What happened to dining rooms?

[Dancer373]

We had a formal dining room growing up but it was only used for holiday family dinners or entertaining. We ate in the kitchen nook. As a "grown up" I have a dining room (which opens onto the living room) which is used as my office/sitting room. I usually eat at the kitchen island. Funny how much things change......

 

[Nords]

The choice I was thinking about was not having a dining room or not, but having a separate dining room vs. an open plan.
It has a dining room, but it is open to the kitchen and living room so that the cook can participate in the party while preparing dinner. The island hides any mess in the kitchen.
A drawback of this floorplan is that the guest bedroom opens directly onto the dining room, but we were going to use that room as a study anyway...

Our layout has the same ideas, with double pocket doors between the study and the diningroom.

The separation between our kitchen and diningroom is just a barstool counter. The parties tend to gather at the bar (or on the back lanai) and [-]ooze[/-] flow into the diningroom.

The Navy helped us get rid of our china, one household goods move at a time, but we use the expensive fourth-generation silverware every day.

 

[haha]

I love open concepts myself. My only thought was it means someone will have to definitely pick up the dirty dishes after dinner from the table unless you want to stare at them all evening..not. But, you probably do that, anyway.

However, I think I will probably have to get a dining room since I have two dining sets.

Don't you have a dump nearby? For a woman who wants to date, the open plan is 575% better. A bar and stools enable the conversation to flow easily and for people to be comfortable and most importantly, for you to be socializing with your date or guests.

When I was last condo hunting I saw a nice place about 1050 sq ft., $450,000. Starting from the SE corner and going north there was a kitchen, with a door! into the formal dining room and another doorway into the living room. Some middle aged bachelor lawyer lived there. It was too expensive, but nice as it was in many ways I would not have bought that floor plan for a third the price. It was last appropriate in the days of kitchen staff.

Ha

 

[harley]

What ever happened to dining rooms? We don't need to sit down to eat any more.

http://i.imgur.com/CtXcm.jpg

 

[Cruisinthru]

My current home has a large formal dining area off the great room and it is visible from the kitchen. I have a large table that seats 10 max and a formal china hutch. We host several family dinners each year (mostly holidays and birthdays). We also have a couple of parties every year and utilize the space for that.

Our home is 4 years old now. The dining area was very important to us when we picked the floor plan. For once we could have the entire family at the same table. We have thoroughly enjoyed having it,

 

[HFWR]

For once we could have the entire family at the same table.

This is the reason I have a small dinng room...

 

[bbbamI]

Does anyone know if china cabinets are, also, out of style? I tried looking thru HGTV's website, but really did not get an answer there. Seems people need to put their "good" china somewhere other than their everyday cabinets, but who knows what is in style now? Are china cabinets out of style also?

I have a built-in corner china cabinet in my kitchen as well as a dining area. I also have a dining room with a china hutch that belonged to my grandparents. The hutch is at least 70 years old and if the house started to burn down, DH would save it before me. We use the dining room maybe twice a year....we just can't get rid of the furniture.

Our house was built circa 1984...

 

[bbbamI]

....and I do have to say those flower arrangements are silk. I think they are out of style too.

I thought about fruit, but I'm afraid they might get the fuzzies. For sure I won't get plastic fruit....

 

[aaronc879]

I have a small(36sq ft)DR but never use it for dining. I eat in my bed. I lie down with the food real close to me over my stomach. I have my lap top on my thighs just past the food. Then if I look above the lap top I can watch tv. So, i'm lying down while eating, "surfing" and watching tv. That's how I like to spend about 90% of my waking hours. Too bad work gets in the way.

 

[Westernskies]

I have a small(36sq ft)DR but never use it for dining. I eat in my bed. I lie down with the food real close to me over my stomach. I have my lap top on my thighs just past the food. Then if I look above the lap top I can watch tv. So, i'm lying down while eating, "surfing" and watching tv. That's how I like to spend about 90% of my waking hours. Too bad work gets in the way.

This post is useless without a photo...

 

[aaronc879]

This post is useless without a photo...

I would provide a photo but don't have a digital camera. I wouldn't know how to upload a photo anyway. I'm technologically challenged.

 

[W2R]

I have no use for a formal dining room although I would love a home gym, instead.

If I knew we were going to stay in New Orleans, I'd turn my very large dining room into a real, dedicated home gym - - I'd re-do the flooring, bring in gym equipment, and on the walls I would install mirrors, a big whiteboard on which to record my progress, and a flatscreen TV. I'd replace the chandelier with something more suited to a gym. That would be perfect and I would do the same in my next house if/when we move north, if it has a dining room.

Like you, Orchidflower, I have a matched dining room set complete with a lovely and very large china cabinet, sideboard, table and six chairs. I don't use any of it. The only reason I have it is that it came with the house. The prior owner of my house died, so I got all the furniture in the house from the heirs for nearly nothing.

 

[ikonomore]

I have a small(36sq ft)DR but never use it for dining. I eat in my bed. I lie down with the food real close to me over my stomach. I have my lap top on my thighs just past the food. Then if I look above the lap top I can watch tv. So, i'm lying down while eating, "surfing" and watching tv. That's how I like to spend about 90% of my waking hours. Too bad work gets in the way.

I hope your joking. If not that's gross.

 

[FUEGO]

I had never really thought about it until this thread, but we don't have a formal dining room. I just realized that after living in the current house for 6.5 years.

We have a "dining area" of roughly 80 square feet that between the kitchen and the living room (all open to each other). I guess you would call it an eat in kitchen or a "breakfast nook" if you were a realtor describing our house. Works great for our family of 4. We dine right next to the kitchen so we can cook, run to the kitchen for things we have forgotten, and eat while maintaining conversation and being in the same room. We have a small-ish table that can comfortably seat 6, plus another small table that we can bring in if we are entertaining and expand the seating to 8-9, plus 3-4 more at the kitchen counter/bar. We occasionally have large birthday parties or host other family gatherings with 30-40+ people, and then people just eat wherever. We put up some folding tables inside and out to hold the food and also for additional seating.

If we are entertaining and just have one other family of 3-4 over for lunch or dinner, then we will sit in our "eat in kitchen" area since it is cozy.

 

[Sarah in SC]

I fear that I wasn't clear in my earlier post. The choice I was thinking about was not having a dining room or not, but having a separate dining room vs. an open plan. Here is an example: the condo we came very close to buying.
View attachment 9553
It has a dining room, but it is open to the kitchen and living room so that the cook can participate in the party while preparing dinner. The island hides any mess in the kitchen.
A drawback of this floorplan is that the guest bedroom opens directly onto the dining room, but we were going to use that room as a study anyway...

Edit
Rats, some lines were missing from floorplan. Replaced it.

I like this plan and it is actually kinda similar to our house that I (with the help of an architect friend) designed. It is one open space divided into four corners, if you will, with the kitchen at one end and the huge pine table that seats 10 on the other, next to a seating area in front of the fireplace. No way would I want walls in there--it is too small of a space. Plenty of room for entertaining but not all chopped up.

None of my pictures of the room show it without about 50 of my friends dressed up for St. Pat's. I'll spare y'all.

 

[harley]

I have a small(36sq ft)DR but never use it for dining. I eat in my bed. I lie down with the food real close to me over my stomach. I have my lap top on my thighs just past the food. Then if I look above the lap top I can watch tv. So, i'm lying down while eating, "surfing" and watching tv. That's how I like to spend about 90% of my waking hours. Too bad work gets in the way.

I don't blame you for not using your DR. I'm pretty sure my king size bed is bigger than that!

 

[aaronc879]

I don't blame you for not using your DR. I'm pretty sure my king size bed is bigger than that!

I just measured my DR and I was a little off with my estimate of 36sq ft. It's actually 54sq ft. I do have a table for 2 set up but have never used it. It was free so no big loss. I would rather not have that 54sq ft. It's just more area I need to heat in the winter so it costs me money and doesn't add anything useful.

 

[haha]

I just measured my DR and I was a little off with my estimate of 36sq ft. It's actually 54sq ft. I do have a table for 2 set up but have never used it. It was free so no big loss. I would rather not have that 54sq ft. It's just more area I need to heat in the winter so it costs me money and doesn't add anything useful.

Could you fill it up with heat retaining rubble?

 

[aaronc879]

Could you fill it up with heat retaining rubble?

That definitly would not be for me. I don't like clutter. I probably have less than half the possessions of anyone else on this forum and probably less than 10% of what some people here have. Other than my queen size bed I could easily fit everything into the back of a pickup truck.

 

[DeborahB]

This is all pretty funny - I love the variety!

Our house was built in the early '60s and the rooms are large. In the front is a room - ~34' x 14' - and one end is the official DR (the realtor told me: there's a chandelier, therefore it is the DR. It is by far the ugliest chandelier I have ever seen but... $$$ to replace it. But I digress...). I found it weird - one long room - but now I like it. When I have a huge crowd I turn the table the long way and can seat 12 easily.

We tend to eat breakfast & lunch on the kitchen table, dinner in front of the TV in the (huge) den watching a movie if it's just the two of us. But we eat Sunday breakfast in the DR where we can spread out the newspaper in a leisurely fashion.

If I have friends over for dinner we always use the DR - the kitchen table is usually cluttered and has a little TV at one end. The DR table has leaves that pull out at the ends so it seats 6 - 12 easily, depending.

I like having a real DR - but then, I like to cook and entertain. Our dishwasher is very quiet - at Thanksgiving I load it up with the first bunch of dishes and no one ever hears it while we eat more in the next room.

 

[walkinwood]

We have a dining room in our 1925 home, but being just two of us, we usually eat in the kitchen. The dining room does see a fair bit of use since we eat there when we have guests.

 

[Orchidflower]

I wonder if anyone here still likes going over to someone's house (not family) and having a sit-down dinner at a dining table in a dining room other than me? Pretty traditional I agree, but if you have good conversationalists there it can be a blast...or I hope so. I've always enjoyed attending these dinners even if the food is mediocre.
I'd hate to see this social activity die with the times myself.

 

[FIREd]

I wonder if anyone here still likes going over to someone's house (not family) and having a sit-down dinner at a dining table in a dining room other than me? Pretty traditional I agree, but if you have good conversationalists there it can be a blast...or I hope so. I've always enjoyed attending these dinners even if the food is mediocre.
I'd hate to see this social activity die with the times myself.

I do.

 

[Gumby]

Me too.

Since we always use our dining room ourselves, when we have guests we always serve in the dining room. It is true, however, that most people tend to congregate in our kitchen before dinner (it is a 500 sqft kitchen, with an island that is 4 ft by 9 ft and perfect for gathering around)

 

[RunningBum]

Sure, and it's just as good in an informal dining area.