Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Chairs and tables?

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

> On Feb 5, 2026, at 12:32 PM, treadway [at] netins.net wrote:
> 
> At Prairie Hill, (Iowa City) many of the first residents were downsizing from 
> larger houses, and donated tables and chairs for our dining room.  We also 
> got our pool table, first washers, dryers, and exercise machines this way.


There are many messages in the archives about tables, particularly, and chairs. 
People have found many solutions but not the perfect solution. Many factors 
affect the use of tables — Is the dining room open to the rest of the common 
house or its own room? Do you want to have a homey look or a well-ordered look? 
Do you plan to move the tables and chairs often so the room can be used for 
other things or do you have a dedicated space?

How the room will be used is a guessing game until 1-3 years after move-in. 
It’s trial and error. Some uses will turn out to be too much work, and others 
will find no participants. It’s trial and error.

DONATED TABLES: You will probably need to use tableclothes since they will be 
in various conditions, colors, sizes, etc. It can produce a very homey look at 
minimum cost.

PURCHASE COMMERCIAL TABLES: Use a distributor that deals with institutions 
before you close on units. A good dealer will have lots of information about 
what is available at what cost and expected useful life. This also allows you 
to include the cost in the unit sales price and thus in mortgages. 

Trade-offs:
Sturdy with no wobble vs light enough for one person to move
Sturdy but folding so they can be stacked to the side of the room or placed on 
a cart to be removed from the room
Round tables that were easier to seat different numbers of people or modular 
rectangle so they could be variously arranged
Cost for sturdiness balanced with cost for appearance and ease of moving
Large or small or a combination

For more than 15 years, I was the person at Takoma Village who almost daily 
neatened up the tables and chairs in the dining area of our largest room, so I 
know what each of these tradeoffs means. I learned two things from repeated 
lessons:

1. Some people liked one long table, and others liked smaller tables, but the 
long table was always used first. No matter how I arranged the tables, at least 
one long table always reappeared as if by magic. It would seat 15-20 people. 
And most often, the other tables seating 4 or 6 would be arranged as additional 
long tables. For years, the norm was 3 long tables.

2. Smaller tables seating 4 to 8 produced quieter mealtimes, but people didn’t 
like it. People came to dinner as individuals who would decide who to sit next 
to or which table to join. With small tables, people were too divided. And if 
the meal was served “family style” with the serving bowls on the table, there 
were too many serving bowls to fill and distribute.

During meals, as soon as I opened the door from the hallway to the dining room, 
I knew how the tables were set up. If it sounded more like a football game, the 
tables were arranged as long tables. If the voices were at conversation level, 
the tables were arranged individually. Some people wanted the tables to always 
be arranged as individual tables, but attempts to do this never lasted.

After years of use and the meals became more frequent, the standard became one 
medium-long table seating 10-15 people and other tables seating 8-10. 

Whether households with children or couples sat together varied over time, 
depending on the household. 

I was in favor of a kids’ table, maybe with one adult supervising, but it was 
viewed by most as a negative thing — as an exclusion of kids. I thought it 
would be a good idea to build a kid culture of finishing meals and eating all 
the vegetables, but it was a continent too far. 

Sharon
----
Sharon Villines
Riderwood Village, Silver Spring MD
Following 25 years at Takoma Village, Washington DC