What do you think of this idea for my awkward dining area?
What I call my dining room is small area off my kitchen. It has a single door to a 4 foot wide walk way that I sometimes have to use otherwise I'd turn that into a much wider window. I like the look of a banquette. What do you think of one in this space?
Comments (6)
Paul F.
2 years agoThanks for the feed back. I'm actually trying to get this to be a multipurpose room. The table would probably have to be an expandable 'console to dining table' type to achieve it. If I could get a comfortable reading/conversation room as well as dining room that would be perfect. Kind of this vibe... only breaking out the long table when I need it.
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Comments (53)I forgot to mention that I travel with an 8 year old boy! Do you mind if he tags along? He would love that pool! Your house is so wonderful, I'm so glad that you took the time to post pictures. I can only imagine the work involved but thank goodness you didn't tear it down! As for the chandelier, yeah, it may not matter what you put there! But, if you want to stay with that cottage cape cod feel consider finding something with more visual weight, and not so many lines. A lantern could be perfect. I don't know if you've ever seen the Currey and Co chandeliers? I love to go to their site just to look at their products, even when i'm not really shopping. This particular chandelier caught my eye for your room. Somethign simple, with some visual weight, although I'm not crazy about the black for your room. But maybe this will spark some ideas... Here is a link that might be useful: Currey and Co chandelier...See MoreWhat do you think of my layout? All help appreciated!
Comments (84)llucy - Thank you for your kind support!! I felt so much better after reading your post. You are right, having to sacrifice the nook and eat at an island is never something I wanted to do. It would feel like a sacrifice, but if I was getting something otherwise fabulous in return, I would at least consider it. If I could snap my fingers and have the perfect solution, it would be to still have a kitchen table and any island seating would just be 1 or 2 spots for perching, not for dining. So, the U shape really does start to make sense. Thank you for the link to the Houzz ideabook! That really helped me and actually got a few new ideas flowing in my mind. The pantry doors will be changed, so that section can be made to look very different. sena01 - Thank you again for more options! It is so helpful to see things in 3d. The one with the bar table actually looked good - I just can't see needing the duplication of another table. But, it visually made the most sense probably. I'm going to play around with your idea of moving the dining nook! It's something else that I never considered and at first the new kitchen looked quite small, but then I saw the section against the dining room wall, so that might give me enough storage. Thank you again! tracie.erin - Thank you for drawing out this layout idea. It's actually fairly close to an idea proposed by a KD I met with. At the time, DH was not open to losing the U shape, so he kinda nixed it, but I'm going to explore this idea further. I like that I can still keep the kitchen table as the more I think about it, the more that seems important to me. Thanks everyone for your continuing advice and ideas! I can't even tell you how much this is helping me. DH is very busy and doesn't want to be too heavily involved in the details, so it's so valuable to me to get to talk things out with all of you! I'm having a GC over on Monday to discuss. I will report back once I have a better sense of my construction limitations....See MoreWhat do you think of my architects idea for a galley kitchen?
Comments (37)I will have been living in a rental for 2 years on June 12th. My fire was 3 years ago last march 2nd. Pandemic lockdown started about 2 weeks later. Supply chain issues have plagued me. The biggest stumbling block has been was that Siemens multifamily (this is a triplex building) electrical panels were out of stock for about 18 months and might still be. I had internet alerts everywhere looking for one I could use. Amazingly ONE popped up on amazon that the city allowed even though I only need 400 amp... and there was NO price gouging. I could have sold that thing for 7k easily. I'll have a blank socket in this panel and its is massive but if I ever do an ADU I can add a seperate meter, so that's good. With that breakthrough in the project since the 1st of the year I've been able to move forward. My last insurance summary of loss said $2.5 mil... my current landlord will have made about $365,000 in rent in this 2 years. He only paid $320,000 for the house! You'd think that would have made someone less miserable and somewhat grateful but NO. Worst landlord ever....See MoreWhat to do in awkward nook area
Comments (8)Hi Emily- I agree with you, it doesn't make sense to have two dining areas right next to each other, and your husband can walk two more feet to the dining room to eat. If you want to keep your desk there you can. If you want two desk, one downstairs and one upstairs, you are entitled to that as well. Another option is to have two comfy chairs and a nice sized table. As to what sized table, think about what you will do in there. If you think you will be doing any work on a laptop, then you want a chair in which you can sit up straight and a table that accomodates the laptop, or maybe a sliding table that will slide over the arm of the chair, a C table. You might want to sit in your chair and put your feet up while you have a stew bubbling away, or sit straight and work on your laptop at other times. So you might want one chair that is a recliner, or a comfy chair with an ottoman, and another chair that is a straight chair. For tables, you could have one table that would serve as a work surface or a quick cuppa, and then also have a C table you could slide over either one of the other tables. I hope Beth H comes on, she invariably finds loads of photo suggestions. Maureen and Flo and Patricia Colwell and Verbo give great suggestions and many other Houzzers do as well....See MorePaul F.
2 years agolast modified: 2 years agoMy wishlist for the room includes a cozy area to sit and have drinks with friends like we are in a nice bar. Playing up the bar atmosphere. Maybe a twinkle ceiling with narrow spot lights, champagne bucket stand... fun stuff like that is not visible during the day. If it is for the rare sit down dinner then I'd use an expandable console as a table in front of the banquette/bench. Never any kids. Other possible uses for the room would be to sit in the morning with my laptop reading and drinking coffee... maybe with a small TV on the wall opposite the bench to watch the news. Last but not least a place to organize bills and a little bit of file storage... I wouldn't call it an office. The maximum width of bench is 9 feet wall to wall so its not huge.
Here's a couple pictures to orient you. First is the view from the back corner. That's a huge pantry you can see. I'm losing the door and door frame on the right and the top will be flush with the ceiling. actually the ceiling can be raised as all the duct work is removed. The second pic is a view from the bench... down the hall to the guest room with the first door being the powder room.
Paul F.
2 years agoEven a table like this would suffice for the kind of office I need. MInus the stools.
cawaps