Lease and Layerwith Nora
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This site is new. Twelve guides are up, one is being written, and there is no third category.

Get my rug size

Checked Sep 15, 2026

12Guides finished
1In progress
30Numbers already published

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Finished on top, in progress underneath

  • The same living room twice, seen from above. On the left a small rug sits under the coffee table only, with the sofa and both armchairs stranded on bare floor. On the right a larger rug reaches under the sofa and under the front legs of both chairs.
    Sep 2026

    Same room, two rugs. One of them shrinks it.

    What size rug do you need?

    Front legs on, and 6 to 12 in wider than the sofa on each side.

    Measure the room, not the sofa. A calculator that draws your room to scale, the size for every common room, the dining and bedroom rules, and the one case where the 18 in of bare floor everyone repeats will wreck a small apartment.

    Calculator7 min read

    Living · Dining · Bedroom

    Test your room →
  • A dark apartment at night. In the foreground a brass table lamp sits on a side table with the lit bulb showing under the bottom edge of its shade, and behind it a floor lamp beside a green armchair throws light down onto an open book.
    Sep 2026

    Sit down in that chair and you can see the bulb.

    What size lamp do you need?

    Shade bottom at seated eye level, about 40 in from the floor.

    Height against the surface it stands on, shade width against the base, and the seated eye level test that settles both in about ten seconds. Floor lamps, table lamps and bedside, each with the sizes that fit.

    Size tables17 min read

    Living · Bedroom · Nooks

    Get the right height →
  • A tape measure held to the wall with blue painter tape, running from the top of a white window casing up toward the ceiling. On a paint spattered step ladder beside it sit a bronze curtain bracket, a pencil and a spirit level, with a linen panel hanging at the right.
    Sep 2026

    Four inches above the frame is the minimum, not the win.

    How high should curtains go?

    Rod 4 to 6 in above the frame, brackets 4 to 10 in past it.

    Rod height, bracket width, panel fullness and the length that touches the floor. Plus the four no-drill options with what each one holds and what it does not, which is the part that decides whether your curtains are still up in a month.

    No-drill options17 min read

    Windows · Every room

    Raise the rod →
  • Looking straight down at a rug in front of a cream sofa. Two rectangles of kraft paper are taped to the rug, a long one and a shorter one laid over it, with a tape measure, a pencil and a cup of coffee on the rug beside them.
    Sep 2026

    Most coffee table regrets come down to length.

    What size coffee table do you need?

    About two thirds the length of the sofa, 14 to 18 in away.

    Two thirds the length of your sofa, 14 to 18 in away from it, at the height of the seat cushion. The table runs by sofa length, and there is an honest row for the 96 in sofa, where the arithmetic does not land on a size anyone sells.

    Size table13 min read

    Living · Small spaces

    Get the length →
  • Seven kraft paper rectangles in different sizes taped to a pale wall as stand ins for frames, one of them peeling away at the corner. On the console table below sit four real empty frames leaning against the wall, a spirit level, a pencil, a wooden bowl and a brass lamp.
    Sep 2026

    Seven frames, and only the first one is a decision.

    How to hang a gallery wall in a rental

    2 to 3 in between frames, the whole group centered at 57 to 60 in.

    Lay it out on the floor first, keep 2 to 3 in between frames, center the whole group at 57 to 60. Then a hanger for every weight band, because the weight is what decides whether the wall keeps your deposit.

    Weight guide20 min read

    Walls · Living · Bedroom

    Place the first frame →
  • Two shelves of a dark wood bookcase against a deep olive wall. The upper shelf holds three cloth bound books, a small gilt frame, a stone bowl and a lidded basket, all spread in one flat line at the same height. The shelf below holds one pale vase at the far left and nothing else.
    Sep 2026

    Nothing on this shelf is ugly. It still looks wrong.

    How to style a shelf in five moves

    Books, height, art, small things, and leave a third of it empty.

    Books first, then height, then art, then the small things, and then the part nobody does: leave a third of the shelf empty. Every row says the size that fits a standard eleven inch shelf, because that is the measurement the photos never give you.

    Five moves14 min read

    Living · Nooks · Rentals

    Fix the shelf →
  • The same rental living room twice, side by side. On the left, flat daylight, sheer white curtains at the balcony door, a pale rug and a bare sofa. On the right the identical room with heavier curtains hung to the ceiling, a lit floor lamp, olive and rust pillows, a knitted throw over the arm and a basket on the floor.
    Sep 2026

    Same room, same furniture. Only one of them feels lived in.

    Why your room feels flat, and the five fixes

    Five diagnoses, and none of them is buying a bigger sofa.

    You bought everything on the list, it is clean, it is tidy, and it still feels like nobody lives there. Five diagnoses, each with the number that fixes it.

    5-minute check16 min read

    Every room

    Find the missing layer →
  • Material samples laid out on gray linen. Most of the surface is cream: folded linen cloth, a plaster tile, cream paper card and a paper bowl with a dried branch. A smaller group holds a blue gray tweed, a walnut veneer and an olive velvet. The smallest group is four little burgundy pieces, a brass plate and a red marble disc, with a burgundy tassel at the edge.
    Sep 2026

    One accent looks like an accident. Three looks like a plan.

    The 60-30-10 rule, for people who cannot paint

    Sixty dominant, thirty secondary, ten accent, and the ten is bigger than you think.

    Sixty percent is the walls and ceiling you did not choose. Thirty starts with the sofa you cannot return. Ten is the accent, and it needs the size of a chair, not a coaster.

    Split tables14 min read

    Color · Every room

    Get your split →
  • A corner of a rented living room where six materials are visible at once: a linen curtain, a walnut side table, a wool throw, a small brass lamp base, a terracotta pot and a limewashed panel leaning on the wall.
    Sep 2026

    What fails first is the coated thing, whatever it cost.

    Which materials survive a rental, and which ones only look like they will

    Linen, solid walnut and unglazed terracotta hold up. A sealed surface has one good state.

    Six materials put through sun, water, rub and a move, each one shown new and then at four years. Which job each material does in an apartment, the five surfaces the landlord already chose for you, and four ten-second tests for spotting the lookalikes.

    Wear test8 min read

    Every room

    Age the six →
  • A rented living room with one carved dark wooden chest of drawers standing between a plain cream sofa and an olive armchair. The chest is the only ornate thing in the room.
    Sep 2026

    One old piece is an accent. Six is an antique shop.

    How much old can a new room take?

    One in five of the things you would name out loud. In a living room, two or three.

    The ratio, and why it is one in five and not one in three. Then the half nobody tells you: which piece should be the old one. The biggest, the darkest or the most worked, one of the three and never all three.

    Slider7 min read

    Living · Bedroom · Entry

    Turn the dial →
  • A cream sofa dressed with three patterned textiles at three visibly different sizes: a large floral cushion, a medium check cushion and a fine stripe on a folded throw.
    Sep 2026

    How many matters less than what size.

    How many patterns can one room take?

    Three, if the three are different sizes. Two of the same size fight and you cannot say why.

    How to measure the scale of a pattern against something you already own, color as the thread that ties strangers together, the small room, and a builder you can break on purpose to see two patterns compete.

    Builder8 min read

    Living · Bedroom

    Build the three →
  • A rented living room whose colors repeat the framed painting above the sofa: warm off-white walls, a terracotta cushion and an olive throw.
    Sep 2026

    The painting already solved it. You only have to read it.

    How to pull a whole room out of one piece of art

    Name the three colors that cover the most area, then keep the loudest one small.

    Pick colors straight off a painting and watch a room take them, including the mistake everyone makes first. What to do when the wall cannot be painted, which is the usual case, and where the art comes from if you do not have any.

    Color picker7 min read

    Color · Every room

    Pull a palette →
  • In progress

    The bulb aisle labels this in a way that helps nobody.

    What color temperature should my bulbs be?

    2700K in living rooms and bedrooms, 3000K in kitchens and baths.

    2700K to 5000K, what each one does to skin, wood and paint, and why the bulb aisle is labeled in a way that makes this harder than it needs to be. Next one out.

    Number published

    Light · Every room

    See the number now →
Chenille, the site cat, sitting side on and caught mid yawn with one front paw lifted.
Three of them have been in progress since she was small.

Thirteen rows is the whole list, and padding it out with reprints of other people’s advice would be easy and would make this page longer and worse. The one still being written already has its number published, with the drawing, so the answer is available before the guide is.

30

Numbers, drawn

Whatever is not written yet, the numbers are already here

Every guide on this site is built out of the same thirty measurements, and all thirty are published with their drawing, their reason and the renter version of how to hit them without a drill. If you came here with one question, the number is probably faster than the guide would be.

See all thirty with their drawings →

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Chenille, the site cat, walking in profile with her tail low and one front paw lifted mid stride.
She does not follow anyone. She was just leaving.

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Each room is one photo with every piece numbered and the number it has to hit.