Apartment Diaries: Dining Room Makeover

In January we moved into our little apartment and pretty much every week since we have moved/changed/upgraded something. Needless to say the dining room wasn’t our top priority when we moved in. Luckily both my roommate and I really feel affected by our space and it’s important to us how it looks. So we decided it was time for a dining room makeover.

 

The Situation

We live on the second (and top) floor of our apartment complex so we have vaulted ceilings. This makes it both awesome for living and super difficult to decorate. Our dining room came with a large, bright LED light that wasn’t the same light color as any other light in the apartment. This may not seem annoying but when you have a very cool toned light it makes it feel very sterile. I found this exact light on Amazon in case it’s what you have been searching for!

Our table was a little big for the space but because it was free from family it filled the dining needs. I found that while I was working from . home that I would spend most of my time at the dining room table. The table was also shoved in the corner because it was an odd shape for the area. 

We had a difficult time “styling” this area because the table also had a large Lazy Susan in the middle. We had a tablecloth at one point. Then we tried chic place mats from Target. We tried round “tropical” place mats but really nothing helped what we were working with.

 

The Process

The Table

Once we decided it was time for a new dining set we started to look around. I was very partial to finding something on Offer Up but after many nights of searching nothing appeared. It wasn’t until Katelyn send me an Instagram post from Living Spaces (original photo by @flourish_hl)that we finally feltlike something was clicking.

We basically went to Living Spaces the next day to find this table because we felt like it was the perfect fit. Once we got there we couldn’t find the table. After  asking a few associates we realized that our store didn’t have a floor model of this table. While we sulked, we walked around the table section to see if there were any other options that might fill the void we now felt. We sat at a lot of tables. We quickly eliminated anything out of our price range and began seeing a common theme with four seater tables: they were all small and cheap. From there we contemplated if we wanted to be limited to just four seats, what color wood we wanted and if we were really sold on a round table.

After much contemplation we found a dining table we liked. The mid-century modern vibe is what originally drew us to this table. We also liked that although it would be tight, we could seat six people. Once we found out that we didn’t have the buy the matching dining chairs we basically said “wrap it up” immediately. 

 

The Chairs

Taking inspiration from the original photo we fell in love with we decided to go with the white plastic chairs. Instead of getting light wood legs we opted for the more sturdy black metal. We’d already made purchases from Living Spaces when we bought our living room furniture and you can read more about our experience in my blog post about our living room makeover!

The Light

As soon as we started this dinning room makeover I knew I wanted a pendant light. My dream light was this one from Ikea. The day I was planning on going to Ikea I made a pit stop at Target and ended up stumbling upon the light we ended up with! It was on sale and was $30 cheaper than the Ikea light.

I would love to weigh in on the difficulty of swapping out the lights but my saint of a father did all of the work. From what I could tell it wasn’t terribly difficult and we’re hoping the process of getting the other light back on when we move out won’t be too bad. This light is warmer than the LED one and the bulb matchings the side table lights in our living room. Overall, 10/10 purchase; it is a great focal point in the room!

The Decor

Once I started writing this blog post and taking the pictures I realized the space was really bland. The texture from the light helped give the walls some dimension but overall it needed more.

We opted to look around Hobby Lobby for anything that might spark inspiration. We ended up finding these geometric shelves. The black in the caging fit the legs of our chairs perfectly to help tie everything in. We opted to paint the wood base white to avoid anymore different colors of wood. They were a bit more difficult to hang than we anticipated but with a few extra washers we got them up.

For the other side of the table we thought that a large print would probably be best to offset the “broken up” nature of the two shelves. We found this large frame and print at a moving sale for an office in Scottsdale! Eventually we may switch out the print for something with more color but for now the white and black tie the room in nicely.

When it came to table decor we still wanted to stick with a minimal and functional piece. Again, from that office sale we collected a few knick-knacks and this cute tray which helps tie in other aspects of the surrounding areas.

The Reveal

So here is what the new space looks like….. * DRUMROLL *

Overall, I’m happy to we invested the time (and money) into upgrading the dining space of our apartment. It doesn’t make sense for a lot of people, but for us it makes the space feel more like outs! How do you think we could improve this space? Shoot me a DM on Instagram!

Want more apartment blog posts? Stay Tuned for our living room redesign!