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Our dining room is as important as the kitchen. In fact, we just renovated it, and it sees plenty of use. And yes, it will see the occasional use as a sewing table, or even as a craft table, but that is not its main purpose/use.
I would loathe to live in a house without a separate dining room.
Agree. We love our dining room. We have a lovely stained glass window and a swinging door to the kitchen. It ajoins to a large bright sunroom and the living room. We spend holiday dinners there have dinner parties, and get togethers. Our house has a great flow - with out being too open. We also have family antique furniture there.
We use it a lot more in the winter and fall than in the summer.
My wife occasionally used it for crafts and a women's group. It also works a buffet area when we don't want a sit down dinner.
How is your formal dining room different than just a dining room?
Maybe you did not use it as you elevated it to some high standard?
I have a dining room and a living room. Nothing formal about them.
Here at least a "formal dining room" is one that is completely separate from the kitchen instead of right off the kitchen like a shared space. That's what we grew up with and we used our dining room all the time. In my house we have the "formal" dining room, which shares space with the formal living room. Also called that because it's it's own area.
Just terminology in different areas like what we called master suites meant a bath in the master bedroom, and now they are being called en suites....
And we don't eat in ours -- it's the sewing room, mailing room library.... anything but dining. Excep storage.
For many decades, from the mid 60's till about 3 years ago, my family had a vacation house at Hilton Head. It was design on the concept that the visitor there would have to spend the minimal time maintaining the house so they could have the maximum time enjoying the beach.
The kitchen was rectangular, sort of a widened galley design. Room enough for more than one person to work in it but no island. It did have a wide, tall pass through that could be isolated by shutters. The dining room was about the same size as the kitchen (without the counter space), was unwalled, and sided with a slightly larger living room. Both the dining room and living room had sliding glass doors their length on one side which opened to a screen porch.
At a gathering of the families (for my father's funeral), I remember many people being able to gather in the kitchen and dining room at the pass through to clean crab or wash dishes.
Looking at the plans for my house to be, it is like that in a way. The great room of 28.5 ft by 22 (more or less) and 10 foot ceilings has the kitchen, living room, dining room all in one area without separating walls. It may be a slight fault not to have actual walls separating the kitchen from the rest of the great room but that can eventually be handled with screens and room dividers, which I already have a number of and a practice I'm becoming familiar with.
Another thing about having the great room is that it does allow me a changeable set to practice a part if I decide....but that is a different matter.
Long story short, having had a consistent house design that I often saw growing up and as a young adult (as oppose to constantly changing military housing), it is not only a familiar design but one I have found comfortable over time.
One thing that crosses my mind (especially after watching the 2nd episode of Bewitched "Be It Ever So Mortgaged" ) is, in the open floor design, has the island of the kitchen become the substitute for the buffet of the dining room?
The item that might suffer in my new home in the great room design is that I live to cover the walls, especially with my photography (if not dance mirrors and the photography of others). C'est la vie, one adjusts.
Last edited by TamaraSavannah; 08-05-2015 at 03:45 AM..
Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Birthdays, Anniversary's New Years Eve we use dining room to make it fancy.
Kids do homeworks and projects on it inbetween.
I be pissed if one of my kids when they got married got rid of dining room as it means they are lazy pieces of crap who never plan on hosting a thanksgiving or christmas
That's what my family did, more or less. We did homework on it and had special occasion diners there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by joe moving
Just built a house. There is no formal dining room ., only "eating area" next to kitchen (same room).
technically we have an 11x14 room off kitchen that could be a dining room, but it wasn't designed to be one. in a pinch, maybe we'd set it up with a rental table or something.
Because of the layout of our 1905 foursquare, the kitchen is the smallest room (discounting the entryway) on the first floor. We could sandwich a table in there, but not with room for the whole family. We eat all our meals in the dining room. I have to say it gets on my nerves that my wife uses the dining room table as an impromptu desk though. I'm anal that nothing should go on the dining room table but food and plates - paperwork is for a desk or hutch or something.
Honestly the mega-kitchen thing in newer construction has always confused me. I mean, more counterspace is always better. But Americans are eating out more than ever, and cooking at home less and less. There's no reason the kitchen should be one of the larger rooms in a house.
Honestly the mega-kitchen thing in newer construction has always confused me. I mean, more counterspace is always better. But Americans are eating out more than ever, and cooking at home less and less. There's no reason the kitchen should be one of the larger rooms in a house.
But those of us who cook at home 95% of the time enjoy our big kitchens. We also like our big kitchen because during parties (of which we host a few) it's the place most people congregate and socialize.
When I finally get my house somewhere in the next 3-4 months hopefully I do intend to use it as an office . It will have enough room to get all the office stuff in there and room to move around in as well . I have a friend who uses her dinining room as an office and she bought the nicest room divider so she is kind of closed off from the kitchen . I intend to do the same .
We had a dining room in our last house, which was used 6 times in 12 years. It was a pretty room, but it only served as something to walk past on the way to somewhere else. When we looked for the current house, we were looking for about the same sq. ft. as the last, but we wanted more space in the kitchen and family room, where we spent most of our time. This meant space had to be lost somewhere else, which meant no dining room.
I love the configuration of the new house. My great room has a table that can seat 10, when expanded and I have room to set up a large folding table, if needed.
But those of us who cook at home 95% of the time enjoy our big kitchens. We also like our big kitchen because during parties (of which we host a few) it's the place most people congregate and socialize.
Yeah, exactly. I know the stats say people are eating out more and more, but I don't know those people. Pretty much everyone I know cooks and eats at home the majority of the time (suppers anyway) and they also host others from time to time.
My kitchen isn't that big, although it's very functional, which was absolutely a priority for me. My last place had a larger kitchen but the layout was awful and I didn't enjoy cooking in it. It's a much more enjoyable experience to cook now.
In my opinion, the most perfect layout for me will be a nightmare for someone else. That's why we have different house designs. My perfect design is a decent sized kitchen with lots of storage and a dining space right next. On the other side or on an ell the family room. I'd far rather have more open useable space. (Yeah -- will probably be upsizing rather than downsizing when we retire -- I've lived in tiny for a long time and I am TIRED of it.
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