4 TV Placement Ideas for Rooms with Window Walls

If you have a spectacular view you’d like to show off, or if you simply want your living space to feel bigger and brighter, then floor-to-ceiling windows seem like an ideal home design choice. Also known as “window walls”, these large windows will give you plenty of access to natural light in the daytime. This can be great not only for your health, but also for your electric bill, as more sunlight means you’ll have to depend less on light fixtures to see your way around your house in the daylight hours.

Installing floor-to-ceiling windows, however, also means you’ll have much less space to display items that would ordinarily need to be mounted on walls. This problem doesn’t just extend to decorative items like photos, art prints, and posters. Say you’ve got a shiny new Android TV you’re raring to display—you can be sure that finding a convenient place for it in a room with limited wall space will prove challenging.

Luckily, there are many ways to make a room with window walls or any other space that doesn’t seem optimized for TV placement work for you. These four tips will help you work around a lack of wall space and other limitations with ease.

Make the TV a Room Divider

If you have an open-plan home or simply a spacious living room, you can use your TV to break this space up into two smaller “rooms.” The easiest way to display a TV in the middle of a big space is to get a large cabinet that can serve as both a room divider and a media console. TV cabinets usually come with shelving and compartments that you can use to store cable boxes, power strips, and other devices for your home entertainment system, as well as hide any unsightly wires.

Free-standing benches, TV stands, or bookshelves are another option for displaying your TV in the middle of a room, but bear in mind that placing your TV away from the walls leaves it vulnerable to tipping over. This risk doubles if you have free-roaming pets or small children in the house. Make sure to place your TV a minimum of 3-4 inches away from the edge of the surface it’s standing on. You’ll then want to secure it down with anti-tip straps or earthquake straps.

Cover the Back of Your TV with Cabinetry

While you can always set up your TV on a shelf, table, or other surface right in front of one of your window walls, certain homeowners don’t want the backs of their TVs to be visible to people looking in from the outside. If this is a major issue for you when it comes to TV placement, you can always use cabinetry to hide the back of your TV and stand your chosen cabinets against one window. Seeing the back of a cabinet likely won’t be any more unsightly for onlookers than seeing the backs of any other piece of furniture—just make sure that the cabinet you choose has ample space for plugs and other components.

Install Blinds or Blackout Curtains

Covering up one window wall with blinds or thick curtains will give you a clean, solid backdrop for you to stand your TV up against. Window coverings will also help you regulate the amount of sunlight that enters your living space during the day. While homeowners generally welcome lots of natural light, sunlight will also cast a distracting glare on the TV screen and diminish the quality of the picture you see. Given this, you’ll definitely want a quick and easy way to darken your room for days that you’d like to spend just binge-watching your favorite movies or shows.

Use Mechanical Lifts

If it’s flexibility you prize above all, then you may want to consider investing in motorized lifts for your TV. These lifts can be stored in large TV cabinets and manipulated via remote control, so you can raise your TV into view when you want to watch it and lower it down into the cabinet the rest of the time. This setup gives you the luxury of placing your TV anywhere you like, whether in the middle of your living room, against a window, or at the foot of your bed. Since you can simply put the TV away when it’s not in use, you won’t have to worry about it ruining your view or possibly being knocked over.

Motorized lifts are typically sold separately from TVs and TV cabinets, so before you buy and install them, you’ll definitely want to make sure that your chosen TV cabinet has enough space to accommodate the mechanism. Cabinets that are wider across are usually better for this purpose, as they allow you to place any consoles and components on either side of the TV instead of underneath it.

While mounting your TV directly on the wall may no longer be an option in a room with window walls, there’s no need to assume that the wonderfully airy design needs to come at the cost of good home entertainment. With a little imagination and resourcefulness, you can definitely set up your TV in a way that allows you to enjoy the best of both worlds.

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