If you love sensual style for your dining room that seamlessly blends space, texture and clarity and discards all unnecessary decorations, then the contemporary look is just for you. Read on to learn all about contemporary dining room design.
Some design magazines have named this style ‘hotel chic,’ leaving us wondering if we can replicate it in our humble homes. Well, the best part is that designs filter down faster than ever now, making it way easier to recreate just about any style at a fraction of the original cost. Everyone’s doing it, and it’s a lot more fun than being conventional.
Nine Key Elements of Contemporary Dining Room Design
01. Contemporary Style Dining Table with Glass Top
A sheet of tempered, tinted glass resting on a pair of trestles looks cool and makes a practical dining surface. It is easy to clean, won’t scratch, and costs less than wood. You can order toughened glass with rounded corners and smooth edges in the sizes of your choice from a local glazier. As far as trestles go, many contemporary dining room furniture stores sell them.
02. Wooden Contemporary Dining Table Design
Dark-stained wood has staged a comeback. If you can’t afford the real thing, you can buy a sheet of 2.5cm MDF and give it a rosewood finish with the help of some deep, red-brown paint and a rubber graining tool. Supported on trestles, the finish is amazingly realistic, and if you splash out on a sheet of glass to cover the tabletop, nobody will be able to tell the difference.
03. Buying Second-Hand Contemporary Dining Room Furniture
Look out for second-hand contemporary dining room furniture and update it with a dark stain. The lines must be squared off and boxy, with straight or tapered legs. If you have a large room, check out second-hand office furniture dealers, who sometimes have boardroom tables and chairs for sale. This way, you can get top-quality furniture at a very low price. And if you’re not ready for dark wood or simply prefer a lighter look, then go for pale ash or beech with straight legs and squared-off edges.
04. Include Stainless Steel in Modern Contemporary Dining Room
Stainless steel in the dining room is fine in small doses, for example, on handles on the sideboard, cutlery, lampshades, the pepper grinder and the salt cellar. When overdone, it will begin to look industrial. The trick is to strike a balance between the hard and soft edges of the room. Keep it cool and comfortable.
05. Contemporary Dining Room Floor Idea
Carpets become a liability when you are partying or consuming food and wine. There is always the fear of spillage and staining. Hence, the best flooring for your contemporary dining room is a floating solid wooden floor. The least expensive laminated types are fine for a dining room and are stain-resistant. If you can’t decide between dark and light wood, then why not alternate them? Flooring laid in stripes of different shades makes a bold, contemporary statement.
06. Chairs Of Contemporary Dining Room
There are many beautiful modern chairs to choose from, and the key questions to ask are how often you will be using them and for how many hours at a time. If there are just the two of you most of the time, it makes sense to buy two good chairs and a set of four others that will look good and are affordable. If you entertain a lot of people, then bite the bullet and buy a matching set of modern upholstered chairs, because they are the most comfortable.
07. Bring In Resilient Furniture for Contemporary Dining Room
If children are going to use the dining room every day, the chairs need to be resilient and easy to clean. Shiny wooden floors can be dangerous for children who rock back on their chairs, so fit rubber tips on wooden chair legs, or better yet, buy moulded-polypropylene or plywood chairs with tubular steel legs, which are always rubber tipped. And, since sitting at the table should never seem like hard work for kids, buy a generously sized, brightly coloured PVC cloth that will protect the tabletop so that everyone can relax.
08. Contemporary Dining Room Lighting Idea
The table is the only area that needs to be fully lit. The lighting should be comfortable and not too blingy. It should be good enough for everyone to see what they’re eating without being harsh on the eyes. They should also not be too ambient, not casting enough light. Consider frosted-glass wall lights that provide an ambient glow, table lamps to add diffused light, and halogen spotlights directed onto the serving area or sideboard. And the table…? You can’t go wrong with candles. Look for the most contemporary styles, such as long rectangular blocks with six or more wicks, tall tapers or clear glass tubes. There are so many to choose from. If you need help finding the perfect lighting for your home, do visit our blog.
09. Harmonious Colours In Contemporary Dining Room Design
If you wish to have a dining room contemporary style, then choose a harmonious colour scheme and avoid strong contrasts. However, this doesn’t mean it has to be safe or dull. Go for textured paint on one or two walls to give it a linen, suede, rustic or metallic effect. If you are searching for colour inspiration, have a look at a contemporary cookbook. A café au lait with a slice of chocolate cake could give you cream, tan or dark brown; and tandoori chicken with lime pickle and poppadoms would give you deep red, burnt orange and pale yellow. It’s not a bad way to plan the colour scheme of the dining room! So, revamp your dining room with the selected colours.
Points To Remember for Contemporary Dining Room Design
- The best flooring in a contemporary dining room is a floating wooden floor. The cheapest laminated types are good enough for a room. Alternated dark and light strips of wood give an effective look
- A sheet of toughened glass on a trestle makes a stunning contemporary dining table.
Swanky contemporary restaurants provide terrific inspiration, and this can also be a tasty way to do some research! On a concluding note, the contemporary dining room look needs to be pared down, clean and uncluttered. The materials of the contemporary dining room design are natural and the line is simple.
Also, read
The Classic Ingredients that Make Traditional Dining Room
12 Tips to Make Your Dining Room Design More Appealing!
Author Bio
Huta Raval – An English Literature and Journalism Topper, Huta Raval has graduated from the L D Arts College, Ahmedabad. Post serving for 23 years in the NBFC and Public Library Sectors her desire for ‘writing the unwritten’ brought her to the creative field of content writing. Her clientele comprises of NGOs, Blogging Platforms, Newspapers, Academic Institutions, et al.
