There are many ways to take your dining room from blah to wow. You can update your dining room table, add a hutch, or change-up your dining chairs — but one of the most overlooked ways to spruce up your dining room is to add an area rug.

A dining room area rug not only helps to define your dining space, it also adds colour, dimension, and comfort to your room.

(Surya Allegro rug pictured above.)

Here’s how you can determine the perfect size dining room area rug for your home in three easy steps:

Step #1 — Organize Your Furniture

Make sure that all of your furniture is set-up as you like it to be in your dining area. This should include your dining table and chairs, hutches, sideboards, wine carts, cabinets, shelves, floor lamps, etc.

Expert Tip: Don’t tuck away any items or redesign your space at this point in the process. You want to be sure that every element that you need and use in your dining room is accounted for with its own floor space.

Step #2 — Mark Your Floor Space

Pull your dining room chairs out from your table as though you were about to sit down. Then, leaving the chairs pulled out, mark the floor with painter’s tape approximately 6” beyond the back foot of each of the chairs.

This process will provide you with a measure of the space that would allow a person to comfortably get up from their chair and still remain on the carpeted area.

(Kalora Alaska rug pictured above.)

Step #3 — Measure Marked Space

Measure the length and width of your tape marks to establish the approximate size of the area rug for your dining room. If your measurements are an odd number (e.g. not 5’ x 8’, or 8’ x 10’), don’t panic, just ensure that you round up in size. It’s always better to have a slightly larger rug than one that’s too small.

Once you know the size of rug that you are looking for, you can decide on material, colour, and pattern — the fun has just begun!

For expert help choosing the right rug, come and visit us at Smitty’s we have a wide variety of Surya and Kalora rugs to choose from. We’ll help you put some wow in your dining room.