Finding A Restoration Hardware Table For Low-cost

(You will get the meaning of that post title in a minute)

Exciting news, folks – we at last found something to take the spot of our too-small pedestal table in the eat-in part of our kitchen.

And we are glad to report that it is a lot more proportionate – and functional! – for the space. Now we can seat six or even eight people in a pinch, which has already proven to be useful with our big families (and my spread-out-all-the-tear-sheets propensities). Of course we are still on the hunt for dining chairs so these are simply for the meantime, but man, it is such an upgrade to have room for adult sized plates again.

Simply try not to stare too hard at fairly much anything except for the table. So ignore the faux-brick vinyl flooring, all that wood everywhere, and that graph-tastic wallpaper (I have already stripped about half of the room– so I owe you a post about that). Let us simply say that when we are done with this kitchen, the table should make a lot more sense “in context.” In fact, here is a similar table in a fairly BHG kitchen. Pleasant, right?

And you will never guess where this baby is originally from. I will give you a hint. It rhymes with Festoration Blardware.

But we did not pay $1795 – $2495 for ours. It in fact turned up at one of our go-to local shops called The Decorating Outlet (which is the outlet for Shades of Light). It is where a lot of returned merchandise or used-once-for-a-catalog-shoot items end up – so it is an excellent place to score a deal (we picked up the pendants in our last house’s kitchen and our old bedroom rug that now lives in Clara’s room there). Turns out this 60″ table hails from Restoration Hardware (where it is sold for $2095) and it was simply used a few times in some catalog shots before it sat in a storage room for a while and eventually ended up at the outlet… priced at a cool $650 (a 70% markdown!).

The top is awesomely weathered and the whole thing is made of reclaimed wood (so no two are ever alike). As a mom I like that Clara and the bun can beat on this table until the cows come home and all of those dents will be filed under “character.” See, when I was growing up we had a shiny lacquered table and it was waaaay too precious (there was a certain especially intense spirographing incident where I scratched it and never lived to hear the end of it).

It is pleasant to know that now I can spirigraph my little heart out without fear of marring some perfectly smooth surface. And truly, is not that the definition of happiness?

The fact that it is such a well-made, solid piece makes us so glad (it is crazy heavy! there is nothing hollow or veneered about it). I am hoping it will be one of those hand-down-to-your-kids pieces that outlives me and John. Who knows, perhaps in 2113 our strong strong grandkids will be spirographing the days away on it. Sigh. Update: We have had a few questions about where our dining table from our previous house is, and the answer is that it is in the dining room. The reason we did not contemplate bringing that into the eat-in kitchen area is because it is around a foot wider (70?) and has larger chairs, so it works better in there and would be too cramped for the kitchen.

So that marks the second piece of furniture we have purchased since moving in around four months ago (which seems to be our pattern since we moved into our second house and picked up our sectional and our dining table within a few months). Between our new West Elm dresser and this score of a table, so far we have spent $750 less than we did on those two initial purchases for our last house – but since our sunroom makeover is going to come in a bit higher than our patio project (which was the first big Hands-on undertaking that we tackled four months into that house) we are most likely going to be on exactly the same track with the ol’ bank balance. Is not it funny how these things seem to have a pattern?

All mathy comparisons aside, we are psyched to have two well-made furniture additions in our new house – especially since slowly acquiring more quality pieces was our goal here (we will consistently enjoy thrift stores and Ikea along with building stuff, but we hope to have a pleasant mix of things in this forever home of ours). Now if only we could get the chairs for this table right on the first try. If our former dining room chair debacle is any indication, it might be a long road…

But at least our table is fairly. Even with our shinnnny fake brick floors. Simply focus on this still life with lemon. Do not look down.

Anyone else buying furniture? Or saving up for something solid and beat-up-able?