I decided to play along with Kelly‘s party this week and show off my dining room. We live in an 86 year old rock cottage, which we love. The day we brought our daughter home we grew out of this house, despite it’s three bedrooms, because in 1923 they didn’t think to build closets. Our house has no hallways or wasted space, but where it is overflowing with character and spacious rooms, it is definitely lacking in storage space. To combat that problem, all of our rooms do some “double duty” and we have to have lots of interesting ways to display and store things.
Above is the entrance to our dining room from the living room. There is a large arch between the two rooms and we treat them as one. You can see one of the original light fixtures that I love hanging in the room. We shortened the chain since our dining table isn’t in the middle of the room and were tired of “avoiding” the light. You can also see the table cloth I made last night as well how great the new rug looks in this room!
This is the view of the bookcases behind our dining table. The table was my grandmother’s and the chairs were my great grandmother’s. I painted them black to match and the bookcases were from Speigel a hundred years ago. I love using them to display dishes, books, etc. and they get “redecorated” frequently.
Across from the dining table is our mini-office area. I bought an old sewing maching base and a piece of glass at a salvage shop and the cheap shelving unit was painted black and mounted on our wall. Since the walls are solid rock/concrete, we don’t have to worry about them going anywhere. On top of that desk is my new pride and joy. Pretty, isn’t she? I really needed a new computer!
To the right of our kitchen door is a cabinet that once lived as a lab cabinet in the biology department of our elementary school. Gran rescued them for me and we use them for storage. This one acts as a coat/purse closet while the other two pieces are used at bookcases and an entertainment center in our living room.
To the left of our kitchen door is this buffet, which used to be the dresser in SD’s childhood bedroom. We repurposed it with a coat of black lacquer and new drawer pulls. Now the top corrals our books, magazines, keys and sunglasses and the cabinets hold linens, tablecloths, silverware and some of SD’s paperwork.Well… that’s it. The color is off on these a little, the color is kind of a spicy pumpkin color and it was a very happy accident. I’m convinced we’ll use it again if and when we ever move. My house is a hodgepodge of pieces swiped from relatives and picked up at antique and salvage stores, but I love the eclectic, thrown together look. I hope you enjoyed the visit!
