We all know the challenge of trying to make a small space work. We’ve all had that one room at one point or another where—no matter what you seemed to do or add to it—it just didn’t stack up to what we were envisioning for the space, mostly due to it being small and hard to work with. What if we told you that you could fit an entire home theater, complete with impossibly cozy home theater recliners, speakers, and a large flat-screen television, all into a smaller space?
It might take a little extra effort, jotting down all sorts of dimensions of entertainment room chairs and other furniture, and measuring every square inch of the room, but it’s doable. And that’s what we’re here for—to help you set up your dream home theater with ease (and some high-end media room recliners, of course).
What Sort of Seating Should You Look for?
Small spaces offer their unique challenges, but when you invest in the right type of seating, it makes a world of difference. When you’re looking for home theater seats for sale, be on the lookout for compact seating for multimedia rooms. You’ll want seating that features a narrower profile, with slimmer arms and smaller seats. These types of seats are more often than not designed specifically for smaller spaces, and it might even denote that in any sort of product description.
Other great seating ideas for media rooms include finding entertainment room seating that backs right up against the wall when it reclines—these types of recliners are also designed for smaller spaces, and while it might seem insignificant, that handful of inches of space saved makes all of the difference and might even be exactly what you need to squeeze past the seating while walking without bumping into another piece of furniture in the room. When you’re working with a small space, it’s absolutely true that every inch counts, and wall hugger theater room seating is proof of that.
While it might be tempting to fill the space with a luxurious sectional for entertainment rooms, it’s better to skip out on those larger, bulky seats and opt for smaller, more modular chairs. Instead of that massive row of 6 home theater recliners, look out for loveseats for theater rooms and even single recliners. One of our favorite tips is to search for she shed or man cave seating online—those types of spaces tend to be on the smaller side as it is, and seating geared towards them is perfect for home theaters, especially the tinier ones. The reason for this being that it’s far easier to make multiple, less bulky seating work in a small space. You’ll have far more opportunities to try out your different ideas for home theater seating layouts in your room, and they’ll offer far more flexible arrangements.
Maximizing the Space that You Have
Now that you’ve got your hands on more appropriately-sized home theater recliners and chairs, it’s time to start thinking about how to lay them out in your space. With more modular movie chairs for home theaters, you have the freedom to arrange them various different configurations, giving you a ton more flexibility than you would have if you were trying to fit a ginormous multimedia room sectional in the space. It would be like fitting a square block into a circular hole—it’s just not going to work.
Creating a staggered layout seems to be what works best in rooms with space constraints. Spreading out your home theater chairs does a couple of things: it’s going to make the room feel more open, and it’s going to offer up plenty of moving space, leg room, and different viewing angles. Whereas a blocky row of media room chairs that seat five would make a small space feel even more cramped, five individual chairs spread out across the room creates more flow and keeps the space feeling open. By doing so, you can experiment with different viewing angles for the television screen, giving everyone a chance to switch things up on movie night and see which is their favorite. Maybe you’ve got a couple seats off to one side, a chair slightly off-center in the middle of the room, and another one on the other side—they’ve all got great viewing angles, but each one offers something different, and the layout meshes well with the space. Play around with the layout or look online for furniture inspiration for media rooms. You’ll undoubtedly find tons of clever designs and arrangements of seating.
While it might be tempting to fit a nice coffee table into the room, you’ll want to consider how long it is and how much of the room it takes up. Some sort of flat surface for storage is essential, especially when you’re bringing in drinks, food, and various other things into the room when you settle down for movie night, but consider other solutions. When you’ve got a small space to work with, consider looking into an ottoman that can serve as a surface to keep items on. It then becomes a dual-purpose piece of multimedia room furniture—you’re able to rest your feet up on it, and when you’re not doing that, it doubles as a flat surface and saves plenty of space in an already-small area.
Building out a functional home theater in a small space seems like a herculean task, but with some careful planning, measuring, and arranging, you can be well on your way to a coherent, cute, and compact space. Just because your room is small doesn’t mean you can’t dream big!