Haha! I'm laughing because I'm always trying to move the party *out* of my kitchen. But it's so true that once people get settled there, it's hard to move them.

Yup, me three... Its always in the kitchen around the center island but I love it

I'm intrigued by the giant basket/bin of ikea dishtowels in the first photo- seems like quite a lot of towels to own to start with, not to mention keep right out in the middle of things?

/overanalysis

Nita, perhaps they use those instead of paper towels and simply grab one of those for wipe ups, or maybe instead of napkins?

^ Seems like a good idea.

Our kitchen always finds itself the center of the party. This was a problem before it had seating...

We have around five dozen kitchen towels--some are kept in a basket in the kitchen, others are kept in our pantry. We use them instead of paper towels for everything and on weekends where we cook a lot, we can easily go through a couple of dozen. By having so many, we never run out and we also don't worry about trying to reuse a messy towel. The majority of them are the white and red Ikea towels--inexpensive and long-wearing.

We also have several (10 maybe?) dozen cloth napkins (mostly inherited from my mother who was a big entertainer). Again, we use cloth all the time, even for our larger parties (50-60 at the holidays). It is so nice not to have to use paper or worry about running out. Of course, we do have a built-in sideboard in which to store them--which is a huge help.

I had to register to make my first comment a comment on towels. I'm pretty sure this makes me a pretty bigfatnerd but oh well, here goes!

My gramma always kept a basket of towels that size for baking bread, buns, and a variety of holiday things that need to be left to proof or whatnot. She'd do quite large batches, and I have good memories of a house full of proofing dough under those red and white style towels on every available flat surface.

I definitely always follow her example in my kitchen cause, well, gramma knows best. But I also find that it certainly never sucks to have an extra clean towel on hand...and for some things (like proofing dough or being dumb and grabbing a hot plate out of the dishwasher) paper towels just don't hold a candle.

I actually also like the idea of having them out in the open and easy to grab, cause I am the loser at a party that always tips over my water glass and causes the host to have to dig out a wad of napkins. But that's just putzy me. :)

My kitchen is so tiny and poorly laid out that I'm considering putting up hooks on either side of the tiny entrance and hanging a decorative cord across it. Yes, many will object. The only alternative is to constantly interrupt my guests and ask them to move.
I cannot effectively manage food and drinks around even one guest who has squeezed into the kitchen and launched into a conversation with someone across the pass-through.
I am quite sure that one guest in particular will mock me. She is also, by chance, one of the two people who is most likely to plant herself in my kitchen, oblivious to the necessity of traffic flow.