Top Five Dinner Party Dining Rooms

It’s January, and going outside is getting less appealing. It is, after all, frumpy sweatpants season. But that can be a slippery slope. So, as to not fully indulge in the great void of hermitage, we try to have people over for potlucks—thus getting exposure to both humans and good food without ever having to leave our home. With that in mind, we raise our glasses to these five fine dining rooms in which we would proudly host our dinner parties.

This dining room is like whoa. If ever there were a space that offers fodder for conversation, this is it. Done with the “what-have-you-been-up-to-not-much” wrap up? Good, let’s talk about that giant antler chandelier above us. Or the variety of esoteric sculptures that stand at the ready like soldiers. An interesting combo of quirky and warm, this dining room would be our first choice for a dinner party. Now, is that a manatee on the table?

This dining room combines three of our favorite things: candle chandeliers, comfy chairs and, of course, a fireplace. If you’re not in the know, candle chandeliers are where it’s at—you could put out a feast of blue soup, omelette and marmalade, and you will still look like a medieval bad ass. (And if you don’t recognize that meal, stop reading this right now and go watch “Bridget Jones’s Diary.” That’s an order.) It’s safe to say this room likely has a mystical feel at night, what with all the various ways to light a fire. So, when the meal is done, the let’s-relive-middle-school Ouji Board portion of the evening would commence.

We’re starting to class things up a bit here. This stately dining room would be perfect for our Gilded Age dress up dinner parties. We’ve never tried it, but dressing up like a well-heeled 19th century socialite has to be fun (albeit uncomfortable. How on earth did they wear those things?). This dining room is impressive and austere. In truth, we’re probably too unsophisticated for it—we may or may not have just found some leftover chocolate on our turtleneck sweater (and ate it). But we could certainly pretend for an evening.

Oh heyyyy. Now, this room has pizzazz! Yeah, we’re bringing back the word with four Zs. It should have never gone away. We’ll concede this room is a bit, how do you say … pink. But, it has all the fixin’s for a proper dinner party, including another fireplace, some cushion-y chairs, and one fine looking coral chandelier. (Turns out we have a thing for chandeliers. This is an unexpected self-discovery.) And if you don’t like the dinner party, you can make a swift exit out of one of the three-to-four doorways.

We’d like to end on a classy note. No doubt this dining room would have our guests saying, “Pardon me, would you have any Grey Poupon?” And obviously we would have it, because that is, no contest, the best mustard around. But, we digress. This elegant arrangement would set the stage for a lovely evening with friends. We feel posh just looking at it from our desk. Now, where did that pretzel go?