Old Rugs for a New Home

    What can a nice antique rug or old area rug do for you and your lovely home? Quite a lot, actually. Area rugs (this includes antique rugs and Persian rugs, among others!) are pretty much necessary for most interior design. They can complement, define, embellish, play down, or emphsize the rest of a room and its furnishings. If you look in the pages of almost any interior design mag, a huge majority of the photos will include an area rug.

    One of the first concerns with buying an antique rug or area rug is sizing- this can't be emphasized enough. Too large and it won't fit, or will dwarf the rest of the room. Too small and it will slide around and/or look silly. Measure your space.  The biggest you want to go is about 24 inches (or two feet) away from each wall, but of course you can go smaller.

    In fact, you can use a rug that is half the surface area of the room's floor to create what is known as conversation groupings. Place an area rug under a gathering of couches, chairs, and  a coffee table to make a sort of 'mini' room within a room. In this case, there should be no more than one or two extra feet of carpet extending beyond the furniture in any direction.

More on area rug decorating tips later!