When you can devote only one area of your easy-living home to formality, the dining room surely warrants consideration. Since you spend limited time there, it can be as formal as you like without intruding upon rooms where you kick back or curl up.
Civilized Twist
Formal dining doesn’t need to be uncomfortable. It is just a different kind of leisure – a civilized, unhurried sharing of your best, from manners and conversation to foods and wines. It is time to indulge the senses and appreciate life itself. The good news for contemporary design fans is that formal dining room pieces don’t have to be traditional only. The design principles for a formal look work equally well in contemporary and traditional spaces. Here are some of the ways to add formal grace when decorating dining room.
- Use symmetrical balance.
Symmetrical arrangements – mirror images on either side of an imaginary center line – provide the most formal balance. Use symmetry for some of your most important table, wall, and furniture arrangements.
- Have it your way.
Set your own degree of formality by sprinkling in a casual touch or two. For example, you can tie-on chairs that will relax the other elements around in your formal dining room.
- Combine elegant finishes
Dress up with gleaming mirrors, lacquered fnishes, polishes veneers, and crystal stemware and candlesticks.
- Formal doesn’t mean fussy
Nothing makes a stronger formal statement than wooden dining room furniture with pure classic lines, be it 18th-century antiques or contemporary classics. Team those with lustrous fabrics, especially silks. Raw silk and silk linen are good choices for formal dining room contemporary settings.
- Match furnishings for the effect
Pick a dining suite, a pair of identical scones, and matching frames for artwork.