Actually, it's even worse now - we moved the too-small table out to the porch, and replaced it with an old door on two sawhorses. Avec doorknob and hinges, for extra classiness. Wish I were kidding.
I've always pictured a big, rustic-but-not-too-log-cabin-ish farmhouse table, with a bench on the side closest to the kitchen, and Parsons chairs on the side closest to the window and the ends. We even had a little road trip adventure to look at some options. Well, things got really strange the other day when I was doing yet another Google search to see if I could find the table of my dreams... and I came across this picture on a website listing.
It's perfect! It's stunning! It's... strangely familiar?? That's because it turns out it was, literally, the second thing I ever pinned on Pinterest. And here it was, for sale!! Of course I emailed right away, and this beauty should be arriving in 2-4 weeks. In an even stranger coincidence, the seller was actually in South Carolina - but has family right outside Detroit, and so they're bringing the table when they visit (!).
So that left the question of chairs. I had been considering these Parsons chairs with a fun, bold floral pattern.
But the more I thought about it, the more I questioned whether these would work. First of all, I worried that the pattern might just be too busy. I was also nervous about ordering them online, since the colors might be different in real life - and in fact, many of the reviews hinted that the light color was closer to cream/khaki, which I didn't think would work as well. I was also worried about the brown clashing with all the other browns we have going on (beams, counter, table)... so I was really iffy on these, and decided to consider solid color instead. So the obvious choice would seem to be brown, but again, see issues with brown above. Hmmmmmm. After much thought (and squinting at the dining room), I decided the safest and most complementary choice would actually be a pretty bold one... red!
Yep, red leather Parsons chairs - am I crazy?? I think these are gorgeous, and I'm hoping they'll work with the brown table and our paint colors (the color in the background of the picture above is actually pretty similar to our dining room color). Plus they had terrific reviews on Overstock (4.9 out of 5.0 with 75 reviews!). As an added bonus, they were even less expensive than the patterned ones!
As an aside, some people who know me may be surprised that my vegetarian self bought leather chairs. Here was my reasoning. More and more, the arguments I find most compelling for my own vegetarianism have to do with the efficiency of using resources - and much of the time, leather is a byproduct of the meat industry. I also think these will hold up forever, so they'll be efficient in that they won't end up in a landfill a few years down the road. Finally, I try whenever possible to use natural (ideally local) products - I've always tried to do this, but definitely with big purchases I am making an effort to avoid plastic and other synthetic, petroleum-based materials. These things are all playing into my definition of "green" and how it fits into my life and decision-making right now. So all that rambling is to say: here's to many years of locally (backyard!) grown meals at the new dining room table!
