It’s amazing how purchasing a new dining room table and chairs can completely change how you view your living and dining area. I’d been on the look-out for a larger dining table for a long time but nothing really took my fancy. Anything I liked seemed over priced but not the greatest quality. A few months ago a friend recommended I check out a furniture store in Newtownards, a town just thirty minutes from where I live. I’m so glad she did because I ended up falling in love with a six seater dining table and six high back teal covered chairs. I’m a huge fan of the mid-century look and the distinct tapered legs, and this dining set ticked the aesthetic boxes for me. The white table top adds a modern look to the whole set.
I knew a bigger dining table meant I’d have to say goodbye to not only my small dining table and chairs (a beloved hand-me-down from my aunt and uncle when we moved in five years ago!), but also the mid-century style green sofa that we had in the dining room. I adored my green sofa but it was more a show piece that anything we used functionally. I ended up selling both pieces on Gumtree.
Once our new dining furntiure was in place, Phill and I started looking at the living area critically and soon we were moving around furniture and re-organising the room. Chairs were re-positioned, ornaments moved and we decided two of our small side tables no longer made the grade. My Nanny’s Parker Knoll nest of tables moved from the dining room to the living room and we moved Phill’s record storage unit away from the TV unit to break up the darkness of the room. It was this that led to the records being used as placemats. Phill has quite a few doubles in his record collection so he decided to turn the ones he didn’t need into fun placemats for guests.
I also sent my velvet mustard cushions off to the dry cleaners and ordered a blue teal rug from The Rug House. We were on a room refresh roll! Next we’ll be hanging more artwork on the walls (we’re in the process of getting a lot of artwork framed).
I’m really pleased with how the rooms now look – the space feels bigger and less cluttered, and the injection of the bold teal colour livens up the rooms no end. We’d love to do alot more to these rooms down the line – including removing the room partition, striping the walls and getting new oak media units but, for now, this mini room overhaul will have to suffice. We want to hold-off doing anything else major to the rooms until we see how our needs change once the baby arrives. Our next priority is decorating the baby’s room!
Before pictures…
