How NOT to Move a Couch

Some of our very dear friends were moving across country recently, and couldn’t take their couch with them. This is a couch I have envied for YEARS, so I of course generously offered to give it a home. The couch seems normal at first glance, but it’s as deep as a twin sized bed, so I can sit on it cross-legged to do all my crafts, and it gives us another space for someone to stay over. It’s also gloriously comfortable. Our plan was to have the new couch live in Hubby’s Man Cave so it could easily double as a guest room. I want to clarify that all this happened when I was barely pregnant and still allowed to move lots of stuff. I was not doing this recently!

These two pictures show the living room after we completely cleared out the Man Cave in order to get the couch in:

Yes, that is a ton of stuff for a tiny room. The tininess of the room is why we had to pull EVERYTHING out before the couch could go in. Here is the couch, after we took the legs off and attempted to get it to its new home. Also notice disgruntled dog, who was annoyed because I wouldn’t let him get a couch dropped on him. Some people are never happy.

There are several things to consider when moving a couch:

1) Is it too big to fit through the doorway of the room you want it in?
2) Is it too long to make the turn in the hallway leading to the room?
3) Is it so long that if you try to move it on its end, it will rub all the texture off the ceiling, and attempt to remove a light fixture?

Here is the results of not taking geometry into account. That white stuff is ceiling texture chunks, and it got EVERYWHERE. We first tried to just get the couch down the hallway, but there was no way it was making the turn, so we backed it all the way out, and stood it on its end. It is 8 feet long, exactly the height of our ceilings. I did not take into consideration that a) this is not the height of any of ours DOORWAYS, and b) if it’s pressed against the ceiling, there is no way to tilt it down to the floor; there just isn’t space.

We ended up moving this new couch into the living room and replacing the right half of our sectional with it. They are almost the same color, so most people don’t even notice unless we point it out. Yes, that means there is a sofa arm in our sectional, but it actually makes this comfy, adorable little nook to sit in our store my current craft project in. Plus the arm is padded, so it’s very comfortable. It’s not a typical living room arrangement, but it fits in with my Bohemian sensibilities. We’ve been using it for months now, and I still love it. The other half of the sectional went into the man cave, and Hubby as happy to have some real seating in there finally, so it was a win win, except for the ceiling.

So what did I learn?
1) Measure every possible angle of the furniture you’re moving
2) Measure every possible angle of the area you will have to move it through
3) You should probably just hire a 3D digital artist to build a model and do a test run for you to see if it’s even possible
4) Don’t feel like you have to stick to conventional furnishings or arrangements.

Your home should reflect your personality, not the artificial set up from a catalog. Would you use your living room more if it had your Hot Wheels ramp or pottery wheel in the middle of it? Then set it up there. There are no rules, do what makes you happy and you will enjoy your home way more.