old country house blog

THE DINING ROOM…or rather…The EVERYTHING Room!

Often the Dining Room is the LEAST
used room in the house
…and the furniture WITHIN is JUST “for show”.
NOT SO in My Old Country House.
We do not have an Eat-In kitchen in
therefore, we USE the Dining Room for every meal INCLUDING  snacks.
It is also serves as the  Party Room, the homework room,
the game room and my painting and sewing room.
Every piece of furniture, is used, and used to it’s utmost capacity.
Versatility and Storage is the name of the game.
There is a story (and a post)
behind pretty much each piece of furniture
…how I scored it, how I got if for a song and refurbished, refinished and re purposed it.

Chairs: I covered these $5 yard sale chairs with  Premier Slub Fabric Chevron seats, there were only 2, but that is all I needed, and the arms fit under the table!!! I painted them gray and reupholstered the seats.

 The galvanized metal chairs were  floor samples I
got at Crate and Barrel this spring, for only $75 each vs the normal $199 they still go for.
Table: The table is an original John Stuart table.  I got it for $250 at a used furniture store.

Rug:The indoor/outdoor Leopard Rug I got for $75 at a store which was going out of business.

Window Treatments:Buying drapes for these windows in a huge endeavor and expense, it took us 6 years to do it.
But these Faux Silk Martha Stewart for Home Depot
are a friendly  $35 a panel! And to top it off, I discovered,
 that they wash BEAUTIFULLY!!!
You would never know that they are Faux anything!
Dresser: I did a post last week on this piece, which I did a u-turn on a busy street to nab for $25 at a the side of the road sale!
 I think because we spend so much time in the dining room,
I LOVE switching things around, changing it up.

the colors in the Dining Room are all Benjamin Moore colors:

BENJAMIN MOORE COLORS: CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: 1. FAIRVIEW TAUPE, 2. WOODLAWN BLUE, 3. MOUNTAIN PEAK WHITE, 4. AUTUMN RED THE WALL COLOR, FAIRVIEW TAUPE, IS EXTRA SPECIAL AS OUR FARMS NAME IS "FAIRVIEW"
BENJAMIN MOORE COLORS: CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: 1. FAIRVIEW TAUPE, 2. WOODLAWN BLUE, 3. MOUNTAIN PEAK WHITE, 4. AUTUMN RED
THE WALL COLOR, FAIRVIEW TAUPE, IS EXTRA SPECIAL AS OUR FARMS NAME IS “FAIRVIEW”
I recently painting above the picture rail the same as the rest of the room :”Fairview Taupe”
When I am painting for a show, new paintings show up every day!
 Case Pieces:The Big Yellow Pine hutch I got years ago, for $100 and recently painted i tBenjamin Moore “HORIZON” and “AUTUMN RED”this color.

 

 This side board below, I got down the street at the Greenwood Country Store. I recently painted it Benjamin Moore “Shore House Green” , and it totally transformed the room!

The plates on the wall may or may not stay..I am not sure, I have all kinds of ideas, but I wanted to give them a shot! The are collected from all over, and a few from Anthropologie that I just got for Christmas!

I tried a few different lamps (notice I have a few pink ones!, and I am liking this oversized Stray Dog Designs one that I got on sale for $100!!!! (usually it is $500)

 I always have little odds and ends on the mantle,
 shells we found at the beach, rocks from the yard…pieces of nature.
 The Ballard Designs Chandelier is a recent acquisition.
It only took 7 years to replace the cheapo
fixture that we had there,
but the new light makes it ALL worth the wait.
Good Lighting makes ALL the difference in the world!
    I love my dining room, even if it usually is often an absolute mess…it it where everything happens in the house,
 where we all come together…
eating, learning and creating…
it all happens right here!!!
in The Dining Room.
Many people are getting rid of dining rooms. Do you Have a dining room?
and if you do….
How often do you use your dining room?
Is it the room that sits undisturbed or is it your everything room too?
What would you change about your dining room?

4 thoughts on “THE DINING ROOM…or rather…The EVERYTHING Room!

  1. Lesli, your dining room is beautiful! The colors and mix of furniture work so well together. I also love that you use your dining room. We use ours about once or twice a week and you’re inspiring me to use mine more 🙂 Thanks so much for linking up to Roomspiration!

Comments are closed.