Switching to TTY2 is probably a better idea. I haven't used Linux in a while, but IIRC modern distributions use TTY1 for the graphical session due to some sort of limitation with systemd.
By the time that systemd came along, this was already established Fedora behaviour with upstart. The systemd people had to work to replicate existing semantics.
* http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/BetterStartup
* http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FWN/Issue150#Moving_X_from_VT7...
Not a limitation, but the notion that the graphical console should replace the text console on the same TTY.
Kind of makes sense, but very consistency/tradition-breaking. One of those decisions that should have been implemented a while back in order to be elegant.