Entry console and mirror heights

The console and the mirror above it are usually chosen as a pair and hung as a pair, which is the wrong way round. They answer to different constraints. The console answers to the width of the hall and the height of a standing hand. The mirror answers to a piece of optical geometry that has nothing to do with either, and that geometry is unforgiving enough to decide, on its own, whether the arrangement is useful or purely decorative.

Two datums, and the one people skip#

Heights on this page are measured from the finished floor, meaning the top of the flooring you will actually walk on, to the top surface of the console. If the floor is not down yet, a 3/4 in (19 mm) board plus underlay puts the finished level about 1 in (25 mm) above the subfloor, and a console cut to the subfloor is a console 1 in too low.

Depth is measured from the face of the wall, not the face of the skirting. A 3/4 in (19 mm) skirting board holds a 12 in (30 cm) console 12.75 in off the wall, and on a shallow hall ledge that difference is 6 per cent of the depth. Where the console has to sit tight to the wall, scribe or notch the back around the skirting rather than absorbing it in the walkway. Getting the room's own dimensions right first is the point of how to measure a room properly.

Console height: 30, 32 or 34 in#

Three standard heights exist in furniture, and each comes from a different body position. A dining table is 30 in (76 cm) because it suits a seated user with 28 in (71 cm) of knee clearance under it. A kitchen counter is 36 in (91 cm) because it is roughly 4 in (10 cm) below the elbow of a median-height adult standing to work. A console is used standing, but nothing is worked on it, so it sits between the two.

Our recommendation is 32 to 34 in (81 to 86 cm) for a console that takes keys, post and a lamp. At 32 in the surface is close to the relaxed hand of a 5 ft 4 in (163 cm) adult, so objects are placed rather than dropped from height. At 34 in it reads as a taller, more architectural piece, and it suits ceilings of 9 ft (2.7 m) and up. Go down to 30 in (76 cm) only when a bench or a pair of stools has to slide underneath, since a 17 to 18 in (43 to 46 cm) seat needs about 25 in (64 cm) of clear underside. The wider size range that consoles are actually manufactured in is set out in console table dimensions and placement heights.

One caution on the drop zone. The ADA reach range of 15 to 48 in (38 to 122 cm) is the band in which anything can be operated from a seated or standing position, and a 32 in console top sits comfortably inside it, but a bowl 4 in (10 cm) tall set at the back of a 16 in (41 cm) deep console is a 20 in (51 cm) forward reach, which is not the same thing. Keep what is used daily in the front 6 in (15 cm) of the surface, which is the principle behind drop zone and charging station dimensions.

Depth against the hall you actually have#

Console depth is not a furniture decision, it is a subtraction. Whatever the hall measures, a walkway has to survive: 36 in (91 cm) on the primary route through a house, and 30 in (76 cm) where the route is secondary or short, which is the same distinction drawn in hallway widths that work.

Two adjustments follow. A console with a drawer needs the drawer to open, which adds 14 to 18 in (36 to 46 cm) of temporary projection, and that has to come out of the walkway for the few seconds it is open. And a console in front of a radiator blocks the convection current that makes the radiator work: keep 4 in (10 cm) clear above and leave the front and underside open, as covered in radiator, vent and register clearances.

What a flat mirror can actually show you#

This is the part that is almost never stated as arithmetic, and once it is, most mirror advice collapses.

Light from a point on your body at height b reaches your eye at height e by striking the mirror at exactly (b + e) / 2. That is the law of reflection and nothing else, and the distance from the mirror does not appear in it. So:

• To see the top of your head, the mirror's top edge must be at least (eye + stature) / 2.
• To see your shoes, its bottom edge must be no higher than (eye + 3 in) / 2.
• The mirror needed to show all of you is therefore (stature - 3 in) / 2 tall, which is half your height, and the same answer at 6 in from the glass or 6 ft (1.8 m) from it.

Standing eye height runs about 4.5 in (11 cm) below stature. Put real people through it:

The right-hand column is the one that ends the argument, and the eye level and sightlines page carries the same eye heights for seated positions.

Hanging heights that fall out of it#

Take a 32 in (81 cm) console and a household whose tallest member is 6 ft 2 in. The top edge has to reach 72 in (183 cm). The bottom edge should clear the console by 4 to 8 in (10 to 20 cm), so 36 to 40 in (91 to 102 cm). The mirror is therefore 32 to 36 in (81 to 91 cm) tall, and its centre lands at 54 to 56 in (137 to 142 cm).

That centre is within 3 in (76 mm) of the 57 in (145 cm) gallery line used for hanging art, which is a coincidence worth knowing about but not a rule to design by: art is centred on the average viewer's eye, a mirror is topped out on the tallest user's crown. Where a wall carries both, aligning the mirror's centre to the art centre line will usually put its top edge too low. Let the mirror win and hang the art to it. The art hanging height calculator will give the hook position once the centre is fixed.

Width follows proportion rather than physics: two thirds to three quarters of the console, so 32 to 36 in (81 to 91 cm) of mirror over a 48 in (122 cm) console, or a 28 to 34 in (71 to 86 cm) round mirror over the same piece. The full set of ratios by placement is in mirror sizes and proportions.

Light, sockets and the rest of the wall#

A mirror in a hall is only as good as what is lighting the face in front of it. Overhead downlights alone put the eye sockets in shadow at exactly the moment somebody is checking their appearance, so where the wall allows it, flank the mirror with sconces on centres at 60 to 66 in (152 to 168 cm) above the floor and 36 to 40 in (91 to 102 cm) apart, which puts the light source at roughly face height and cross-lights rather than top-lights. Ceiling and pendant heights for the same space are set out in entry lighting heights and lumen targets.

If a table lamp is doing the job instead, watch the total height. A 26 in (66 cm) lamp on a 32 in console puts the top of the shade at 58 in (147 cm), just below standing eye height, so the bulb is glimpsed from the doorway unless the shade is opaque or lined. Twenty-four inches (61 cm) is the safer lamp for a 32 in console, and the proportions are worked through in table and floor lamp dimensions.

Sockets are the last thing to place and the first thing forgotten. Approved Document M asks for switches and sockets in new dwellings in England to sit between 450 and 1200 mm (18 and 47 in) above the floor. In the US, 12 to 18 in (30 to 46 cm) is the common height. Behind a console, the higher end of either range wins, because a socket at 12 in disappears behind the stretcher rail and a drawer box, and the comparison across countries is laid out in socket and outlet heights.

Putting it into a real entry#

The arrangement only works if the wall it wants exists, and in most houses the front door swing has already spoken for one of them. A console 48 in (122 cm) long needs 48 in of clear wall plus a hand's width at each end, so call it 54 in (137 cm), and it must not sit inside the arc of an inward-opening door. Where that wall is missing, a 6 to 8 in (15 to 20 cm) wall-hung ledge at 34 in (86 cm) does most of the work of a console at a fifth of the depth, and it leaves the floor clear for shoes. The wall-by-wall arithmetic for the whole space is in entry hall and landing sizes, and the rest of the first 6 ft (1.8 m) of the house is covered across the entryway section.