9 Mins Read
January 17th, 2024
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As a founder of iii studio, Brinda has designed and executed over 100+ projects with a special focus on luxurious residential designing. She is the owner & principal designer at iii studio, Hyderabad.
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If you ever wanted to split your living room into small pockets where you had different experiences, a divider can make that happen for you. Dividers are screens, panels, and fittings that divide one space into two or more temporarily or permanently.
They’re mostly moveable and can be folded if they’re not needed. There are various options for you to choose from, depending on your budget and preferences. Walk with us and we’ll take you through wall dividers in detail.
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Some questions to ask yourself before you think about designing a living room divider:
This contemporary partition style works great for separating living and dining rooms, and to differentiate bedrooms, home offices, and living areas in studio apartments. To make sure the glass doesn’t break when exposed to vigorous movement, you can consider getting a metal framing to add strength.
To prevent the glass from getting overheated, you can also insert curtains to partially block sunlight.
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A freestanding clothing rack/coat rack in the living room comes in handy to separate spaces elegantly. In larger homes, the coat rack is a great place for guests to enter, hang up their coats comfortably, and then proceed to the living or dining room. In cramped spaces, the clothing rack differentiates the bedroom from the dressing area.
Alternatively, as a DIY room divider idea, you can hang a horizontal clothing rod from the ceiling, and hang your clothes with hangers. The length of the dresses divides the spaces into two.
If you want a room separator without a bulky wall, you can get a lattice bookshelf that adds visual variety, offers ample open shelving space, and gives you room to store all your favorite decor items.
It gives you a chance to exhibit your most prestigious decor pieces, and books all while smartly delineating the living room. In studio apartments with small living spaces, some decorators suggest residents get a bunk bed attached to the bookcase.
| Artem Kropovinsky, founder and principal designer at Arsight says, “Think of a personalized bookshelf that acts as both dividing wall. To begin with, it serves as a natural dividing line in addition to providing adequate storage and display area. The design can range from very contemporary to rustic, depending on the look of the room.” |
If you live in a small space with not much area to place dividers in the living room and bedroom, you can hang two horizontal rods from the ceiling, and install sheer curtains so they look like a majestic canopy over your bedroom.
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These are floor-to-ceiling curtains installed on heavy rods and are mostly heavy drapes that almost act as an impermeable layer to the space adjacent to the one they’re in. If you want complete privacy with no room for light to pass through, you can opt for full-length curtains. They add a royal, opulent look to the space they’re in. You can find tons of varieties in IKEA.
| Artem Kropovinsky, founder and principal designer at Arsight says, “Use an interesting folding screen with complex patterns. It can be a focal point in the room and at the same time provide adequate segregation. This choice is ideal for those who want a movable partition that serves the double purpose of being useful and an art piece.” |
Create visual differences between two closely connected living spaces with minimal effort with partial dividers. Some of the forms they can take are translucent, or frosted glass panels placed in the corners of a living room.
| Vivianne Chow, founder and principal decorator at Viv and Tim Home says, “If you don’t want to block out any natural light when choosing a living room divider, stick with dividers made from clear materials like frosted or fluted glass. This allows light to fill the space while still creating a visual divide. You can also consider dividers made out of wood with slats that allow light to pass through and add a sense of warmth and texture to the space.” |
Crystal beads woven together as a curtain are aesthetic to look at, tactile to feel, and make any place look opulent and put together. You can also get macrame curtains. They divide the space very well and this is an option commonly resorted to.
If you have the right type of furniture and you can position them at the right intersections, you can seamlessly create designated areas, and spaces and make spots for conversation and interaction.
Say, you have an open floor plan and want to entertain guests in the evening. You can pull up a coffee table, throw in an area rug, with a sofa and a couple of chairs, and create a spot in the centre of a living room.
Or, you could place a lounge, a rug, and an ottoman near the fireplace and make for a nice reading nook. You can keep the sofa or the sectional in the middle of the studio apartment or the centre of the living room pointed at the TV, and create a drawing room right there.
Read also – How to Arrange Furniture in a Small Living Room: Space-enhancing Tips
Beautiful, patterned dividers that can go as background, at the back of furniture, or used as decorative arches to spruce up the entryway of the living room or the room adjacent to it. You can use it in the bathroom to divide the dry and wet areas.
The rugs you use in your space immediately become statement pieces and focal points. Especially if you use a busy rug with unconventional sizes, shapes, or forms, the area covered by the rug receives special attention and creates a visual difference in the living room.
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You can find it widely used in dorm rooms or studio apartments where two or more people share a room/house. The plum blossom pattern on frosted glass makes for an excellent divider for any place, especially between the living room and the dining area.
Another popular way to show division in your living and dining room is by raising a half wall and installing a decorative divider atop it extending to the ceiling. It creates spatial variation and goes easy on the eyes.
Wide-spaced wooden frames with intriguing patterns, and varying heights, are perfect room dividers that demarcate two spaces and give you privacy. You can hang potted plants in them. If you need to use the entire living room as one space, you can fold them up nicely.
A beautiful way to differentiate between two spaces, swings are subtle yet can break the space into two or more areas. They don’t obstruct vision and allow light movement seamlessly.
You can opt for antique or vintage savings to make the swings the focal point of the room. You can take it to the next level by adding a backrest to the swing or ornate handles.
Steps are a contemporary living room partition that you can see in apartments and duplex houses alike. They create a division and elevate the look of the living room in many ways.
If you want a divider that completely obstructs your view of the adjacent room, you can get an opaque divider and place wall planters on it. You can also mount pegboards to bring in greenery. Get easy-to-maintain houseplants that don’t require much water or chemicals to grow.
| Artem Kropovinsky, founder and principal designer at Arsight says, “Using a vertical garden as room divider makes the space feel refreshing. It is not merely a partition but an art piece that continues to live. These are ideal when you want to give your urban interiors a natural touch and it can be customised according to different light situations.” |
In an open-concept living room or a studio apartment where there are fewer designated areas to store materials or perform designated functions, or fewer closet spaces, you need every little space you can get.
When you get a magazine rack, you get hidden storage space you can use efficiently. When placed strategically, the magazine rack can seemingly divide two spaces.
These dividers spill over to the adjacent room and have good-quality hinges that can cover a large portion of the living room. If you want a divider to obscure your lounge and living room from the dining room, you can go for a collapsible partition.
Another way to ensure 100% privacy is through closely placed wooden slabs that don’t allow any room, or air to pass. You can play around with unique textures, patterns, and colors to create a stunning backdrop for your living room.
If you want to give a classy, contemporary look to the living room, you can choose a laser-cut wood or acrylic panel as a divider. They suit any style and give an exclusive look to the room.
One smart way to bring your home bar away from the kitchen and sandwich it between your living room and dining room is to use it as a space divider at the end of your living room and demarcate the division from your dining room.
Show your spatial intelligence by using every inch of the space wisely and place the bar table in such a way it grabs the attention but doesn’t hinder traffic.
Barn doors you can see in barndominiums and farmhouses sliding doors in the threshold between two spaces, to facilitate easier movement and easier concealment if required. Sliding doors not only apply to farm-style houses, you can readily apply them to any style you want.
They can be great dividers of space in the living room, to prevent guests from eyeing your bedroom or kitchen directly. In open-concept living rooms too, if the guests in the living room feel uncomfortable with the cooking odor and heat coming from the kitchen, the sliding doors can come in handy.
Two different colored lights, white and golden, or colored lights when hung in two spaces can entirely differentiate the spaces even without having any physical demarcations. If you want to crank up the dividers a notch in your living room, try having a warm light in the drawing room and a cool light near the space adjacent to the living room and see the magic happen.
| Mark Buskuhl, Founder & CEO of Ninebird Properties in Dallas, Texas, says, “Living room dividers come in a variety of styles and designs, so it’s important to choose one that fits with your overall decor. If you have a modern or minimalist living room, opt for a sleek and simple divider. For a more traditional or eclectic space, consider a divider with ornate details or unique materials. It’s also a good idea to consider the color and finish of the divider to make sure it complements your existing furniture and decor.” |
When you conceptualize the living room divider and attempt to visualize which divider style would be best for you, you need a powerful visualization and design tool like Neo by your side. Here’s what you can do:
Step 1: Sign up for Foyr Neo’s 14-day trial.
Step 2: Go on to the Neo mood board and curate the divider you’d love to have.
Step 3: Create the floor plan of your living room on Neo.
Step 4: Choose from 60,000+ 3D decor materials and simply drag and drop them into the design.
Step 5: Get any material in any color, texture, shape, or pattern and truly customize your divider.
Step 6: View the design in 2D and 3D, from all possible angles and lighting conditions.
Step 7: Render your design in a few minutes and witness your own living room divider in all its glory.
That’s all it takes! With 24/7 support and live chat, we’re here to help you if you ever get stuck anywhere. You can find tutorials on how to design on Neo all over the internet, so you’re never truly alone when you design using Neo.
What are you waiting for? Start curating your mood board, sign up for Foyr Neo’s 14-day free trial today!
Using Foyr Neo is as easy as 1, 2, 3. First, upload a floor plan or create one from scratch. Then drag and drop from over 60K 3D models to fill your rooms. Lastly, just set the shot and let the AI create stunning 4K renders for you in less than 10 minutes.
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