No piece of furniture defines a living room, den, or other communal space of a home or office like the sofa. It is the flagship piece, what everyone will see and most everyone will be sitting on. Thus picking the right sofa is no easy task. Luckily it’s at least a little bit of fun. We’ve decided it’s a procedural process – step by step. Those steps are as follows:
Right Size
Figuring out what size of sofa is desirable and possible is first on the list. There’s nothing worse than picking out the perfect sofa only to find out there’s no easy way to walk around it in the living room, or the thing won’t even fit through the doorway off the foyer in the first place. Measure the existing sofa or the space where you want the new one to go. Measure the entrances into the living room. Now onto the next step.
Right Color
Ever notice how there’s hardly ever more than two or three colors in any given movie frame? It’s the same reason why interior decorating focuses on a harmony of hue. Too many clashing colors, or mismatched colors, make for an unattractive image – at least when most common notions of style are concerned. Pick a color which works with the paint and/or surrounding furniture and carpeting. Now for step three – the best part in our opinion.
Right Style
Stroll through a department store or browse a furniture gallery online and you’ll quickly see how the seemingly conventional dimensions of the common sofa can change wildly depending on subtle adjustments. But don’t think you have to settle for what stores want to put on display. Use visual search technology such as LikeThat Apps to snap a photo of a sofa you see in the background of a magazine photoshoot or in the lobby of a hotel to find similar-looking items online.
Right Material
Depending on factors such as family, pets, smoking, and even sunlight pattern in the room, picking the right material sofa is often times a utility-based choice as much as an aesthetic and financial one. If leather is undesirable, woven material with high thread count is key if the sofa is going to experience heavy usage. Durability of the fabric matters less if the sofa is destined for an infrequently visited space. But be careful not to let expensive silk or linen sofas in often-empty rooms get too much sun.
Right Price
Rare is the person willing let alone able to pay $12,000 for a hand-built, doweled and corner-blocked sofa stuffed with goose down and covered in the finest fabrics. Rightfully so – there’s no real reason why you can’t find a well-made sofa meeting your custom criteria for less than $1200 brand-new, tops. So long as you aren’t required to make your choice in under 48 hours it’s worth it to take your time to find the right reasonably priced sofa.
The sofa is the chief of communal space furniture. Choosing the right one to go with the look of a room is an important decision never to be taken lightly. With that said, the process putting you on the diligent path toward successful sofa selection can be a fun one.
