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Dining Room Table Design

Dining Room Table Design

 Dining Room Table Design. A great project for the home workshop. It's a practical project that will earn "brownie points", with your better half.

Building a dining room table, like all other projects, starts with the design stage. However, it is important to consider proven "standards", when considering size. It will be sad to find out after the fact that you didn't allow enough room for elbows or knees. (And your brownie points go out the window).

Approached with these standards in mind, you're certain to achieve results that will be enjoyed for years to come. Keep in mind that the room size dictates how big the table can be. It is easy to under estimate the room needed for walking past a seated person.

The first thing you need to decide is how many people you want to be able to seat. A second consideration is what shape the table will be. ie.. round, oval, rectangle, and so on. Also, you must decide if it will open or extend to enable the use of leaves, for those occasions when you have company.

Fortunately, there are published standards to help with these details. While they're not "absolutes", sticking close to them is suggested.

Dining Table Standards

Round:

  4 people can be seated at a 36" diameter table.

  5 people can be seated at a 48" diameter table.

  6 people can be seated at a 60" diameter table.

Square:

  4 people can be seated at a 36" square table.

  8 people can be seated at a 48" square table.

  12 people can be seated at a 60" square table.

Rectangle:

  4 people can be seated at a 30" by 48" table.

  6 people can be seated at a 30" by 60" table.

  8 people can be seated at a 36" by 72" table.

Allow approximately 28" - 30" per person, when figuring length. Allow approximately 20" at the end of a table before starting seating at the sides, otherwise the people at the ends of the table will be cramped.

As far as height of the table, 29" - 30" is standard. A minimum of 24" should be figured for leg clearance.

To be continued...

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