Cowhide Rug Placement Guide

A cowhide rug can add a lot of styles and a lot of visual interest to space almost instantly – but finding the right place to put that rug is never quite as simple or as straightforward as you might think.

For starters, cowhide rugs almost always have very irregular patterns compared to traditional rugs that are rounded, squared off, or rectangular in shape.

On top of that, no two cowhide rugs are identical in their pattern, in their shape, or even in their overall size. There’s always going to be small differences between different rugs made from cowhide, which is why there’s no such thing as a “one-size-fits-all” kind of approach to placing it in a space.

That being said, there are some tips and tricks you can arm yourself with to navigate using cowhide rugs in your interior spaces. Below we highlight some of the most important fundamentals think about when you are using these gorgeous floor coverings, using them in ways that really elevate the style of a particular space the way that only these kinds of rugs can.

Let’s jump right in!

Living Room

When you are thinking about putting a cowhide rug in the living room you really have three different options to work with: 

• Placing your furniture directly on top of the rug, allowing a little bit of overage to sneak out behind the furniture
• Placing your furniture half on the rug and half off of the rug, letting the cowhide itself show off a little more and become more of a focal point of the space
• Or placing your cowhide rug alone on the floor, with nothing obstructing it, really making it the star of the show and a centerpiece of your interior design

Each of those choices have pros and cons, but it really all comes down to the type of cowhide rug you have, whether or not you want it to be more of a background piece that adds a bit of texture or the main focal point of your space, and the type of furniture that you have to work with, too.

Consider playing around with these three configurations in the living room to find something that really speaks to you!

Dining Room

When you are putting a cowhide rug in a dining room there’s one super important thing to consider, and that’s how the chairs situated around your table are going to move in and out as people sit down, get up, or leave the table – and how that’s going to impact your cowhide rug.

Cowhide is very durable (no surprise there) but consider positioning your new rug in a way that the edges of the chairs aren’t going to hook or catch on the perimeter of the rug. Quick fix: if this is an issue with your table and chairs, we recommend using Rug Grippers X-protector. 

In a dining room we usually like most areas, going a little larger is a safe bet as it gives you more flexibility to work with. This is the case when going solo on the rug design or when layering with another rug underneath.

Bedroom

Nothing adds as much character or warmth to a bedroom space the way that a cowhide rug can, and there are a bunch of different ways that you can use this floor covering to take your bedroom look to the next level.

Oversized cowhide rugs can be placed underneath your bed and your nightstands in a variety of angles, and even directions of sticking out just a little or the entire rug – and that’s a great look for those that want this material to sort of fade into the background while still adding color, texture, and visual interest.

Of course, you can also leave cowhide rugs half under your bed and half exposed or can even place them as “runners” leading up to each side of the bed. There’s a lot of versatility that you’ll enjoy when you are working with this kind of floor covering.

If you really want your new rug to make a statement it may not be a bad idea to use it as a “headboard” of sorts.

Attach the cowhide rug directly to the wall behind your bed and you’ll create something that is impossible to ignore, not only adding extreme visual interest to your space but also adding a lot of texture and atmosphere to your bedroom that would have been impossible to pull off with any other form of art or headboard you could go with.

Breaking All the “Rug Rules”

At the end of the day, the irregular shape of cowhide rugs give them a lot of latitude to be used in ways that traditional floor coverings couldn’t ever successfully pull off.

You can use these floor coverings to delineate different spaces, to tie different types of furniture together (visually, anyway) by sneaking them under a chair and an ottoman or a coffee table, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

You can even mix and match different patterns together in different spaces to break up larger rooms, can use these as throws over furniture, or (as highlighted above) can even hang these rugs on the wall for an eclectic and engaging piece of textured artwork that adds a lot of WOW! to a space straight away.

You'll never run out of options when you are working with gorgeous cowhide rugs!