A Craigslist Deal for the Dining Room

The formal dining room at the house in Hooterville has not been a priority for me to furnish, especially when we have so many other projects I deemed more important.  We have a breakfast room we use for our day-to-day meals so I couldn’t really justify spending a lot of time or money right now on a room we will likely only use at the holidays.

That doesn’t mean I didn’t have a plan for the dining room though.

About the time we were in the process of buying the house in Hooterville, the mega-talented Layla @ The Lettered Cottage designed the dining room below for one of her clients and I was instantly smitten.      Layla’s design became my inspiration photo for the house in Hooterville dining room I would get finished “some day.” 

(I took the liberty of flipping  Layla’s  photo so you can  better visualize how well my favorite elements from her design would work in my dining room.)

I loved the bead board in Layla’s design so when I painted my dining room, I added my favorite  Graham & Brown Super Fresco bead board wallpaper, which is available for purchase here.    Although I’m not a huge fan of fabric window treatments in my own home, I was  intrigued by the simple white panels used in conjunction with the bamboo roman shades.  I also liked the look of the dark table, dark buffet and mirror mixed with the different styles of chairs, particularly the slip-covered parson’s chairs.

Kate @ Censational Girl has also mixed a classic style wood table with  4  parson’s chairs  with short, white, pleated slip-covers in her dining room. 

 photo source:  Censational Girl

I have actually swooned, drooled and lusted many times  over the same upholstered couture parson’s chairs and short pleated slip-covers  on the Ballard Designs website that Kate has.    When it comes to slip-covered parson’s chairs, I think Ballard’s  are the  crème de la crème.  

 photo source:  Censational Girl

But four parson’s chairs and 4 slip-covers from Ballard’s seems a bit pricey for a seldom used dining room though so,  we’ll see… 

About 5 weeks ago, I happened to be perusing my local Craigslist  and saw a classic style mahogany dining room set for sale.

The table…

 photo via the Craigslist seller

and EIGHT chairs—

2 arm chairs and 6 side chairs.

   photos via the Craigslist seller

Price:  $675.00

Me to Hubby:  “I wasn’t really planning to buy furniture for the dining room now but we’ve GOT to go see this set!”

The set was in beautiful condition so it came home with us.  He was absolutely ecstatic over the deal we got.

The top of the table is almost flawless.  I need to check into getting a piece of glass cut for it to keep it that way.

In keeping with my inspiration photo from Layla, I’m now I’m on the lookout for a deal on a mahogany buffet similar to this style.source

Or, I could move this buffet to the dining room but I’d have to find a replacement for it as it is providing much needed storage in our home office.

Once I find a buffet, I think a buffet plus the  8 chairs that match the table is  too matchy-matchy and too much wood for the lighter look I’m going for.  My plan is to sell  the 2 arm chairs and 4 of the side chairs that came with the table.  I’ll keep 2 side chairs and replace the 4 I sell with 4  white slip-covered parson’s chairs.   (Maybe from Ballard’s, or perhaps I can find some  on Craigslist!)  If I need more than 6 chairs for a family get-together, I can always pull in the 2 mahogany arm chairs I bought off Craigslist for the living room.

So, although I wasn’t planning to buy furniture for the dining room right now…

sometimes you just have to jump on a good deal when opportunity knocks.

Have you jumped on any good deals lately?