5 Unique Table Settings for your Next Outdoor Dinner Dinner Party
The summer outdoor entertaining season is nearly here. Are you ready to host a party? Whether you’re hosting a few friends for a midweek tapas party or an extravagant holiday affair, part of the fun is presentation: not just the food, but the settings. To bring a festive vibe to your al fresco or indoor gatherings, here are 5 unique tableware ideas for your next party.
1. Make Each Place Setting as Unique as Your Guest
Many of us have a set of “good” dishes that we bring out for special occasions and fancier parties. Chances are that several pieces have broken over the years, which limits your ability to host more people than you have place settings for.
A fresh and fun idea is to do away with the thought that each place setting should be the same and instead, make each place setting completely unique - just as individual, quirky, and filled with unique personality as each character who is invited. Yard sales and thrift shops are great sources for inexpensive one-of-a-kind pieces that may or may not “go” together, but provide lots of variety and color. This is an opportunity to finally use that one bowl that doesn’t match anything else. Pick up a few cool yard sale orphans and give these old beauties a home instead of relegating them to the landfill. The beauty is in the mis-matching.
You can also take this approach with glassware and silverware, placemats, and napkins. The more varied and colorful the setting, the better. Then, no matter the styles you’re mixing, the result will look deliberate, not accidental.
2. Chic and Coordinated
While the mix-and-match approach is fun, it does lend a bohemian air to your place settings. To make things more sophisticated, stick with a consistent design theme. What’s trending? Square placemats; earth-toned, somewhat irregular dinnerware; dinnerware with a consistent color theme but varied patterns; for fancy parties, two layered tablecloths in different patterns; a mix of “everyday white” dinnerware and colorful placemats, napkins, and table linens.
The juxtaposition of materials is always fascinating: rough linens with smooth china; a rustic wooden table with crystal vases; delicate stemware and industrial-inspired silverware.
3. Repurposed Items
Tired of fancy wine glasses getting broken? Parties are the perfect occasion to use a set of small mason jars for wine, and larger mason jars for water. Mason jars are much more durable than many drinking glasses, and add a comfortable homey touch to your festivities. How about using vintage baking tins and well-worn butcher block cutting boards as dinnerware? They’re fun, durable, and definitely conversation-starters.
4. Fun With Outdoor Table Linens
Indoors or out, your party deserves a special touch. Keep a couple of table coverings on hand so you can instantly change the mood of your dining space. Table runners are a contemporary way to dress a table, especially if you don’t want to cover a table that’s a work of art.
You can also layer a runner over a tablecloth or, for a fun touch, lay several runners across the table to create shared placemats with people seated across the table from each other - a fun way to create a subtle bond between people who may not know each other.
Cloth napkins add an elegant touch to any party. If you can’t stand the thought of washing napkins, fancy banquet-style paper napkins can substitute - although nothing beats the elegance of cloth.
Placemats can be unique in keeping with a mix-and-match theme, or coordinated. Bamboo placemats that can be rolled are easy to store and require little more than a damp cloth to clean.
5. Unique Outdoor Centerpieces and Conversation Starters
Create a focal point with one centerpiece for a square or round table, and several smaller centerpieces for longer tables. Be sure they are low enough to prevent the peek-a-boo effect and small enough not to crowd out your dishes.
Try decorating your table (indoors and outdoors) with crystals, unique shellacked rocks, vintage wine bottles filled with fresh flowers, tea lights set in pottery or vintage teacups, quirky salt and pepper shaker sets, unique napkin rings, unusual candles, or bundles of fresh-cut herbs to dress up a table and showcase your personality.