Aug 11

Aug 11 Tropical Dining Room Refresh

Our dining room has come a long way from the dark and bland cave that it was when we moved in! As far as I'm concerned, it's not a finished project, but an evolving work in progress that morphs with the seasons - or a rainy Saturday when I get the itch to switch things up.

The latest dining room update came after deciding it needed a rug. In general, I'm a fan of wood floors in dining rooms, but not a huge fan of the rich stain on our wood floors that came with our house. So, to take the focus off the wood floors, I decided to cover some of it up with a rug.

I found this fabulous striped rug for an unbeatable price and after much deliberation about which size to order, I went with the smaller of the two choices.

Our Great Dane/English Mastiff mix, Summer, is my official Rug Tester ;)

I know - the general rule of thumb when it comes to rugs is "when in doubt, get the larger size", but our dining room has a side entry which leads to the kitchen and laundry room/garage. It gets a lot of traffic and this size allows us to walk through without having to walk directly on the rug each time. The fabric and weaving is exactly what I was looking for, so in the event these paws (or shoes) do make their way to the rug, I'm not too worried about it.

These are "talons", folks. Not just regular claws. I needed a durable rug, just in case!

After recruiting my husband to help me move the table and chairs to set the rug in its place, I got the idea to switch out two of the white slip-covered chairs I have and use my bamboo x-stools at the ends of the table, instead. They were floating around the house anyway and I think they give the space a fun and casual feel.

Aren't these folding bamboo sling stools the cutest?

Below is what the dining room looked like without a rug and with 6 slip-covered dining chairs. Also, I hadn't painted the chandelier yet! You can find more details on how I transformed our very dated chandelier here.

Mid-makeover with a naked chandelier and floor.

And of course, the key ingredient to feeling those tropical vibes is greenery! I brought in my majesty palm and trimmed up some palmetto leaves from outside to use as a centerpiece.

A vase full of fronds is always a good idea.

It may appear that the lights are on in this room, but no electricity is being used! What you're seeing are our Sky Tunnels that we had installed on each end of the dining room. (This is not a promotion, I just really love them.)

View of the dining room from the kitchen.

So what do you think? Was this striped rug a good choice? I am loving it! But it's definitely challenging me to figure out how to decorate for fall and the holidays with these blue stripes! Adding color is a tad out of my comfort zone, but a rug can easily be swapped out! So, no harm done. ;)