Etiquette Challenge Workshop: The Dinner Table Candles

Dear Blushing,
When should I light the candles on the dinner table?
Truly,
Leah, Ontario


Well, readers? Do kindly chime in.



Photo credit: rootcandle.com

Etiquette Challenge Workshop: Observing Kosher

Further to last week's challenge, EM wrote in response to my thoughts:

I am Jewish and keep kosher, so I already have one set of meat AND milk dishes. As deserts usually involve milk, I keep a completely different set of dishes for the desert (and must clean up the entire kitchen before serving it!) However, because I love china, I was pondering just buying the dinner plate for formal meat dinners, and using either glass dishes or the regular meat dishes if I needed extra for a meal. Obviously, some color coordination would
be helpful in this instance.

- EM



One of my oldest and dearest friend's childhood home was graced with a soaring kitchen that fascinated me. Two of everything: Sub-zero's, ovens, microwaves, dish closets, and pantry's, all for the respectful observance of kosher dining.

Believe me when I say, I had to bone up to find a helpful answer to this query, and I hope you will join me in making a suggestion for EM (she was among my first five Followers and remains very close to my heart for her allegiance to this blog).

If you have an etiquette challenge question with which we can help, please email it to catherine@blushinghostess.com.


Reminder: Enter the finestationery.com Blushing giveaway here.

Photos: boston.com, Cooking Light

Table style: Vinyl grows up, makes me apologize

Dear vinyl table coverings,

When I said you were hideous, ugly, and in poor taste and should be used for arts and crafts at Camp Kerplookee, you were in your (40 year) awkward stage.



And when I said you belonged in a kitchy ghoolish 70's wax museum under the elbows of a surreal and alluringly grotesque Brady Bunch card party - let's face it, you were straight up ugly. I mean, darn, darn, bad.



But I have seen the error of my ways. I have met Chilewich vinyl table products and been shamed regarding how I did go on and on about how hideous you were. Because you are the ugly duckling of the table no more.



I have stopped all that now. I am trying to figure out how to score myself some of these vinyl - (yes, I just said that; Readers, kindly take something for those hives, will you, Dahlings?) Brocade items.



I am so, so, sorry vinyl. But, really, you were such a mess. I could hardly have seen this coming.



Love and kisses! See you at brunch?

Blushing

The Hostess on the tablecloth question

Afternoon, readers.

As promised last week, here you have my response to Mrs. C's etiquette challenge question on table coverings.

Do chime in!

Best,
Catherine

Dear. Mrs C.,

The rule of thumb, traditionally, is that round tables take round cloths. The length of said table cloth depends on the event or regular purpose of the table:

- informal use: 10" drop from table edge to hem
- formal use: 15" drop from table edge to hem

However, I have a 48" round in the kitchen and the thing makes me perfectly mad. I cannot stand cleaning around the two year old's chair when the 70 is on the table - far too long for a family and I do not like the look of a short cloth because the legs are not pretty.

I use my Grandmother's beautiful square when the protocol is not important. When it is, I found a beautiful fabric at a local fabric store that was 60" width and cut and hemmed my own round out of it: Really easy and some solids will run to 72" widths - under both of these is a vinyl liner for the art projects and to act as a silencer for the glass noise during meals...




Enter the San Lori reader giveaway here.

Photo credit: countryliving.com

Table style: Rock the Casbah

The alluring table setting of the Emmy's Governor's Ball, September 20, 2009 by Sequoia Productions.

Take me to the Casbah on any scale, is always my policy.

Dress it up.

Jean Louis Coquet Hemisphere Matte Gold, Gumps

Moroccan tea glasses

Horchow

Even the buffet.


Horchow

Pare it down, maybe.

Tangiers, attractive on a bare tabletop

But always serve Blushing's Moroccan Chicken.

DBD 2009 - Vasi Yipsilanis and Margaret Cevasco

I think I ate in this restaurant in Taiwan. It had foie gras temmpanyaki. It looks really nice just a little expected maybe, a little been-there-done that, perhaps?

The place settings, however, were killer.

DBD 2009 - HP

Gorgeous, even a little spirtitually peaceful.

DBD 2009 - Razortooth Design

Seriously, can I live somewhere that these walls would fly? I am researching locations that are weatherless and breezeless so these panels can be my only walls. Chances are, that is not in the Carolina's and it surely is not here in New York today. Where have these been all my plaster-walled life?

This dining room was magical but just did not sit up nicely for its photos or close ups: Photographing vibrant colors in that dark building was a mite easier. But I swear to you on my 50th Anniversary copy of Amy Vanderbilt, this was eye catching and glamorous. I hope you suspect that from these photos.

Ghost chairs made this job hellish.

The black stuff (technical term) placed all over actually sparkled but the lights in the room were so dim they did not make anything of the embellishment. I had to get within a foot of the terrier centerpiece to note the material of the black stuff. When I did, I was disappointed it wasn't used to greater effect because it carried light and colors beautifully. It is a shame a light was not directed towards it. The room looks dark because it was. Really, really dark. With clear chairs. A tad frustrating.

The centerpiece was a terrier which looked suspiciously like Mickey, my Mom's snarky Cairn, and the black stuff is loosely made in the shape of flowers.

It had elements of genius.

DBD 2009 Tracy Reese

What can I say here? This really did nothing for me in light of some of the others.





>

DBD 2009 - NYDC 200 LEX

This installation was New York the way I normally would not think of it. One gets accustomed to the things they see in places they know well. I don't think twice before moving quickly past streetlights (on the napkins), all manner of trucks around town (on the dinner service), and graffiti (all over). But those elements contribute to our glorious city and this room so perfectly
captured all the things I miss in a day...

But here it all is, presented so that one understands this is a labor of love for cities and that even the blemishes are magnificent.

At first, I really did not get the fruit centerpieces. After I looked at the room for a while, I decided that while a million other objects could have been placed there, they do soften the scene and the colors fit in perfectly. Which is to say, not at all, because it is a vibrant free-for-all.


So, the Hostess will never own the place settings or napkins but someone less trad than I will and in the meantime, they tipped the balance of understanding for the consumer here: Everything rough and gritty about cities, brushed up, refined, and presented in such a way as to create an appreciation of the things we overlook in a day.

Right down to the graffiti'd crown moulding. Look really close, the ceiling is papered end to end in blue prints.
Completely over the top and definitely a masterpiece.

DBD 2009 - New York School of Interior Design

New Years? An engagement party? Broken glass and complete disaster? Could go either way. There were twinkling diamond-like rocks hanging from the ceiling on "invisible" string which created the effect of a diamond chandelier crossing the entire ceiling. "Diamonds" were recklessly tossed all over the table top. Against that peacock blue drape and under those lights, they were in optimum sparkle conditions. The photos do not do justice to the glow in this room.



The shattered-glass wall ties into the place settings which appear destroyed and glued back together. There was something glamorous and broken about it all at once.

DBD 2009 - Mark Blackwell

Certainly Mark Blackwell's sophisticated masculine dining parlor was luxe, beautifully executed, and completely mature. I was just in the mood for something lighter, I guess. But it was fabulous, hits of oranges and boxwood greens to finish struck perfect notes.

DBD 2009 - Kravet, the pink and green lovers

Perfect for a girls party in Palm Beach, Kravet's tribute to a girl-prep was hip and fun. I could see shoppers from Flat of the Hill and Island Outfitters loving all these familiar fabrications used in this way.
Is there anything that winks more at summer fun than a huge white picnic table? It's raining in New York today, and I am totally ready for summer and party in a tent like this one.



The table setting was crowded but pleasing in the exhibit-sense: Glittering, gold, of varied heights and textures.


Caged cupcakes: Fun. Only, the vibrant colors of the tent made me wish the cupcakes had been more vibrant as well, like those memorably featured in Lily Pulitzer's book in hot pink, lime, and golf greens.
On the whole, a really cheerful beach dream.

DBD 2009 - Jesgordon/ Properfun

Wasn't this installation just full of young exuberance? It stopped you in your tracks with bright-lights-big-city feeling and a noteworthy lack of self-consciousness. It was happy and contagious.

The young designers here are two sweet peaches, you would adore them. I could easily see this at a roof party in LA... at the top of The Standard, maybe.



Belt buckles! Given my profession, I love apparel references. One of my favorite place settings of all time involved a white ribbon attached with a large black mannish hook and bar in a room full of clubby men's references. This is equally as bright an idea: A tort belt buckle over wide grosgrain. Just fun and reminds us there is no craft that can not contribute if we think creatively.



I hope these girls do well in their endeavors. They were bright and enthusiastic. The design world could use more of them.

DBD 2009 Jerry Sibal

Right, so, huge butterflies at the corners of a illuminated stage. And then ghost chairs and tables. And as you can see from the photos, the "ghost" concept makes photography predictably difficult...

DBD 2009 - Gourmet: Madness, mayhem, and tea

At the bottom of the rabbit hole there is a mad hatter who just pitches a million china and porcelain patterns everywhere until there is no where left to sit, barely a way to think, and a visual onslaught so demanding the mind just spins around and falls down, down, down.

It was hard to miss the point: Madness, mayhem, and, oh, cup of tea? The settings, which were everywhere and nowhere all at once were a wild mismatch of nearly every stunningly beautiful pattern on the planet which ever deigned to make a teapot or cup. The colors were overwhelming but cheerful and alluring. I wanted to look away because it was such an obvious train wreck but I could not stop wondering how they captured the thing so thoroughly, nor why they wanted to.

I understand the appeal of Alice in Wonderland. Conceptually nothing could be more dream-like, as open to interpretation, or bursting with insanely brilliant possibilities. But it has a downside, which is that it is a story about madness. Some will feel one, some the other, precious dangerous few can reach both. I dove right into the patterns but it was not long before claustrphobia overtook me and I wanted to tidy the whole thing and slap that stupid rabbits' snout.

Honestly, looking at this table made me feel crazy inside. I just wanted to get away from it.
And so, it achieved its goal, did it not? Alice realized finally she was the only one at the tea party who was sane and wanted to jet. Much like the Hostess who refuses to deal with chaos.


I tell you, it was maddening this obtuse concept. Looking at these pictures rattles me anew.