Feng Shui TV Placement: Screens, Mirrors and the Bed

What a television is in feng shui terms

Three things at once, and it is worth separating them because each has its own advice.

Light. A screen is a concentrated source of light, and in the elemental system light is fire. A large television switched on in a dark room is a significant fire element in that space, and it is also, plainly, the thing your eyes are locked onto for two hours. The practical complaints about a badly placed television — eye strain, a headache, falling asleep in front of it — are the same complaints the feng shui tradition describes for a fire element that is too strong and in the wrong place.

Sound. Sound is one of the ways qi is described as moving, and a television is a sound source pointed at a fixed target. In a living room the target is the sofa; in a bedroom it is the pillow.

Metal. The screen and its housing are metal, and the element that a screen brings into a room is worth counting, particularly in a house that already has plenty of metal in it.

And what it does to the room’s focal point

Beyond the elements, a television takes over. In feng shui terms the room should have its focus at the command position, which is the seat with a wall behind it and the door in view. A television facing the entrance — or a sofa facing a television with the door behind it — reverses that: the room now faces the screen and the entrance is behind you or beside you, and the room is oriented outwards rather than inwards.

The television in front of the entrance

The keyword search this article answers — a television placed in front of a window — comes up two quite different faults, and both are worth covering.

A television in front of a window is a practical fault first. The screen is backlit, so contrast is poor and the picture looks washed out in daylight; you end up turning the brightness up, which makes the screen brighter than it needs to be at night. The window behind also stops working as a light source for the room, because the light is reflected off a large dark rectangle rather than distributed.

A television facing the front door is the feng shui fault. A screen on the axis of the entrance is treated as pushing the home's qi out into the street, in the same way a fireplace on that axis is. It also means that the first thing you see when you come in is a screen, which is the opposite of the welcoming, settled arrival the tradition wants.

How to fix each

For the window: move the television to a side wall so that it sits at 90 degrees to the window, or at least at a strong angle to it, and fit a lined blackout blind or a good curtain to close the window when you watch. That improves the picture and reduces glare.

For the door: turn the seating so that the screen is at an angle of about 30 to 45 degrees to the entrance, so you can see the screen and the door is in your peripheral vision rather than dead ahead.

The television in the bedroom

This is the most consistent television fault in feng shui, and it is the one where the traditional reasoning and the medical evidence agree most closely.

The traditional objection: a screen facing the bed throws light and sound directly at a sleeping person, and light and sound are fire and movement. It keeps the room activated at the point where you are trying to switch it off, and it is described in the tradition as dispersing the qi of the sleep position.

The practical objection: watching a screen in a dark room is hard on the eyes, because the contrast between a bright screen and a dark surround keeps the pupil working. Blue light in the evening suppresses melatonin and delays sleep onset, and the content — the news, the arguments, the scrolling — keeps the mind engaged rather than winding down.

What to do instead

• Do not put the screen directly opposite the pillows. If the television has to be in the bedroom, put it on a side wall so you can turn your head to look at it, and never directly in the line of the headboard.
• Set the screen to switch off with a timer, or use the sleep timer on the set itself, so you cannot fall asleep to it.
• Use a warm night-mode setting and keep a low lamp on in the room rather than watching in darkness.
• Keep the set out of the bedroom altogether if you can. The bedroom layout generator covers the arrangements that tend to work better.

And when it stays

If the television is staying, cover it.

Living room arrangement: the screen as an object in the room

The best arrangements give the television a wall of its own and let the seating come to it at an angle, rather than pointing everything at it.

Put the screen on a solid wall. A screen that stands free in the middle of the room, or sits on a console in the middle of the floor, is a fire element and a metal object sitting in the position you want to keep open. A wall-mounted set on a solid internal wall is stable, unobtrusive and gives you the floor back.

Turn the seating. Rather than putting the sofa square on to the screen, angle the seating by about 30 degrees. This is the same principle as angling a desk in an open-plan office: it keeps the entrance in your peripheral vision, stops the screen becoming the only thing in the room, and it is simply more comfortable to look at a screen that is not directly in your face.

Keep it off the door axis. This is the rule that comes up most often, and it is worth bending furniture to achieve.

Mind the height. For a wall-mounted set, the centre of the screen should be at or slightly below seated eye level — roughly 100 to 120 cm from the floor for a typical sofa. Mounting it at eye height or above, as is common, makes people look up and gives the screen more visual dominance than it needs.

Distance and glare

Sit at roughly 1.5 to 2.5 times the screen’s diagonal distance for a modern set.

Making the screen less dominant

Three adjustments that work

Once it is positioned well, there are three further adjustments that make a room feel better with a television in it.

Cover it when it is off. This is the cheapest and most effective change in the whole article. A switched-off black screen is a large hole in the surface of the wall, and it draws the eye in exactly the way the feng shui argument says it will. A fitted cover, a throw over a console, or a cabinet with doors takes that away. The paintings and wall art guide covers the same principle on a wall without a screen on it.

Give the room another focus. A room with one screen and nothing else is a room oriented outwards. A plant, a picture, a bookshelf, a lamp with a warm pool of light, a view — anything that gives the eye somewhere else to go — balances the fire element of the screen and makes the room feel like a place rather than a viewing area.

Let the light work. Watching a screen in a dark room is uncomfortable and, in the elemental reading, throws the fire element out of proportion. A warm lamp behind the sofa, off to one side, is the classical remedy and also the most comfortable way to watch television. It also puts a bit of wood and fire into the arrangement, which is what the materials guide recommends for a room where you spend your evenings.

A checklist for any room with a television

Five questions, in order of how much they matter.

1. Is the screen on the axis of the entrance? If it is, can you turn the seating by 30 to 45 degrees so that you are looking past the screen towards the room rather than straight out of the door?
2. Is there a window behind the screen? If so, can the screen move to a side wall, or at least to a strong angle, and can you get a blackout blind or a lined curtain for the evening?
3. In a bedroom, is the screen opposite the pillows? If it is, move it to a side wall, set a sleep timer and consider a cover so that it is not lit and not on show.
4. Is the screen the only focus in the room? If it is, add one or two things that compete with it deliberately — a plant, a picture, a lamp.
5. Is the screen dark and exposed when it is off? If it is, cover it.

One last note

None of this is about pretending the screen is not there. It is about recognising that it is the largest light and sound source most people look at in the evening, and that a source that size changes the character of a room wherever you put it. Choose the position on purpose rather than on where the socket happened to be, and the room will be better for it.