How to Rearrange Your Room

Co-authored by MacKenzie Cain

Last Updated: March 13, 2023

A lot of times after New Year's, on spring break, or before summer, people want a change made in their room. Your room is your sanctuary, and must change as you do too. Whether you're doing it for a fresh start or just a change, you can learn to plan for the job, as well as a few creative tips about organization strategies.

Part 1

Part 1 of 3:

Getting Started

1
Ask permission first. Before you go shifting around your bed or other furniture, make sure you have the go-ahead from parents, partners, roommates, or landlords, to make sure it's ok to move stuff around. This can also be a good opportunity to ask for a helping hand when moving time comes.
- Don't attempt to move especially large furniture by yourself. If you're going to try to move a big dresser or a bed, you need at least one other person to help you, and preferably more.
2
Get furniture sliders for big items. One easy way to move bulky or cumbersome items easily if they aren't on casters is to put them on sliders or "furniture feet," which allow you to slide the furniture along the ground more easily, without worrying about tipping. These are available at most housewares and home repair stores.
- You can also make your own sliders from blankets, frisbees, sheets, towels, or old carpet samples.
- Use hard plastic sliders for carpeted floors, and padded sliders for hard wood. Depending on whether you have hard wood floors or carpeting in your room, sliders can be more or less effective. They're not necessary in every case.
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3
Get rid of stuff to make extra space. Before you start moving anything around, take some time to declutter your space. Get rid of trash and anything that doesn't belong in your room, including drinking glasses and other kitchen stuff, other people's belongings, and towels and other things.
- This might take a while, but it's an essential step and you should let it. If you want to spend a few days going through your desk and your bookshelf, tossing out unwanted old papers and materials, this is the perfect opportunity to do so. Be judicious and cut down on your stuff.
- Tidy up your clothes and separate your clean clothes and dirty clothes. You can evaluate whether or not you need and have space for additional organizational space later.
- Try to keep only the minimum of things you'll actually need to use regularly, to keep out in your room. Everything else, either get rid of if you have no sentimental attachment to it, or place the objects into storage and keep it out of sight.
4
Start with a thorough cleaning. A newly rearranged room should be clean, so it's pretty typical to start by thoroughly cleaning your space, then taking some time to clean under and around the furniture that you moved later. Rearranging, organizing, and cleaning usually all blends together into one big project.
- Clean mirrors, vacuum, wash the floor, do a thorough dusting, and clean all the surfaces and interiors of the furniture that you're planning on moving. Start by cleaning high, sweeping out the corners of the room. Do the floor last.
- Alternatively, some people may prefer to start a bigger mess and clean up later. Depending on how you like to work, just jump right into reorganizing and get your room messy, then worry about doing the deep clean after you've got everything in place.
5
Visualize your new space. Now that you've got your space uncluttered and clean, start planning where and how you'd like your room organized. Measure your furniture to make sure it will fit in the spaces that you want to move it, before you've done so. Read the next section for tips on reorganizing your furniture.
- For some people, it may be helpful to draw a visual layout of how you want your room to look. That way, if you don't like it you can erase it and start over. Measure everything to make sure it fits. You don't want to waste all your energy only to find that things don't fit.
- You might consider measuring all the walls and the areas in your room, as well as the furniture, and draw your plan to scale. Or, you can just get moving if you're more of a hands-on thinker.

Part 2

Part 2 of 3:

Rearranging Concepts

1
Rotate everything on an axis. Depending on the current orientation of your room and your furniture, it's sometimes easiest to go with an easy axis rotation, shifting things over one "position" or one rotation, and not trying to move mountains. If you're looking for a little change, but aren't quite sure how to make it happen, this can be a good, fast, and simple way of doing so.
- For example, if your bed is parallel with the door or window, just turn your bed so that's its along the perpendicular wall. An easy left or right turn with the bottom edge of the bed should work.
- Pick a corner of each piece of furniture and keep it in the same place. Imagine all the different orientations of the piece, just by rotating it in one or the other direction.
2
Orient furniture to the windows. Some people hate waking up with the sun beating into their eyes, while others like to let the sun ease them into the day. Others may hate the sun in their eyes later in the day, when trying to sit at a desk and work, while others may like evening light. This is totally up to your choice and preference, but it's good to imagine how light comes into your room through the windows and how to orient your furniture around that light.
- You might consider marking the strongest light in the morning and evening on the floor or the walls with some painters tape as you're moving stuff around, so you'll be able to remember where the light is, even if it's cloudy or dark.
- You can also use the spacing of the windows to dictate how you organize your furniture. You might line up your bed, shelves, or other furniture with the outline of the windows, or the space between the window and the wall.
3
Save and create space with your furniture. Using furniture wisely, you can create and maximize the amount of space in your room by reorganizing, or you can separate a larger room by using furniture to partition off a corner or other space in the room.
- If you have a desk or dresser, you an save wall space by putting your desk at the foot of your bed (if the desk doesn't have a back). This is excellent for smaller rooms in which you need to have sleeping and working space.
- If you have a larger room, use your desk or some free-standing book shelves to partition off a separate space from your bed and create an office or working area.
- Curtains, scarves, tapestries, or drapes can also be a great way of partitioning off your bed or creating other small sitting areas in a bedroom. Hang cloth from the ceiling and the corner of the wall with tacks to experiment with different areas and see what you like best.
4
Think about traffic patterns. How do you come into and go out of your room? What do you want accessible to you at different positions throughout the room? It's important to consider the practical elements of reorganizing your room, as well as the aesthetic elements. You'll have to have a certain amount of open space so you can move openly, and preparing for that space is just as important as thinking of where you want the furniture.
- If you have people come into your room regularly, keep the bed on the opposite side of the room from the entryway door, so you don't have to sit on or around your sleeping space, when you're hanging out.
- If you have a rack for shoes, is there space for it near the door? You'll be able to access things easier, the closer they are to where you'll need them.
- Where are "tuckable" places in the room? Under shelves, your bed, and in closets are great places where you can slide organizers to keep your room free of clutter on the floor, making it easier to get around.
5
Make sure nothing is obstructed. Be sure to keep all passageways and things that you'll need to access free of obstruction. Can windows be opened, curtains and shades be drawn, and doors be used freely? Make sure that moving your furniture around doesn't affect the function of any of your furniture, forcing you to open a desk drawer so it bangs into your bedpost.
6
Place your chair or desk in the "power point" of the room. It's common to position desks and chairs facing the door, with your back to the wall and your face toward where people will likely be entering. This tends to help people feel more at ease and aware of their surroundings, and it makes it very easy to greet anyone who knocks on the door.
7
Consider new storage options. When you start thinking about how to move things around, it's a good opportunity to upgrade the storage options you have available to you, and see whether or not there's an opportunity for consolidating or adding new space savers to your area. Think about whether or not you could incorporate any of the following storage options:
- New shelving units
- Plastic organizers or tubs
- Decorative baskets
- Trash bins and clothes hampers
- Mason jars on a windowsill
8
Change the curtains. One easy way to change the color scheme or brighten up your space quickly, easily, and drastically is to just change the curtains to a new color or style. This can alter the light that comes into your room in subtle ways and can also make your space appear new, without having to change much.
- You could also just take the curtains down in your room, if you want some more light in your room.

Part 3

Part 3 of 3:

Rearranging Your Space

1
Remove all small things you don't use much from your room. Before you move anything, it's good to consolidate all the little stuff that might get jostled, broken, or lost while you're moving furniture. Take the same things on your desk or dresser, like lamps, pens, and picture frames, and move them to another room in the house momentarily. To avoid them falling or adding more weight, gather them all in a large bin and take them out of your room.
2
Take furniture out, if necessary. In some cases, especially if you've got a crowded room, it's better to take the furniture out and get the room empty, or close to empty, before refiling it in a new way. This will also give you the option of cleaning the floor more thoroughly, underneath your bed, dresser, and other areas that might not have been cleaned since whenever you last rearranged.
3
Get help moving the big stuff. Start by placing the biggest thing in your room, which will usually be your bed, but you might have a large dresser or desk that rivals your bed in size. If something else is in the way, move that a little out so you can move the other furniture in.
- Once your first piece is in place, take the thing you just moved out of the way and move it to where you want it. If something else is there, do the same thing you did before and continue this until everything is in its place.
- Another way to organize is picking a corner of the room that's farthest from the entry door and building back toward the door from there. This will keep the entryway relatively uncluttered while you're rearranging stuff.
4
Continue moving furniture in according to your new design. Once you've got the biggest stuff in place, continue bringing in more stuff and filling in around, according to your new plan. Make sure you like each piece in it's new place before you build around it, so you don't have to start all over, if you don't like something.
- If you move your desk in and start loading up the drawers again, it would be annoying if you had to take it all out because you're unsatisfied with the desk, once you get the dresser in place. Don't decorate quite yet, get the big stuff in place first.
5
Focus on the finishing touches after the furniture is in place. Bring all the little things back into your room and put them where they belong, once you've got the major stuff settled. Do other cleaning, as you see the need for it.
- If you think your room needs a whole new bedspread and curtain situation, check out the article Decorate your new room for tips about redecorating.

Expert Q&A

Question

How can I rearrange my furniture?

MacKenzie Cain
Interior Designer & LEED Green Associate
MacKenzie Cain is an Interior Designer and a LEED-certified Green Associate for Habitar Design based in Chicago, Illinois. She has over seven years of experience in interior design and architectural design. She received a BA in Interior Design from Purdue University in 2013 and received her LEED Green Associate certification from the Green Building Certification Institute in 2013.

MacKenzie Cain

Interior Designer & LEED Green Associate

Expert Answer

When you're rearranging a room, think about the natural traffic pattern through the room. It may take some time living in the space and a few times rearranging, but allowing these paths to be open will help you determine where your furniture needs to be placed.

Warnings

If you are not very strong you can hurt yourself while moving things, so make sure you have someone else there in case you need help.

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