< Back to Main Blog Posted: Nov 2024

Christmas Dinner Table Ideas

Food is only half of the battle - how to set up the room and the Christmas table is another important part of your Christmas dinner checklist. Unless your dining room looks like it’s from Downton Abbey, if you’re hosting, you’ll need to get creative. So how do you make the most of your space over Christmas? We’ve got some Christmas table ideas to set and decorate your table in the most visually appealing (and practical) ways.

Expand the Room

If you have adjoining rooms, tables can stretch between the two. Get a long tablecloth to cover the tables and, hey presto! A lovely, uniform look. Under a nice tablecloth, an old trestle table and a George III mahogany dining table look remarkably similar! Alternatively, you can set up a kids’ table in one room and an adults’ table in the other.

Mix and Match

If the number of bottoms and the number of dining chairs don’t match up, benches are always a good substitute. Little bottoms can shuffle over and make room for bigger bottoms or more bottoms. Break up the sets around the table to create a mix-and-match of places to sit (you can always say you’re going for the bohemian look!). If you find you’re still short of tables and chairs as you run through your preparations for Christmas dinner, ask friends or neighbours who are going away for Christmas.

Comfort

However atmospheric your dining area looks, if people aren’t comfortable when they sit down to eat then they won’t relax as much or linger as long. Cosying up your chairs with blankets or sheepskins can really change the look and feel of a room and also bring a bit of consistency if you’re borrowing chairs from all around the house (or garden!)

Entertain

No matter how beautiful your table looks, keeping the kids seated at it can be a challenge! A little bit of table-top entertainment can help hugely here:

• Decorate your own place mat. We like these by Marion Deuchars.

• Xylophone Xmas Crackers where each (recyclable) cracker has a numbered xylophone piece and a mini mallet. The conductor then calls out the numbers from his musical play sheet…and the din begins!

• Origami (with napkins or paper): looks great and takes up hardly any space at all.

• Place settings can be personalised and include a story that has to be told at the table: the most trouble you ever got in at school; the most embarrassed you’ve ever been; your earliest childhood memory. You can go round the table and share, making sure that all generations get a chance to join in.

Candles

Christmas dinner is about the only time we don’t recommend pretty-ing up the table with candles - there are just too many hazards to contend with. Older generations, younger generations, party poppers, crackers being pulled, loads of food, hands / arms flying everywhere…it can turn into a bit of a minefield if you add candles into the mix. We recommend fairy lights instead - a nice Christmas idea for table setting that can just quietly do their atmospheric thing without increasing your blood pressure in the process.

Greenery and garlands

While you want to leave space for all the food, a square glass jar with some red berries and evergreen foliage from the garden can look lovely. Or a couple of (small) spare branches from the Xmas tree can work well as a feature down the middle of the table. Pinecones are a nice addition, too, but keep the sprigs of holly for above the pictures. Nobody wants to be stabbed while reaching for the cranberry sauce.

Napkins

If you want a nice and easy Christmas table design idea, turn a Christmas dinner essential into something decorative with colourful napkins in beautiful napkin rings. Or you can keep a family member busy by getting them to fold your napkins into the shape of a Christmas tree. Seriously, Google it. It’s a thing.

Drinks

An essential part of Christmas, but remember that gazillions of glasses and bottles can take up a lot of space on an already busy table. It can be easier to have a separate drinks table with corkscrew, ice, cordial etc all set up to one side to free up a bit more room for everything else.

Make Your Glasses Sparkle

Every bartender worth their salt will tell you: use white wine vinegar. It will evaporate so, providing you just use a little on a lint-free cloth, you won’t taste it. Or, for really cloudy glasses, use a lot then rinse with water. Some nice sparkly glasses will do wonders for your setting, and is one of the more overlooked Christmas table ideas!

< Back to Main Blog Posted: Nov 2024