You're thinking about a home decorating project and breathing some fresh life into a stale space. Maybe you're even going to buy some new furniture for your spaces. But as you begin to shop, you're stuck with a worry. Should the living room furniture match the dining room furniture?
No, your living room and dining room furniture don't have to match. In the case of an open-concept floor plan, you might even choose to differentiate between the two spaces. Of course, if you want to match, that's fine, too, but it's not necessary.
Without further ado, let's take a look at some options and ways of furnishing a living room and dining room.
Dining Room And Living Room Furnishings
Thinking about basic needs in the dining room, we typically find a dining table and chairs at a minimum. If you have more space then there will usually be a sideboard of some type and maybe a china cabinet or hutch for serving pieces. Add a rug and some wall decor and you're in business.
For the living room, we typically choose a sofa and armchairs, or a sectional, a coffee table, rugs, side tables and some kind of television console. Don't forget to add some lamps, perhaps a plant or two, and your favorite wall decor.
To Match Furniture Or Not To Match Furniture?
In the very function of the pieces, you won't have an exact match. But it is possible to find furniture that acts as a coordinate set. Built out of similar materials and styles, often the same color of fabrics, you can buy two rooms worth of furniture that are meant to go together.
This room uses a loveseat that matches the sofa as a dining room seating bench. Similar leg styles are apparent on various pieces of furniture, and everything is upholstered similarly.
Here soft cream fabrics perfectly tie the dining room chairs to the sofa and the natural light highlights these soft tones.
Not Matching Your Living Room And Dining Room Furnishings
As we've established, it's not necessary to match your furniture between these two rooms. Be as eclectic as you want or just pick up a unifying color or theme to tie the two spaces together. In this apartment, we see Scandinavian touches and personal choices that help separate the spaces while still creating a great design look.
How Do You Separate The Living Room From The Dining Room?
There are so many creative ways to separate your spaces in an open concept plan. We've put together a few for you to be inspired by.
Here a large cabinet, which acts as a china hutch on the dining room side, separates the two spaces. On the living room side, you could use the cabinet as a wall for artwork or the television if you had a nearby electrical outlet to use there.
In this room, a simple rug and positioning of furniture are used to differentiate between the two spaces. The couches and armchairs are placed around the rug, facing one another, while the dining room table occupies its own space to the right.
Lighting is another way to differentiate between the two spaces. Here a large copper orb pendant lamp frames the space for the round table below it, while the rug and standing lamp defines the living room area.
Should You Paint The Living Room And Dining Room Different Colors?
If you want to differentiate your spaces, this can be a great way to do it. It works particularly well if you have some sort of delineation between the two spaces like a raised area or columns that frame a large opening. It gets trickier if you have a simple open plan, but it's not impossible. The thing you'll want to be careful about is making your space too busy or choppy.
Here a soft gray graces the wall above the chair molding, though the molding color stays the same between the two spaces, adding a cohesive element to the look.
You can always do one wall of color to showcase the dining area versus the living area. This is a great way to bring attention to an area without detracting from the rest of it.
Here a bold color draws the eye in from the neutral living room to the fun dining area. The architectural details of the doorway make this a natural separation for the spaces which includes changing up the paint palette.
Can You Use Dining Room Chairs In The Living Room?
Maybe you're short on space or budget and want to do a little furnishings multi-tasking. Is it possible to use your dining room chairs in your living room also?
Like with all design questions, the answer is often yes, as it boils down to personal style. But now, with dining chairs going way beyond your standard wooden-backed chair, there are options.
Benches, love seats, upholstered chairs are all seen in the dining room these days and can all serve double-duty as extra seating in the living room. We've gathered some examples for you here.
Upholstered Bench
A bench like this can easily be moved to create extra seating in the living room. Match the upholstery to a chair or throw pillow on your couch if you want things to coordinate.
LoveSeat
With this set-up, simply move the table out of the way and you've got an instant living room.
Upholstered Chairs
This space is like a living room and dining room all in one. Comfy sofa and armchairs surround a large wooden farmhouse style table. Whether eating, doing puzzles, or catching up on the news, this is one way to combine your furnishings.
Using a large wingback or another upholstered chair at your dining room table provides you with easy additional seating if you don't have space for both.
So there you have it, ways to decorate similarly or not in the living room and dining room. Your furniture does not have to be the same to make a space cohesive, and your furniture can even serve double duty if necessary. If you enjoyed this post, please check out a few of our others that we think you'll enjoy below: