When choosing carpet for your living room, the standard questions apply, such as: What will you use this room for most? How much foot traffic will the carpet endure.
If you’re carpeting a living room, not a family room or den, it’s likely that you will reserve this room for more formal occasions, and the foot traffic probably won’t be as heavy as in some other rooms of your home.
If that is the case, you can focus your attention primarily on choosing the carpet you want for this room based on color, style and quality. Sound like fun? It can be if you know what to look for when you begin shopping. Choosing color and style for your new carpet is a personal choice, and there are many options for you to consider. A lot depends on where you’re beginning with your room. It’s true that color, light and space all have a specific influence on your room’s ambiance.
Assessing your personal circumstances will make the choice easier. Are you starting from scratch with your carpet and furnishings, or do you have furnishings and draperies you want to coordinate with your new carpet. If you are building a new home, you might decide to shop for your furniture before choosing your carpet. Then, you can have a better idea of which carpet will complement your décor best. If you’re remodeling your room, you may have furnishings and draperies you will continue to use with the new carpet. Either way, an important thing to remember is that you can highlight your carpet, or you can highlight your décor and allow the carpet to become an elegant backdrop.
Light has an enormous effect on the way your carpet looks in your home. So even if you choose a great color at the store, it may look vastly different in your home. Always remember that the lighting in the carpet showroom is very different from the lighting in your home. The best solution is to obtain samples to take home with you, if at all possible. Having samples at home will give you the opportunity to look at the carpet during different times of the day and in different types of light – natural sunlight, under lamps, and under overhead lighting.