Decluttering your living room is a crucial step in creating a peaceful and organized space for your family and guests. Your living room serves as a hub for relaxation, entertainment, and quality time spent with loved ones.
However, it’s all too easy for this multifunctional space to become cluttered with items that belong elsewhere in your home, resulting in a disorganized and chaotic environment.
To effectively declutter your living room, follow these simple steps that will help you create a more spacious, inviting, and aesthetically pleasing space. By implementing these strategies, you can transform your living room into a haven of tranquility and comfort.
Easy Tips for Decluttering Your Living Room
Do General Pick Up Every Day
To prevent your living room from becoming excessively cluttered, it is not necessary to wait until it reaches a state of disarray. By dedicating a few minutes every evening to tidying up and organizing, you can effectively prevent the clutter from becoming overwhelming.
This can be achieved by picking up any toys that may have been left on the floor, returning games to their designated places, and ensuring cups and glasses are placed back on stands or the coffee table. Implementing these practices consistently will help maintain a clutter-free living space.
Get Your Entire Family Involved
Encourage active participation from all family members in the decluttering process of the living room. As a shared communal area, the living room often accumulates miscellaneous items from each family member.
By enlisting everyone’s assistance in the decluttering efforts, the task can be efficiently accomplished in a timely manner. This cooperative approach ensures a thorough and organized living space for the whole family to enjoy.
Set Up A System
Once you have finished decluttering your living room, it is important to establish an efficient and effective system for managing incoming mail and other disposable items. By promptly disposing of these items in the recycling bin or trash, you can prevent clutter from accumulating and eliminate the need for future decluttering efforts. This proactive approach will save you time and ensure that your living space remains tidy and organized.
How To Declutter Your Living Room Step-by-Step
To effectively declutter your living room, consider following these straightforward steps that will simplify and streamline the task at hand. By implementing these recommendations, you will achieve a cleaner and more organized living space, creating an environment that promotes relaxation and functionality.
1. Collect Items that Go in other Rooms in a Basket
It is often common to find items in the living room that actually belong in the kitchen or a bedroom. Taking the time to return these items to their rightful places as you come across them can result in significant time wasted.
To prevent this, consider using a basket to conveniently collect items that pertain to the kid’s room or other areas of the house. Then, systematically go from room to room, returning each object to its proper location.
This approach eliminates the need to constantly work around these misplaced items and allows for a more efficient decluttering of the living room. By implementing this method, you can save valuable time and avoid unnecessary back-and-forth trips between rooms while tidying up.
2. Clear off all Flat Surfaces
To start the decluttering process in your living room, begin by clearing off all the flat surfaces including the coffee table, stands, entertainment center, and floors. Flat surfaces tend to accumulate items that lack a designated spot, forgotten belongings, and overall clutter that no longer belongs in your home.
These surfaces are prominent clutter hot spots, and your living room likely contains a significant number of them, such as the coffee table, end tables, and bookshelves. Dedicate time to sort through old magazines, DVDs, and books to create more available space on your shelves.
Additionally, make sure to discard any waste that may be lying around and put away books, games, and controllers. By following these steps, you will create a more organized and tidier living space.
3. Declutter Old Décor
To achieve a clutter-free and clean living space, it is important to clear away old decor. While adding pieces that bring joy is delightful, accumulating too many decor items can result in a cluttered and crowded environment.
If you feel that your living room is overwhelmed with clutter, there is a quick fix. Take a moment to assess your bookshelves and remove any excess decor items. This simple action will allow your shelves to appear more open, organized, and devoid of unnecessary items. Benefit from a serene and pleasant living space by keeping your decor choices concise and purposeful.
4. Sort and Declutter Electronic Cords and Accessories
When organizing your electronic cords, remotes, and accessories, it’s important to avoid the common problem of them becoming a jumbled mess. To prevent this, start by labeling each cord to identify which device it belongs to.
Additionally, take the time to check for any extra cords that may be lying around from previous devices. Dispose of any outdated remotes that no longer serve a purpose and consider consolidating your remotes into a universal one.
By doing so, you can conveniently store away the remaining remotes, minimizing the daily cleaning tasks you’ll have to tackle.
5. Check Out those Throw Pillows
Throw pillows are a wonderful addition to your living room, offering both comfort and a pop of color. However, it’s important to note that worn-out pillows not only have a negative impact on the aesthetics of your space but can also leave behind debris, causing additional cleaning and maintenance.
To maintain a clean and organized living area, take a few minutes to inspect your throw pillows and dispose of any that have reached the end of their lifespan.
Moreover, it’s crucial to avoid excessive clutter by limiting the number of throw pillows you have. Choose only those that serve a functional purpose, enhancing the overall appeal of your room rather than detracting from it. By following these guidelines, you can ensure that your living room remains stylish, comfortable, and free from unnecessary mess.
6. Declutter and Organize Your Bookcase
It is important to dedicate some time to organizing your bookcase. Start by disposing of any books that are ripped or have missing pages. Furthermore, consider donating books that no longer capture the interest of anyone in your household.
Finally, arrange the remaining books in a neat and orderly manner by either author or size. Taking these steps will ensure that your bookcase is visually appealing and easy to navigate.
7. Declutter the Entryway
To maintain a clutter-free living room, it is important to periodically clean out the coat closet and have your kids clean out their backpacks. Since the entryway is often located in the living room, it tends to accumulate clutter that doesn’t get put away properly.
By clearing out this area and implementing an effective organizational system, you can make the process of cleaning your living room much easier and prevent clutter from accumulating. This will create a more organized and welcoming space in your home.
8. Clean Out Drawers One at a Time
In most cases, the drawers in your living room tend to accumulate various objects over time. It is recommended to dedicate some time each week to organize and clean out one drawer at a time.
Assign specific spaces for different items such as paper clips, pens, pencils, and other similar objects. In case necessary, consider acquiring drawer dividers as they can assist in maintaining items neatly in place.
Things to Declutter from Your Living Room – Decluttering Checklist
The living room serves as a central hub for various odds and ends that accumulate from your family’s daily activities. Over time, this can lead to a cluttered and disorganized space. Therefore, it becomes crucial to prioritize sorting items and returning them to their designated rooms, rather than simply relocating them and facing the need to declutter again.
While decluttering is indeed important, it is essential to bear in mind that your living room houses numerous items that naturally belong there but require occasional decluttering. These items may encompass old decor pieces, outdated throw pillows, magazines, books, old mail, toys, pet toys, crafting supplies, as well as unused tech gear.
By proactively decluttering and organizing your living room, you can maintain a harmonious and inviting space that is free from unnecessary clutter, enabling you and your family to fully enjoy its purpose and functionality.
Tips to Organize after Decluttering Your Living Room and Keep Clutter at Bay
After successfully decluttering your living room, it is important to develop strategies to prevent the issue from recurring. To optimize the results of your decluttering efforts, it is recommended to devote sufficient time to effectively organizing your living room space.
By implementing systematic approaches and incorporating practical storage solutions, you can maintain a clean and well-organized living room environment.
Encourage Family Members to Pick Up Items after Use
To facilitate the decluttering process in your living room, it is advisable to encourage family members to pick up and put away the items they use before going to bed at night.
By instilling this habit within your household, not only will you be able to maintain an organized living space, but future decluttering endeavors will also be less time-consuming and more efficient.
Storage to Hide Clutter
Utilize customized storage solutions that effectively conceal clutter which cannot be disposed of or is temporarily awaiting proper placement. These storage options offer a practical and visually pleasing way to manage belongings in an organized manner.
Have a Dedicated Place for Family Board Games and Puzzles
It is recommended to allocate a dedicated shelf or drawer for storing family board games and puzzles. It is advisable to periodically inspect these items to ensure they are in good condition and that all the pieces are intact, thus ensuring that the games can be played or puzzles completed without any issues.
In case the family loses interest in a particular game or puzzle, consider donating them or disposing of them appropriately to prevent the accumulation of an excessive number of games or puzzles.
Use Baskets
Baskets can serve as excellent tools for organizing your living room. If you have sufficient shelf space, consider setting up a designated basket for each family member. This way, they can conveniently store their belongings in the living room, preventing them from being scattered haphazardly throughout the space.
Set Up a Station at the Entrance
To maintain an organized living space, consider setting up a designated station at the entrance of your home. This station should include a tray for conveniently depositing miscellaneous items, a designated area for leaving messages intended for other members of your family, as well as hooks for hanging items that are not meant to be stored in the coat closet.
By implementing this practical solution, you can effectively prevent unnecessary clutter from accumulating in your living room when these belongings are left scattered throughout the house.
Keep a Box for Mails
It is highly recommended to have a designated trash can specifically for junk mail and small items that your family may have accumulated in their pockets, which can be conveniently disposed of at the entrance.
Additionally, consider incorporating a hanging box or a designated box on your table for the purpose of organizing and separating mail that belongs to other members of the household, ensuring it is correctly sorted.
These additional measures will facilitate an efficient and organized system for mail handling within your home environment.
Final Words
The living room is often prone to becoming disorganized and cluttered due to its status as a central hub for the entire family. In order to maintain an organized and clutter-free space, it is important to involve the entire family and implement strategies to facilitate easy storage. By encouraging family participation and simplifying the process of tidying up, you can effectively eliminate clutter in your living room.
