If it's Christmas it must be time to wheel out the red dining room

** Don't forget my giveaway** closes 16 December 2009

We have an Edwardian house, and in the manner of such houses we have some things and rooms which Edwardians used a lot, and we have not much use for. Namely, an old lady ghost, a sitting room with a piano alcove and a separate dining room. We are also not much into food set in aspic, gaiters, sideburns, pointless colonial incursions, whooping cough and tesselated tiles, so the points of difference continue.

However, the house came with the dining room, so we obediently adapted it for that very use (we refused the vendor's kind offer of their billiard table which converted to a not very nice table, and bought a Georgian table which seats 8).

We do not use our dining room very often. And when I say not very often I really mean it. In fact we haven't used it since..... oh, fancy that....... Christmas 2008.

In the intervening 12 months it has been used as bicycle storage, portacot storage, old clothes going to the Salvation Army storage, creepy painting with the eyes that move storage, old jumpers waiting to be converted into charming patchwork blankets storage and Charlie and Lola style tinfoil covered non aerodynamic rocket ship storage.

I occasionally go in there and admire our Venetian etching things, and fondly stroke the curtains. And then I leave again.

(as you can see I haven't even bothered to smoosh the curtains for this photo. One of the items framed in this shot is actually a BILL from a restaurant we ate in once in Paris (Le Grand Vefour). Suffice it to say it just had to be framed, but I might leave that to a later post)

The thing is, of course, that we have a perfectly fine dining area with a table which seats six at the back of the house, and this is where we eat our meals and have dinner parties.

Initially we didn't use the room because we didn't like the light fitting. It took us 7 years to replace it and when we did we did so in foolish over the top way with a red Murano glass chandelier. And for those who read From the Right Bank, you will understand why ever since Alek's dropped out of the ceiling and smashed to smithereens for no discernible reason, I have been a bit concerned about mine.

And now, we don't use the room because it is close to the children's bedrooms and we don't want to wake them.

And further to the last now, now my husband has started casting aspersions upon the colour, a deep brick red. The colour he insisted on, and which makes me feel all conversationally stimulated just looking at it. He also now says he doesn't like the curtains.

We were originally inspired by this kind of room:

and this:

(Ben Kingsley's dining room - not bad at all)

And this:

But now along with a hankering for snow, I think I wouldn't mind something Scandinavian..... white......... mixed up .... with all Completely Different Chairs......like this:

Or this:

Or this:

Or this:

Maybe I could set up a little business in the dining room for the 364 days of the year it is unused. Or turn it into a dormitory for the children. It just seems such a waste.

I have also been very taken by the dining library pictures one sees around (see Habitually Chic here). What a brilliant use of a lot of wallspace.

What do you think? Should the separate Dining Room go the way of the dinosaurs? Do you have a coloured one? What oh what can I do with mine?

(Images: (1) House to Home (4) Scott Sanders (5) Momoy.com (6) Point Click Home (7) via Hausmaus originally Elle Interior (8) Marie Claire Maison (9) via Design Shimmer (10) Homedesigning.com)

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