apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I'm sorry but I'm vehemently against pillows on dining chairs. I feel as that it indicates a lack of foresight by the designer and the buyer. If you want comfortable chairs then buy the ones that already have them built in not the ones that look like an afterthought.

I'm fine with adding actual seat cushions to hard chairs, but sitting on a throw pillow is never comfortable.

Where is the floral pendant from in the first picture?

tpgirl--unless you are using a set of dining chairs that are second-hand. In my my case they are SOLID wood, it's hard to find anything as sturdy as these chairs...but they *really* need some kind of cushioning.

Does anyone know where that metal dining chair, the white one, in the first picture is from?

I already use cushions on my dining chairs.

There's nothing wrong with the chairs which I used sans pillow for a good long while. They're perfectly comfortable with or without the pillows. I bought the pillows because I thought the embroidery (not visible in the photo) was pretty. Sometimes we use them against the back of the chair, sometimes we sit on them, sometimes we go without. It's just a matter of preference.

I don't get why it's such a devisive issue for some people.

i suspect it's a divisive issue because people are bored and have cushy lives. otherwise nobody would bother to care if a sofa had straight legs or turned, because they'd be too busy surviving. still, that's why we all come here, so we can kvetch about other people's design choices.

sometimes it annoys me at how privileged it all is, but most times i just chuckle.

enjoy your cushions, harlie, ignore the cushion haters!

BTW, harlie, that photo is gorgeous, and i love the dining room set.

Man, that first photo is gorgeous. I love me some LivingEtc.

If I had solid word chairs, I'd slap some cushions on those suckers in a heartbeat. Pier 1 and Cost Plus World Market both have nice affordable cushions you could switch out by season or whatever.

If you make it too comfortable, they'll NEVER leave!

I'll be blunt: I have a bony ass, some very over weight corn fed midwestern friends, and not a lot of money. I love to entertain on a dime and there is nothing better than a long evening around the table with good friends. But, our chairs are these petite 1940's numbers and the upholstered cushions (probably redone with mint colored chenille - yuck- in the early 80's) are shot. We cannot afford new chairs, nor can we afford to have someone re-do the seats - they are complicated and have spring coils in them. I think the answer is to slap some pillows over them, but I agree, they look and feel awkward. The color doesn't go with anything else in the room either and it seems strange to put a seat cushion (yep nice ones at world market) on top of an upholstered seat.

thorndale, the good cheer and atmosphere are the important things. Slap the pillows on, nobody will even notice.

I think the first picture looks beautiful, but the others with the wire chairs look messy. I agree with tpgirl that they look like an afterthought, like people were scrambling around cursing themselves, "Eff, we should have sat in these before buying so many..."

The pillows on the benches look fine in the picture but I imagine they'd slide around a little too much in real life.

As for being overly negative, I feel like it's fair game to criticize what all look like professionally decorated spaces with big budgets. I wouldn't walk into a friend's home and think the same thing, just like I wouldn't expect someone to come over to my place and criticize my unfinished dining room. Real people have a lot more limitations than the ones who came up with the rooms in the pictures.

How do I make a reservation at the third picture?

does anyone know the name of the chair on the left side of the picture? I've seen it before, but I don't know if it's famous or not.

retrostyleguy81, do you mean the Thonet Bistro Chair No. 14? Pricey, but very nice.

the polish chick, thanks! We're really loving our new table...with the Fall Cure in progress, we'll soon have the whole room looking as great as the dining set.

@tpgirl - I think it's a little much to expect a designer to be able to design (or a homeowner to be able to buy) a chair that would be comfortable for people of all sizes, body types, and physical conditions! It's not possible. And I can't imagine sitting for more than ten seconds in a Bertoia chair without a cushion - ow!

We recently bought new dining chairs. I had initially thought to get upholstered ones because, like Thorndale, I think there is nothing better than a long evening around the table with good friends, and I thought upholstered chairs would be the only way to make that bearable. But we couldn't find ones we liked - and then we test-drove the Eames molded plastic armchairs. Done. They are the most comfortable chairs EVER.

Most of those pillows look uncomfortable. I hate sitting at a dining room table with not enough room between my knees and the table, and some of these pillows would add way too much height. And they slide around. Flat ones can be ok, but poofy ones - no thanks.

I'm also not fond of reading blog comments with gratuitous spam stuck in them, modernnests.