DECORATING : Creating Space for Modern Dining

Dining in the ‘90s increasingly means eating in. But with dining rooms put to other uses, shrinking or vanishing, how does one eat in style?

One way is to rearrange the furniture you already own or select pieces other than the ponderous suites of yore. The right furniture will allow you to use a dining area for more than one activity.

“Try a large round table with banquette seating at one edge of the room, rather than a traditional dining room table set dead center,” advises decorator Teri Seidman.

Seidman created a multipurpose room by rearranging the client’s furniture, a round dining table on an iron base and a mission-style sofa. She placed the sofa against a mirrored wall with the table in front of it, surrounded the table with wrought-iron chairs upholstered in the same black silk as the sofa and hung a black iron chandelier with crystal drops above the table.

When using a sofa with a table, she usually selects a table that’s a few inches lower than the regulation 29 inches. Dining chairs should also fit the lower height.

You can dine grandly anywhere, even in the kitchen or foyer, says decorator Bebe Winkler. The basic principle is to provide visual grandeur and comfort. The grandeur comes from using large pieces.

“Nine out of 10 times, people choose something that’s too small; they play it safe,” Winkler says. “I usually go up several inches over my initial idea, and it always fits and gives a sense of importance. If you think the table should be 48 inches, make it 54 inches. If you think of a 36-inch square, make it 42.”

She suggests using upholstered armchairs on casters for greater ease. Should concern about spills make fabric-covered chairs seem risky, have the fabric vinylized or choose a vinyl that looks like leather.

Winkler recently created a grand dining space in a 7-by-10-foot foyer, starting with a gilt-frame mirror hung on one wall from ceiling to table top.

“I overscaled the furniture with a 60-by-40-inch glass-topped table,” she says. “The four chairs are commodious upholstered armchairs, and the mirror visually expands the space. When it isn’t used for dining, the table functions as a console table.”

Dining rooms in many new homes--if they exist at all--tend to be smaller and boxier than the long, narrow ones in older homes, says John Reinhardt, director of wood merchandising at Drexel Heritage Furnishings.

Smaller rooms work better with furniture that looks grand without taking up too much space. Thus manufacturers have come up with larger round tables that can be used with unmatched chairs and antique or unusual serving and storage pieces.

Some tables come with ornate pedestals. One by Mark Hampton for Hickory Chair Co. has a gilded dolphin pedestal base and a 58-inch top of matched mahogany veneers that make a vivid pattern. The table, about 10 inches larger than is typical for round dining tables from Hickory, can be used for dining and as a center hall table.

Another option is the glass-topped pedestal table. The see-through top accentuates an interesting base.

Does all of this mean the large formal dining room is a thing of the past? Not entirely.

“We get requests for 14-foot-long dining tables,” says Chad Womack, design director of the John Widdicomb Co. “And a client in Ohio with a 50-foot dining room recently ordered a 24-foot table with four to five pedestals and more than 20 chairs.”