How to Choose a Bedroom Rug

A bedroom area rug serves many purposes. It gives your bare feet a warm place to land when you get out of bed on a cold winter morning. It reduces noise in the bedroom, especially if your alternative is a hardwood floor (which while beautiful, can amplify sound). A bedroom rug can also accent your bed covering and window treatments.

A plush bedroom rug keeps your toes warm when they hit the floor on cold winter mornings. As with most interior design precepts, there are no hard and fast rules to choosing a bedroom rug — what you like should be the most important factor in your decorating decisions. There are, however, a few guidelines to consider when shopping for a new bedroom area rug.

Placement

First, decide where you’re going to place the rug. If you have an exceptionally large bedroom, you can choose to lay smaller rugs in different areas. For example, place one rug in the corner under your sitting area and a larger, complementary rug angled across the bottom of the bed. If you prefer symmetry, place one large rug under the bed so that it peeks out equally on all sides. For a small bedroom, you’ll be best served with a-rug-under-the-bed solution because small area rugs chop up the space and make the room appear even smaller.

Size

The size of your bed usually determines the size of rug you need. In a traditional bedroom with a nightstand on each side of the bed, place the rug just in front of the side tables. A king-size bed is 76 X 80 inches, which means a 9 X 12-foot rug will provide adequate coverage on all sides. An 8 X 10-foot rug, meanwhile, is sufficient for a queen-size (60 X 80-inch) bed. Both of these choices leave plenty of soft surface area to walk on all the way around the bed. Another option for your queen-size bed is to place a 6 X 9-foot rug horizontally under the bed, giving you enough rug to land on when you leave the bed, but little at the foot of the bed, which is ideal if you have a chest or blanket holder sitting there. Alternatively, you can always place matching runners along the sides of your bed with a complementary or matching 4 X 6-foot rug at the foot of the bed (although you can get away with a 5 X 8-footer if you have enough room).

Style

It’s always easier to match your bedcovers and curtains to the rug than it is to find the perfect rug to go with your other décor. But remember that your taste should trump any convention, especially in your bedroom. Given that overriding advice, here are some specific guidelines:

• Stick with hand-knotted Oriental rugs to complement a traditional room with cherry furniture, high bedposts, or antiques.
• If you’ve got a more minimalist style, use the floor to splash color in the room or continue with the overall style and use a rug with muted tones that match your color scheme.
• Floral patterns on your linens may be more difficult to complement, but if you stick with traditional rugs, you should be able to pull out the primary colors in the room with your floor covering.

Whatever color, style, or fabric you choose for your bedroom, make sure you absolutely love it. It may be the last thing you see before putting out the light every night and the first thing you see when you climb out of bed every morning.