Dining Room Before and After

One of the most dramatic transformations in my home was my dining room, thanks in large part to to the eye-catching Chinese hand painted wallpaper from Griffin and Wong. I’ll be going into more depth on the paper later this week, so for now let’s look at the furniture and lighting.

The original dining room in the house had lovely wainscoting with built-in cupboards on either side of the windows. There was also an arched niche in the centre of the room that could fit a hutch. All together the room was a decent size, but with my visions of entertaining large groups (my immediate family alone is double digits), we decided to add three feet to the room as part of the addition. That bonus length combined with removing the built-in’s allowed for a table that could sit twelve when extended. It also made room for a server, so with these main pieces space planned, I set out sourcing the perfect dining table and chairs, server and hutch.

I hunted down antique and vintage tables and chairs for months, but ultimately I realized it would be nearly impossible to find such a large antique table and suite of chairs that were in my price range. After resigning myself to shopping for new pieces, I was delighted to discover Carrocel Restorations not only fixed up old pieces in need of some love as their name implied, but also did a beautiful job custom finishing and upholstering reproductions that they stock.

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Herringbone Heaven and a Marvelous Marble Mantel

I mentioned in the last post that I wanted sophisticated interior details for my home that would evoke a traditional Parisian pied-à-terre. Two of those elements that I had my heart set on were herringbone wood floors and a marble fireplace mantel.

Herringbone hardwood floors are pricey due to the high labour cost (hello perfect angles and intense installs), so we splurged only on the formal rooms of the home and went with regular plank flooring everywhere else. I worked with Mare Flooring, who did a beautiful job installing white oak in a herringbone pattern with a simple border running the perimeter of each room to deal with any tricky angles.

When it came to choosing a stain colour, I debated between espresso and walnut, ultimately deciding to go with the richer medium brown. I felt like this would be not only more forgiving for wear and tear, but would also be a more timeless choice.…Read More