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How to center your artwork: with the furniture or wall?

How to correctly center artwork on the wall is one of the most popular questions we get asked:

Q: I have a piece of furniture that is not located in the center of the wall. If I want to hang a piece of art above it, should the artwork be centered with the furniture or the wall?

Two images of a picture hanging above a couch; one image the picture is centered over the couch and has a green check mark indicating done well; the other image has the artwork centered with the wall with a red x that indicates this is not the best way to hang the artwork

 

When hanging your pictures, always hang them in relation to the furniture sitting below. With your couch off-centered on the wall, focus on hanging your painting centered above the couch to create a great focal point for your living room. As you can see, if you were to hang your piece centered with the wall, the entire furniture arrangement looks out of balance.

Two images of artwork hung above a table: one centered with the table and one centered with the wall. There is a check mark on the one centered with the table to indicate this is the correct way to hang the art.

Hanging artwork with furniture is a good decorating guideline that works with all kinds of pieces. In the table image above you can see how hanging the artwork so it is centered over the table creates balance and harmony in the space.

For more tips on hanging artwork above a sofa, check out this related blog post, Easy tips for hanging pictures above a couch. You can also learn more about our Hang & Level™ picture hanging tool, and shop online at UTR Decorating.

Have any other decorating questions? Email us at questions@utrdecorating.com and we’ll do our best to help you Create the home you love™

At Under The Roof Decorating our mission is to design innovative products that help you Create the home you love™.

We believe everyone should have a home they love that reflects who they are. Our passion is to design products to help you quickly and easily decorate your home—all on your own. Discover the joy of creating spaces you love, and the satisfaction of doing it yourself.

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Reviews (7 comments)

  • The UTR Team On

    Hi there, thanks for reaching out. That’s a great question. Generally speaking, we try and align artwork with a piece of furniture, even if that piece of furniture is not centred on the wall. This approach is the same when dealing with a space that has been divided by something other than walls, for example by furniture arrangement or coffered ceilings. Whenever you walk into the space, your brain will look for balance in the space. Aligning the artwork with the furniture arrangement or in the middle of the space will make it look more balanced. That’s the approach we’d take, but at the end of the day, whatever looks good to you is the ‘right’ answer!

  • Stephanie Robinson On

    Do I center wall hanging horizontally on the long wall or center it horizontally to long side of coffered ceiling, which is not centered to the wall?

  • Marta Santoro On

    Hi I recently moved to a smaller house and have many paintings that my husband insist to put them up on this wall regardless . They all are different in size and frames . Here is the wall space I have with a flat tv on the furniture and all these pics he put on the wall, that in my opinion they are all wrong , no style , no balance no nothing . Please help !

  • Kristy On

    What if the couch is approx. two feet from the wal!?

  • Faye Stewart On

    I have a queen panel headboard, what can I put over the headboard?

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