Choosing appropriate couch slipscovers means paying attention to good design. And the first step in good design is analyzing a room's space. After you've examined the space, you can make adjustments to alter the room's look and feel. Because a couch is usually a significant room feature, selecting couch slipcovers that make it a natural part of the room is important.

If you'd like to change the furniture in a room, it's easiest to either make sketches or use scale furniture cutouts for possible configurations. But if you're satisfied with the present arrangement, determine what the room's focal point is. If it's the couch, then your choice for couch slipcovers will tend to be more bold and dramatic. But if it's not, then you'll want to choose a slipcover that doesn't distract from the focal point.

Good design often breaks traditional rules, but before learning to break the rules, you need to know how to apply them. The fundamental design concepts involving space are scale, line, balance, harmony, and rhythm.

• Scale - The scale of something refers to its size in comparison with its surroundings. And size relates not only to the size of objects, but to the size of fabric patterns. So for instance, couch slipcovers should have larger patterns than those for a chair.
• Line - Lines define space. And like scale, they relate to both objects and the fabrics used. Horizontal lines generate a feeling of relaxation. And vertical lines instill a sense of strength and formality. Diagonal lines imply motion and curved lines are soft and sensual. Your choice of fabric design for couch slipcovers can either soften or accentuate its existing lines or the dominant room lines.
• Balance - To achieve balance, a room's furnishings must be evenly distributed in either a symmetric or asymmetric fashion. Symmetric balance is a distribution with one side a mirror image of the other. A large painting in between two smaller same-sized paintings would be an example of this. Asymmetric balance uses different sizes in proportion, such as hanging the two small paintings one above the other and both to one side of the large painting.
• Harmony - You produce harmony by having various elements relate to each other through such things as style, color, and pattern. And whatever the underlying scheme is in a room, your couch slipcovers should be a part of that.
• Rhythm - The repeated patterns in a room are what give it its rhythm. Whether it's color, pattern, or line, rhythm gives a room a dynamic feel. And while rhythm gives the room motion, harmony keeps it from being chaotic. So any fabric picked for couch slipcovers, should be in keeping with the room's other rhythm elements.