Absolutely I can see it together w/ the booths in your house. I suggest making sure the table is very, very sturdy leaning on the long edges along the top, as one would do supporting oneself getting out of the booth. If it tips at all, you may need to widen the base. How wide is the top? I think this is a great find.

I love that style of table and in good condition to boot!

Go for it, just make sure that it's the right height for your booth seating.

I think that table was made for those benches. I'd go for it and even if one or the other doesn't work together, I'm sure you could do different chairs and sell the benches or vice versa for at least as much as you paid. Go grab that table before someone else does!

I definitely think it could work, though as marthriver suggested I'd make sure the base is stable. I assume it is standard table height, but it never hurts to ask. You could be looking a long time on CL before you'll find something with the dimensions to match your booths so act fast if you want it.

Please post pics when it is all done. It sound very interesting.

As much as I love that table, it would kill me to paint it. The wood looks so nice.

Thanks so much for the help Mago, Parma and Budge! I called, they still have the table. It's 36" across and 30" tall, so it would work with the booths fine. I'm waiting for my DH to call me back, he'll probably be able to stop and grab it on the way home .. once he confirms he can, I'll get back to them to set up a pick up time. He's good about going over stuff, looking for flaws, loose joints, etc. A solid wood trestle table for $90, I don't think I can lose.

I agree Parma - the wood is gorgeous and would look great with the black booths.

Thanks so much for the for the help Val! :)

Parma, before I decide whether to paint the table, I'll pair it with the booths and see how it looks. I'll also make sure I want to use the booths with it before painting. Like Budge said, I could easily sell the booths for what I paid for them if they don't work out. Right now white sounds good, but my mind may change when I see the table in the actual space. :) I'm thinking one booth and chairs on the other side might be an option too.

I love the table! Hope it works out for you. It will be fun to see what you end up doing with it. Don't forget to keep us posted.
Lynn

The base does not appear to be in the middle of the top? so check for stability for sure..price is right!

Alright guys .. the table is here, it's sturdy and works with the length of the booths. That's about where it stops though, if I'm going to use both the booths and get the table to work with them, I'm going to have to find a creative solution on pulling the look together. Starting with building bases for the booths and maybe painting the table .. plus trying to create a nook maybe ??? Or maybe one booth and some chairs on the other side. Right now it easily seats six with plenty of elbow room, you could also put a chair on the end too.

Excuse the mess ... the floor is just laid, not sanded and redone yet .. etc.

Can you see any potential at all ????

Paint the base of the table black and you are done! Great look!

Sorry, I don't see that working, at least not the way it is. Perhaps if you added some wood bases for the benches, with some kind of scrolling that matched the table. But right now the two don't fit, imo.

Also, with where the base of the table is at each end, I don't see getting three people comfortably on each side, without the table base getting in the way.

Thanks so much for the help and opinions Threegrad and Les!

I agree that right now the table and the booths are way too different and they don't flow. The base doesn't seem to be an obstacle as far as sliding in and out. We sat there and ate last night just to see if the table would be comfortable, even my husband who is a very tall, above average height, long legged person was comfortable sliding and sitting.

Here's what I'm wondering .... see where I drew the white lines on the booths? What if you were to box them out like that and paint that part white .. then 'marry' the table by painting it white? To give the whole thing a more built in look?

You'll have to pretend the table is white .. as you can see my skills are very limited. *LOL*

Could you possibly put a curve on the bottom edge of the benches, similar to the curve on the table legs? That would make it work. I agree with les, as is it doesn't really go together. I also like the table not painted.

Great CL find. Great $, good job.

This set-up appears to be blocking access to the doorway on the right. And the lower part of the window. Both would bug the heck out of me.

Y'all are tough! ;) *LOL*

Okay .. let me see if this picture helps out any, it's sad, I'm not very good at mock-ups.

Please pretend the base is painted, my hand is not steady enough to do it. It looks like it's been colored by a pre-schooler when I do.

As far as the base matching the base of the booths, I'm not really sure if it would bother me if they didn't. I do like an electic collected, cottage look though.

Graywings point about the set up blocking the door, is valid. The window, I'm not as worried about since this is an old house and most of the windows are low like that. It's kind of just how things go with these windows.

The doors .. that is one set of three sets of french doors leading out to the deck. That set could actually go if I wanted to create a nook, we have another place they can be used in the cottage opening to the pool deck, we need to buy a set out there yet.

Here's the picture .. see a bookcase and shelves could replace it .. Just a thought ;) This is a hard room to seat!!

Here's the three sets of doors :

Leave the doors as they are. Craigslist table and booths are not worth removing doors. Just keep side doors locked and use only middle one.

Have you sat with a group of you at the table? See how comfortable it is first. I would not paint any of those items white. IMHO

Thanks Threegrad! We have a family of five and were all sitting there last night. There was plenty of personal space, the booths were very comfortable to sit in. You could easily fit three people on each side and one at the end.

The door we actually use most often is the first door on the right as you are looking at the picture, that is the door the hall 'dumps' out to. About the only time we'd open all the doors is if we are entertaining on the deck to make an indoor/outdoor area. Also BTW, the doors will be flipped so the swing out not in before this is all said and done. Here's how the room is set up ...

I'm standing in the hall taking this pic, the short wall is where the kitchen starts.

After considering this all morning, sitting back there pondering it. I'm trying too hard .. I like the booths more than the table, they're actually very comfortable. This table would make a great craft table for my office too if I decide not to use it back there. The room is long, narrow and no matter what there is no perfect setting choice. There is going to be issues some place no matter what, it's just a fact. *shrug* It would be best if the whole seating area was movable too, to be used for more people, for less and also as a serving area.

zipdee: I like where you are headed. I think your home has some wonderul architectural features that I would not modify to make these pieces work. My preference would either to use free standing furniture or create a custom nook that accomodates that low window. We also seat a family of five so I do appreciate the issues with accomodating everyone in a small space. You do not mention the ages of your children, but at least with my family I've noticed the most comfortable setup for my youngest is not the same for my oldest and what worked 5-years-ago doesn't work as well today. As they get older they need more space or want to get in/out at different times. Have you considered a round table and five chairs for your space? Perhaps get one that will take a leaf that you could extend for guests.

I do like the table you bought and think it could alternatively work well as a craft table.

Val, thanks so much for the help! :)

Our girls are 8, 10 and 12. A round table would be great for our family, especially with a leaf to extend it. The room is only 8'4" wide though, so it would be a very tight squeeze to move all of the chairs around in there and have room for the table.

Let me ask you guys a question, can you see any table working with my booths except the traditional pairing which would be a formica table?

Personally I like the formica tables just fine, but I don't want my room to take on a themey type of vibe which isn't what I'm going for. I'm going for casual, vintage, comfortable, eclectic, cottage, unexpected and not too squished. ;)

What about this ....

Okay .. take the booths and put both against the low wall backing the kitchen as one long banquette area. I have 14 feet to work with from the wall to the hall .. the booths total would be 148".

Now I could use one long narrow ( 30" ) table and leave room to enter and exit the booths from both sides or two shorter tables that could be pushed together or seperated for easier access. The tables would look like this, painted all white .. which is the type of table Teacats suggested at one point.

I know some people don't like painted wood, but if it's not a good wood or doesn't have a nice patina, I have no problem painting. Plus this table or tables would have to be made for me probably by my husband .. I can't find anything like this, I've looked. Plus I can tell you from looking at the wood table up against these booths, it doesn't work.

One the other side how about a set of vintage faux bamboo chairs, painted in a darker jadite color ?? Something along these lines .. just side chairs, not arm chairs.

How would this look ??
The whole configuration would be movable, there should be plenty of room for the people in the booth and in the chairs to move around and I could probably seat around 12 people easily.

I love the chairs (ballards?) and I like the table.. sorry, the banquettes are giving me trouble. They look comfy and in good shape but I think they are causing you a lot of trouble in the space. With all those french doors and the patio, I see something light, airy and bright there .. like the green chairs. Are they comfy?

I know you really like the banquettes and if you love them you'll make them work for you.. it's really a beautiful space.

Would it fit to put a bench against the wall (perpendicular to how you have it now) and have chairs on the outside?

Love what you have going on with your home!

Funkyart .. still not digging the booths, huh? :D How about if I say the counters will be soapstone, so the booths would be backing the black soapstone counters ? Does that help balance the black out or are the still on the nope list?

The only problem with using chairs and a table in this room are that there will not be room to slide the chairs in and out if I center the table in the room. Now Les suggested that I use a long table pushed up against the low wall, with chairs on the one side. Which is a great idea too, but I could never figure out how to do the lighting since the table and chairs would be off centered, I guess I'd have to off center the ceiling light too to center on the table, which I'm not sure how that would look.

Valzone .. the booth does fit against that wall, but there is a window there now. I'm sorry the pics are confusing. The first picture up top is newer after the window was cut in, the lower pics with the dogs in them right after we hung the beadboard. Thanks so much for the compliment, I really like the light in this room now. :) If I can ever get a decent eating area set up, I think this will be a nice room to hang out in.

Oops .. I forgot to answer your question Funkyart. Those pics are just pulled off of google .. I googled vintage faux bamboo chairs. They were popular in the Hollywood Regency era I think. You can often find them at antique malls and vintage/retro stores.

I have a table off my kitchen that was built in against the wall. It is much smaller than you are talking but if I could give some advice if I were to do it again. I would not attach to wall just push up against wall.
{{!gwi}}

I don't know if you've given up on using the booths and the table you bought, but I saw something in the February, 2007 Sunset magazine that seems almost exaclty like what you had in mind and I think it looks great! Check it out online at www.Sunset.com; search the site for "playful family farmhouse" and when you get to that article, I think the second in the picture series is what I'm talking about....you'll know it when you see it.

Here it is

Here is a link that might be useful: playful family farmhouse

Somewhat crude, but you get the idea...

"........... I like the formica tables just fine, but I don't want my room to take on a themey type of vibe which isn't what I'm going for. I'm going for casual, vintage, comfortable, eclectic, cottage, unexpected .........."

Just so you know......there's a whole lotta ways to do formica that meet your requirements. It's not all 50's diner themey!

Here's a shot of our booth with wood edged formica table

VERY cool, dlm2000!

Uberbeachy, Yes .. that's almost exactly what I was thinking of, thanks for letting me know! Those eating nooks were very common in bungalow type houses, I've noticed they are starting to make a come back.

Graywings, thanks so much for finding and linking the pic!

Greenthumbfish, thank you so much for the mock-up! It helps me visualize much better.

Dlm .. I agree with Parma very cool set up! I totally agree with you that using a formica table doesn't have to equate Diner. I think it's actually a great material to use with children too. I also think it depends on the materials used with it though to how it will read.

Like in your home, you have more of a banquette type booths, used a traditional table base, chairs, a wood edge on the formica and you kitchen is warm woods.

In my home, the booths are just like the ones you'd see in Diners. The colors being used are white, black, red and jadite again an often used palette in diners. I'm using a lot of retro stuff, like a vintage 50's tappan stove, jadite glass and fireking glass. So if I put a formica table with my booths, it's a lot more likely to read differently than what you guys have done.

Also .. I actually like the diner look and think it could be extremely fun, but it's not what I envisioned going on in here because our house is older than that.

Maybe this has been asked, but does the 1/2 wall have to be there? Seems you would have more useable space for eating without it there.

Hi Annz, unfortunately the half wall has to stay. That's the start of the kitchen area. Because it's an old house and we are working around many obstacles, the kitchen side of that half wall will house the sink, dishwasher and dish storage cabinets. I tried laying the kitchen out a million times without it there, but there was just not enough room to have a functional kitchen without it. It would also cause a problem to remove it because our house has a center hall .. if we removed the wall totally, we would really have to get rid of the hall in the back of the house since it would merge the back room, the kitchen area and the hall as one. That would really mess with the layout of the house making part of it an open floor plan, part a closed floor plan and having a center hall in the front, but not the back of the house.

I actually really like the direction you were starting to go with the booths/CL table. There's no way to escape blocking part of the old-house-low window or some of those gorgeous doors if you actually want to us that room!

I understand wanting something more mobile for entertaining, but I bet that area would be a hit with people.

zipdee, I'm with housevixen on this one. We all make the besst of what we have, and in my opinion it's not worth worrying about the window being a little low. In fact you might find it will be the best place for the salt and pepper shakers and napkin holder. Out of the way yet easy to get to when someone's in need. Not to mention on a warm day the nice breeze that will blow under the table too.

Little, yes little, things like this are what gives a home character and your booth and table will be the perfect addition to your home. Something many other's, including myself, would oooooo and ahhhhhh at when they come to visit. If you have another place to use the set of doors, go for it. Using them will make your new area fit better with your home and allow for some creative storage behind the bench on the right.

You showed how you'd like to put shelves above the bench which would be great. What I'd do behind the bench is to make a pull out storage unit similar to a pull out pantry. No sense waisting all that space. If I have time later I'll "Paint" you a virtual of what I mean.

~Becky

HouseVixen, I agree with an old house it's really hard to work around the windows, ect .. you kind of have to get creative and do the best you can with the space you have. Thanks for the help!

Becky, if you have the time to do a virtual that would be wonderful. I appreciate the offer and the help! :)

Well here you go zipdee. I did it last evening, but hubby got home before I got it posted so I had to finish and eat dinner. He's rarely home so when he is I stay away from the computer.
I only did one side, but you can get the idea.

{{!gwi}}

The bookshelves would have to be attached to the wall with a base attached to the back of the booth bench so you'd be able to make a roll out cabinet below the shelves and behind the bench.
I added baseboard around the built in which is cut so it too would roll out, but look finished when pushed in place. I didn't add any detail to the pull out not knowing if you'd just want it beadboard so it would blend it or for it to look like your kitchen cabinets.
Let me know if there's any changes you'd like me to try. I only use the "Paint" program so it's nothing fancy. I pretty much just draw it on and fill it in. Enough to get my idea across, I hope. I know my perspective isn't the greatest. I was more into drawing fashion figures way back when.
~Becky

justgotabme, Now we're talkin'! LOVE your mockup! Put the same beadboard base on the other booth and dinner is served! Great job!

Thank you kmcg. I decided instead of taking a nap while Owen (our grandson) was asleep I'd add the rest of the beadboard and kind of what it would look like with the hidden storage pulled out. So here it is.....

{{!gwi}}

Becky, Wow .. first let me tell you how impressed I am you did the mock-ups in your paint program! They look awesome, you have a talent there. I agree with Kmcg .. they look great and you nailed what I was trying to convey with my sad line drawings. The booths would look fab trimmed out with beadboard bases, lending to the built in look. I really like the idea of a pantry type pull out on the side too, that would be a great storage area of board games, puzzels, cards games for the kids or a great storage space for the dogs food and stuff.

I could see a school house type light fixture above the table.

The shade something along these lines, with the vintage green shade :
http://www.schoolhouseelectric.com/fixtures-detail.asp?FixtureID=26&all=

But use a small chrome pendant fixture that was made for the slanted ceilings .. something like this, but not near as long, keep it much closer to the ceilings.

http://www.schoolhouseelectric.com/fixtures-detail.asp?FixtureID=21&all=

I hit the submit button too quickly!

Thanks so much for taking the time to do the virtuals for me. I really appreciate it, it's very, very kind of you to do!

You are very welcome. I've drawn, according to my Mom, since I could hold a crayon in my hand. I would love to get a virtual pencil, but should just grab one of many sketch pads and draw. It's just that I no longer know what I want to draw. In late elementary school it was all horses. By seventh grade I knew I wanted to be a fashion designer and took every art and sewing class I could cram in my schedule. The only time I know what to draw is at times like these. So, I thank you for the oportunity. It filled a need in my life.

I absolutely love both those light fixtures, but the one with the yellow had me drooling! I think the fixture would look great at about 36 inches above the table. You don't want to hide it up high in my opinion!

I'm heading over to that site and check out their other fixtures. I love vintage fixtures. Our home is a queen anne style Victorian Revival. We didn't spend the money when we moved in adding period lighting, but I'd love to do so along the way when we can pay cash for them. We have nice fixtures, just not what I envision. You are lucky to have a real old home. Ours is just a look a like. Though I do love it.

~Becky

Love how Becky brought your idea out so beautifully in her rendition.* I think you should trust your vision...and you could also do pull out storage in the bench boxes if needed/desired.

* I'm at the stick figure level of talent, so wild applause from me.

Thank you housevixen. I appreciate it. Your comment gives me the boost my ego needs. Now if I can just convince myself to get out the real pad and pencil and get the tree drawn for the project I've promised out daughter for over a year now.

Love your idea of storage under the benches. I can't believe I didn't think of it! My hubby thinks I go to extremes with finding ways to use empty spaces. Although he has now seen the light in adding a floor to our attic to store the kids left behinds.

~Becky

Thanks so much for the help Becky and House Vixen! Love the idea for storage under the benches too.

Becky, I think you should definitely sit down with a sketch pad and pencil! I'd love to be able to draw like that.

Thank you zipdee, I just may have to do that this weekend. If it turns out half good I'll scan and share it with you.
~Becky