Our Colorful + Formal Dining Room

When we moved into our new home at the beginning of last year, the dining room was low on our list of priorities. It’s really unfortunate because it’s also a wide open space that you see immediately when you walk in our front door. So, we really should have tried to focus on it a little earlier, but we were mostly focused on trying to find furniture in the formal living room, paint new kitchen cabinets, and get my new home office situated!

So, when we decided we were going to host the VIP night at our house for my Equipped Conference, I told my interior designer friend Deb that I really wanted to get this room done. Because she knew that we were doing SO MANY other projects around the house, she volunteered to decorate for us. We gave her a budget, and then our family took off to Florida. LOL.

This is what the dining room looked like before…

We were using a small round table that fit well in the old home.  Clearly… it was very farmhouse, which is beautiful, but our taste has really changed! The round table didn’t really work in the longer, skinnier room. And let’s face it, I really wanted a dining room with a lot more COLOR. 

So, we gifted the table and chairs to a friend, left for Florida, and left the room wiiiiiide open for Deb to work her magic!

When we came home, this is the furniture she had in the space: long and skinny table, two big padded nail head chairs on the ends, a couple of chairs with wicker backs, and a bench. We LOVED the lamps she picked out. And we really loved the picture that she found at Nebraska Furniture Mart, which is hilarious because I had actually already picked that out and KNEW I wanted it in my house. So, how funny is it that Deb picked it out (without knowing I already loved it!), and we came home and saw it hanging in our dining room!!?!

We loved it all!!!!

You know I ALWAYS need to up the ante on color because I love it so much. We discussed putting wallpaper on the ceiling, and she ended up finding this really pretty, tone-on-tone wallpaper with a hot pink pattern that just finished the room for me!

I’m obsessed with the rug that she found. It’s Kathy Ireland and we actually found a suuuper similar one on Wayfair for a lot less money HERE. A lot of the other items we purchased at local furniture stores here in Kansas City but if you want to find them online, you can shop my affiliate links below…

Grey nailhead chairs: Amazon

Long bench: Pottery Barn

Credenza: Houzz

And we got that amazing gold light fixture from Best Lighting, which is where we’ve gotten most of the other lighting in the house. See the blog post on that HERE.

We also recovered the seats on all four chairs!

These were the fabric samples that Deb and I liked.

And you can see the chair seats after being recovered peaking under the table. 

What I love about this space is that it’s SUPER colorful but it’s not “busy”. This is literally where Jason sits every day to work. If you didn’t know that my husband and I work together now, you can listen to the podcast episode HERE where we talk all about it.

Here’s a little before and after for all you super visual people like me…

Farmhouse and monochromatic before…

Colorful and playful after! 

The new dining room totally fills my need for color and quirkiness, while also looking formal enough for a formal dining area. I just love it and I can’t wait to spend more time in this room since it’s finally finished!!

There you have it! You can pin the graphic below on Pinterest and subscribe to my email list so you don’t miss the next home remodel update! Wink wink, we have lots more coming soon! 😉