Dining Room Style Tips

A space food, friends, and family combine, a dining room should be both elegant and inspiring. Learn how to design your dining room with style and function in mind.

Good friends and great food certainly make for a marvelous dinner party, but a stylish dining room is what really sets the mood. 

Dining Room Lighting

Lighting is crucial to creating the right atmosphere in a dining room, so think about your lighting needs throughout the day and for different uses of the space. Overheard lighting is key, as well as sconces and table lamps for ambient lighting. If the dining room will double as a workspace, be sure it’s equipped with task lighting, too.

Bring Drama With Drapery

We love nothing more than a dramatic dining room, and in that arena, drapery does the trick. We love luxurious curtains or drapes that pool at the floor, but a beautiful pin-tucked or pleated drape is also chic when it just skims across the floor. Whatever look you’re going for, be sure your window treatments provide all the privacy you need and allow in enough light in the daytime.

Dining Room Rugs

There are different schools of thought when it comes to rugs in the dining room. In open-plan spaces and large rooms, a rug is a great way to define the dining area. In smaller spaces, they’re not as necessary. They are, however, a great way to add style, pattern, and color. If you do choose to use a rug in your dining room, be sure to leave at least 24 inches of space between the end of the table and the edge of the rug to allow for seating and chairs that slide in and out.

The Finishing Touches

Don’t forget to hang artwork on your walls of your dining room—it’s key to give your guests something to gaze at between courses. We love using a mirror over a buffet or sideboard as a way to brighten up the space.

Bar carts, sideboards and buffets can double as storage for glasses, china or barware as well as a place to display personal decorative objects or rest table lighting.

Measure Before You Buy

Before you purchase large furniture pieces for your dining room, you should make sure they’ll fit through doors and entryways—measure twice! It’s also helpful to use painter’s tape in the room itself, representing each furniture piece in actual size, to see how the layout will impact the flow of traffic through the room.