Style Your Living Room With These Entertainment Center Ideas
When designing your living room, the entertainment center often becomes the focal point that sets the tone for the whole space. With televisions getting bigger and media libraries expanding, entertainment centers must be both functional to store all your components and stylish to coordinate with your room's decor theme.
Luckily there are endless options for customizing your living room entertainment center to not only meet your media storage needs but also show off your unique style. From DIY projects using repurposed materials to high-tech smart TV stands, you can create a beautiful entertainment furniture arrangement perfect for movie marathons, gaming sessions, or casual viewing.
Types of Entertainment Centers
The first decision involves selecting the right type of entertainment center for your available floor space while factoring in elements like wall mounting abilities, storage necessities, and style preferences.
Freestanding Units
Freestanding entertainment centers come in a wide variety of sizes, shapes, materials to match your living room layout and decor. Typical media consoles provide ample shelving and cabinet storage within a long, low profile ideal for centering across from seating areas. Narrower credenza styles fit in tighter spots like behind sofas. Tower units feature a taller, vertical orientation for corner placement. Whatever silhouette you choose, be sure to leave ample ventilation room around electronics.
Wall-Mounted Units
Wall-mounted entertainment centers attach directly to living room walls, saving floor space in smaller areas. Floating shelves with ledges offer open component display along with wall anchorage for strength. Cubby style racks recess back into the wall to neatly stash media equipment. When installing, ensure securely fastened mounting brackets, outlet positioning for wires to feed behind, and adequate airflow so nothing overheats.
Media Consoles/TV Stands
Media consoles and TV stands come ready to accommodate today's array of home entertainment necessities. Look for entertainment centers with adjustable shelves and partitions to customize storage of your cable box, gaming consoles, stereo receivers, and other gear. Doors and cabinets keep clutter out of sight. Many include gaps or built-in conduits for threading cords. When shopping, note the maximum TV size and weight each model holds to ensure compatibility.
Storage and Organization
While streaming entertainment doesn't require racks upon racks of disk storage like DVD collections once did, equipment and media management remain pivotal entertainment center considerations.
Insert shelving with adjustable heights and depths within the unit to neatly arrange components. Partition media devices from decor with sliding doors. Install extra power outlets inside cabinet interiors to neatly hide plugs and prevent cord clutter. Label shelves and storage areas for intuitive media access.
Entertainment centers with gaps, raceways, conduits, and cable cutouts simplify wire routing from devices to centrally stored power strips then out of sight. Plastic cable boxes around back keep connections neatly bundled. Consider cord covers to run wiring neatly along baseboards to wall outlets.
Functional Elements and Accessories
Look beyond simply storing electronics to entertainment centers serving expanded living room functions.
Entertainment center lighting transforms units into illuminated focal points. LED strips mount under shelves, inside cabinets, or behind units for soft, ambient glows. Swing arm scones flanking the TV provide task lighting. Smart bulbs change colors to set viewing moods.
An electric fireplace built into the entertainment console offers flame-free cozy warmth. Many models include heating, crackling sound effects, and life-like flames visible via glass screens or acrylic cutouts. Some designs feature floating shelves over wall-recessed fireplaces for a more customizable look.
Today's entertainment centers also integrate seamlessly with whole home audiovisual networks. Look for units ready for sound bar or subwoofer positioning. Conduit shelving allows speaker wiring to surround seating areas. Many stands feature built-in racks to neatly mount A/V receivers and media hubs.
Decorative Touches
Personalize entertainment centers by incorporating decorative elements echoing your living room's style.
Flank flatscreen TVs with artwork, plates or wall shelves for visual interest even when powered off. Plants natural soften entertainment center edges while sculptures, vases or baskets atop media consoles provide surfaces for accenting with decorative balls, river rocks, pine cones.
Line media console shelves with decorative books and collectibles related to passions like travel, food or art. Coffee table styling tricks like stacks of colorful throw blankets, accent pillows and trays provide surfaces for displaying cherished travel souvenirs or pretty candleholders.
Incorporate surrounding furnishings like patterned area rugs extending under the TV stand, textured pillows and throws atop sofas for continuity. Remember to repeat entertainment center finishes, frames and colors via throw pillows, wall art and rug designs to tie the whole area together.
Design Styles
Choose an entertainment center aligning with your living room's interior design style for maximum cohesion. Here are some popular genres to consider:
Modern
Often involving sleek geometric lines, luxe metals and wood veneers, modern entertainment centers feel glamorous and current. Glass shelving contributes lightweight transparency. concrete or acrylic media consoles feel earthy yet refined. Multimedia power hubs and cord conduits keep things cleanly streamlined.
Pair modern entertainment units with marble coffee tables, metallic accents and contemporary artwork. Crisp white walls or exposed brick backdrops keep things clean. Ensure ample breathing room around spare, linear furniture silhouettes.
Rustic
Rustic media consoles feature natural, untreated woods like oak, pine or hickory paired with distressed metal finishes. Reclaimed barn boards offer authentic salvaged charm. Woven rattan, leather and stone add organic texture. Iron fixtures provide hand-wrought appeal. Carved accent legs feel sturdy and substantial.
Position reclaimed wood entertainment centers within cozy seating circles. Echo rugged media console textures via jute rugs, leather ottomans, and natural fiber throws. Black and white photography, antler chandeliers, and earthenware accents reinforce the laidback charm.
Transitional
Transitional entertainment centers blend elements from traditional and contemporary styles for broadly appealing versatility. Finishes like brown painted wood feel familiar while brushed nickel hardware and simple molding profiles keep things fresh.
Flexible sizing from compact media consoles to spacious credenzas adapts to many spaces. Multifunctional designs serve multiple needs like media storage, display shelving, and decorative libraries. Neutral colors ensure easy coordinating with existing decor.
Budget-Friendly Entertainment Center Ideas
Lavish custom built-in entertainment centers may not suit all budgets. Luckily, you can create budget-friendly media storage solutions using clever DIY upgrades, discount materials, and simple embellishing.
One thrifty route involves repurposing existing furnishings like old cabinets, buffets and dressers into makeshift entertainment centers. Sand and stain yard sale finds to refresh. Supersize storage with stacked crates or bookcases topped with plywood for makeshift media consoles.
Affordable big box store materials like particle board, MDF and pine provide blank slates for customizing on any budget. Cut dowels, trim and molding transform basic boxes into built-in looking designs. DIY concrete board forms offer industrial edge. Wax paper or shower curtain liners make inexpensive cord covers.
Watch for media console sales, open box discounts and clearance deals from retailers like Wayfair, Ikea and Walmart. Budget dollars stretch furthest on simple designs and neutral colors easily spruced up with paint, hardware and decor.
Smart Home Integration
Today's entertainment centers do far more than simply house electronics. Integrating your living room's style, storage solutions and media setup with home automation products and smart devices can seriously amplify functionality, ambiance and overall convenience.
Start by ensuring any new TV stand or media console accommodates current and future smart gadgetry. Look for integrated shelves and docks for voice assistant displays, Wi-fi speakers and tablets used to control other networked home systems.
Smart plugs automatically power down peripherals when not in use while connected smart light strips and bulbs transform entertainment centers into ambient glows or bias lights expanding screen visibility. Connect electronics and lighting to home automation hubs and mobile apps on Wi-Fi for intuitive voice or app-based control.
Motorized curtains not only dial in daytime light levels but also provide blackout darkness for daytime viewing. Similarly, automated window shades preset customized lighting scenes at the touch of a button - or via voice command prompts.
Sustainability Considerations
Environmentalism increasingly guides home design choices. Fortunately, you can easily incorporate green and eco-friendly practices into entertainment center selection and placement.
Opt for renewable materials like bamboo, reclaimed woods or repurposed factory components within furniture designs. Or use formaldehyde-free, sustainably sourced particle boards and MDF marked with environmental certifications from the Forest Stewardship Council.
Energy-efficient LED lighting builds into many media stands not only save power but also last years longer than inefficient incandescent bulbs. Similarly, electronic equipment placed inside adequately vented entertainment center compartments benefit from consolidated power sources like integrated strips or modules equipped with auto-off timers.
Future-proof adaptable designs withstand changes in optimal display placements, viewing distances and media consumption habits. Mobile mounts, wheeled bases and expandable frames bring flexibility as your space and needs evolve.
With endless style, size, material and layout options available, designing an entertainment center tailored to your living room's unique style and functional needs is very achievable. Keep proportions, existing architecture and seating arrangements in mind when selecting between wall-mounted or free-standing media units.
Look for display areas to alternate between housing media components and decorative objects when powered off. Consolidate media equipment into a few streamlined furnishings to leave room for flexible furnishings arrangements as preferences shift. And don't overlook how strategic entertainment center placement can define comfortable conversation areas or reading nooks when screens stay dark.
By drawing inspiration from interior design styles aligned with your overall living room vision, you can easily devise innovative storage solutions and decorative flourishes transforming any entertainment center into a showstopping space for both daily media enjoyment and impressive style even beyond movie nights and binge-watching sessions.