Happy New Year, WOW welcome to 2021 and the end of January. I can’t believe where the time has gone. I know I had a crazy busy finish to the year and didn’t get around to my Blogs. So I have started up again while on holiday, getting fresh new ideas, and planning new projects.
Following on from Blog #5 Living Room, the Dining Room is the next room that ties all the living spaces together. Flowing on from the Kitchen the dining room is a more common place to eat dinner, family gatherings, friends over, sometimes it’s just a table that sits there and looks pretty or fills up with random items. Pretty sure a few dining rooms were used as homes offices during lockdown, I know that’s where my hubby set up.
Most new builds now days have the space for the dining room to be centred around a lovely feature table or a table to have a feature pendant light. Older homes used to have the dining room separate from the kitchen and lounge, now-days these homes are being renovated to open up these spaces and create one big space that allows better flow from the kitchen into the dining room and then into the living room. When designing your dining room whether it be from scratch for a new build or renovating an older house there are a few things that need to be considered.
Furniture – This is a very personal taste for the home owner. But there are so many options to think of. Do you want wood, what colour wood, do you want steel, glass, plastic, or another unique product. What sort of seats do you want wood, cushion, hard or plastic, how many people do you entertain, could you mix seats with a bench, does your table clash colours with your flooring or does it stand out.
Flooring – When thinking about the floor, you want it to flow from the kitchen as this should be the same flooring product. Lately you are seeing a lot more laminate or wood look products and some polished concrete. Occasionally you will get tiles, but this isn’t done as much anymore because laminate flooring is warmer and quieter. Furniture is something that you also need to take into consideration when thinking about your flooring, because if you already have your furniture will it look nice with the flooring or do you need to look at another option. When some people are trying to save money or are on a budget they tend to leave carpet under the table. I understand this but I think practically, if you have children or are playing children, they make a lot a mess with crumbs but not only that if you are having a dinner party and someone drops a drink, its so much easier to clean it up off hard flooring than off carpet. So I would suggest really considering your flooring for the dining room, think practically.
Lighting – This can be so much fun, there are so many different options, downlights, large pendant, a cluster of small pendants. You can be really creative in this area and there are some really beautiful options out there. Some do find it hard to figure out the placement for the pendants, when I built our latest house, we drew the table measurements on the floor and marked out where we wanted the 2 pendants to go and it worked. But having pendants means that you are limited to where the table can go. That’s why it is sometimes easier to have downlights as this means you can move the table around, so if you are someone that likes to change rooms around, downlights or wall lights might be your best options. My favourite places to shop for lights are Mr Ralph; Social Light; and for some more simple options you can always go to Lighting Direct; or Lighting Plus
Colours – Paint colours are always good to flow on from the kitchen and living spaces, this makes the room feel so much bigger and like one whole space. Choosing a warm colour is always nice as well, those soft warm hues, warm greys, softs whites, sometimes a nice cream colour can work nicely, but this all depends on the other colours & tones around it. If you want a little bit of colour around the dining room if there are some walls you may be able to use a nice wallpaper.
Window Treatments – This depends on if you have windows, how big are the windows, how many are there, is there a door, how big is the door, what does the door open out on to. You need to think about a lot of things before deciding on what treatment to have. Curtains on doors or large windows would be the best, as they fill up the space. Roman blinds or Roller blinds would be good on windows as it keeps the fabric out of the way and close to the window. Doors could also look nice with Roller Blinds as well and you can have the option of having a couple of blinds on larger doors so you can have 1 blind up and 1 blind down. When thinking about the treatments you should also think about how you want the space to feel, warm & cosy, relaxing & soft, crisp & clean.
Overall, dining rooms are a great place to bring the family together, but to also make the space feel peaceful and calming by way of lights.
Next Blog…Bathrooms
