an urban area). Wood burning fireplaces also create more pollution than natural gas fireplaces.

Natural gas can actually be quite efficient at heating a room or floor in your home if you choose a fireplace model intended for that purpose, which can likewise reduce energy usage by allowing you to turn the thermostat down in other rooms that you are not using.

Flooring

We love natural, durable flooring materials at My Modern Home.

Natural materials such as hardwood and stone tend not to be trendy in the way that vinyl flooring or carpeting can be, meaning that they will look current for decades to come. These flooring materials also have the added advantage of being easy to clean and maintain.

Both hardwood flooring and stone can be used in all rooms of your home (stone in particular is suited to a main floor, with a transition to carpeting or hardwood for your basement or second floor recommended). Other flooring materials, such as carpeting, tile, or vinyl, are not well suited for this purpose. Using one flooring material uniformly across your home (or main floor) creates a clean, modern look and also increases the flexibility of your home’s design. This is also particularly important if you have an open floor plan.

A good quality hardwood floor is not only beautiful and warm, but also very durable and can be refinished if necessary at some point a long ways down the road. We recommend against purchasing softer “hardwood” flooring materials (such as birch) which will not stand up well to the wear and tear of everyday life.

Stone flooring also makes a beautiful flooring material if your budget will allow for it. At My Modern Home we see a trend towards a continuation of exterior materials to the interior of the home. Stone flooring is a perfect way to accommodate this element of design.

When using hardwood or stone flooring, we recommend using area rugs to define spaces in your home, and to provide additional color and texture to your interior design.

What Other Design Elements Should You Consider in Your Design?

Now that you have prioritized those elements of your living room design that are difficult or costly to upgrade in the future, allocate the remainder of your budget on other design elements that can create a beautiful modern living room.

Millwork

High quality custom millwork will raise the bar on the design of any room – irrespective of your design style.

Rather than making millwork “fit” into the remainder of your budget, we recommend planning for living room millwork when you build your new home or renovate your living room, but having the millwork built and installed at a later date if your budget cannot accommodate good quality workmanship and materials.

Lighting

We often see living rooms as a space where lighting has not been given sufficient consideration.

Not only do light fixtures and floor and table lamps create a sense of style for your living room, access to sufficient lighting used for various purposes will make your living room more comfortable and more enjoyable to spend time in.

When designing your new modern home or living room renovation, ensure that your builder provides you with a lighting plan to review. Go over the plan carefully to ensure that your living room has ample built in lighting, so that lamps can be used as an interior design element rather than the primary source of light in your living room.

Great design incorporates lighting that works on three levels:

• General Lighting: The lighting elements that provide even light across the entire room;

• Task Lighting: Provides light specifically over certain areas, such as a piano, desk, or reading chair. This element is less important in living room design than in your kitchen, for example, but should still be considered in your lighting plan.

• Ambiance Lighting: Lighting elements which contribute to the atmosphere in the living room and adjacent spaces.
  
  

Ideally, these three lighting elements are able to be switched independently to maximize effectiveness and to give choice and variety to meet the multiple functions that a living room accommodates.

Consider also new technologies such as smart bulbs and switches. These technologies are affordable and make this level of control simple and flexible for any space in your home.

Decor

Of course, décor is an important and very fun part of living room design!

When choosing décor, prioritize your budget on your “key” pieces of furniture, such as your sofa and chairs, and purchase the best quality pieces that your budget will permit. Choose classic styles and colors, and these pieces will stand the test of time.

You can then choose less expensive items for your other design elements, such as coffee tables, lamps, side tables, throw pillows and art. These items are easy to update or upgrade in the future.

We’ve provided you with a lot of information to consider in this article, but then – living rooms give us a lot to consider since they play such an important role in in our homes and in our lives!

If you are planning on building a new modern home and have questions about living room design (or any design questions!) drop us a line – we’d love to hear from you.