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SIZING SIMPLIFIED: BEDROOM EDITION

Your bedroom is the spot in your home where you should feel the most at ease. It’s where you unwind after a long day and, on the best mornings, get to lounge around and just relax. The last thing you want is to be frustrated or uncomfortable, so you need to make sure that you get the proportions of your furniture just right.

Mattresses

Luckily, this one is very straightforward. Mattresses come in standard sizes:  

Twin: 40” wide x 75” long

Full: 55” wide x 75” long

Queen: 60” wide x 80” long

King: 80” wide x 80” long

California King: 72” wide x 84” long

Nightstands

Height. Your nightstand should be the same height from the floor as is your mattress. It will seem obvious if you think about it — you want to be able to reach the nightstand from your bed without having to reach up or down (just like with your sofa and end table). So when buying a nightstand, stick within a couple of inches of your mattress height. Here are some general nightstand measurements:

For a standard bed with no box spring:                 24-26” high

For a slightly raised bed and/or a box spring:       27-31” high

For a high platform bed:                                         20-24” high

Lamps. The rule of thumb for lamps on nightstands is also the same one that applies for end tables: the height of the nightstand should be the same as the height of the lamp on top of it. So if you went for a 24” nightstand, the lamp should also be 24” high, give or take 2”. Generally, your lamp should be 22-26” high.  

Rugs under the Bed

We always place rugs perpendicular to the bed so that together they make a T shape. This way, there’s plushness all around where you step off.  You can see images of this on our website, in my book, or in design magazines.

To do this with a queen size bed, you’ll need a rug that is at least 6 x 9”. For a king-sized bed, go for one that’s 8 x 10” or even 8 x 11” if you can find it — it’s a more rare size but looks more balanced. 

Dressers

Long or tall, dressers pretty much come in standard sizes. They are all 16-22” deep. Low dressers are typically waist-high at 32-36” and tall dressers range between 40-55”. 

Now that we’ve laid out the standard sizing of your basic furniture, you need to think about how to position these pieces. By now you know how important proper sizing is not only for keeping your proportions in balance but also for comfort and optimum usage.  That’s true not only for the size of the pieces themselves but also the spaces in between them. We’ll cover that in our final installment of this sizing series.  

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