Furniture Kits - Dining Table and chairs

I am in two minds (or more!) as to the location of the fireplaces and the depth of chimney breast.  Traditionally one side of the house in a terrace would have the chimney breast in their rooms and the other side of the house would have flat walls (useful in the smaller rooms of my house) because the chimney went into their neighbours house.  Though this isn't a hard and fast rule.  Indeed Georgian chimney stacks were often in a void between the houses with a slight projection in each house - so they are generally very shallow chimney breasts.

With all that kerfuffle in my brain, I am taking a bit of a break from the build and turning my attention to making up some furniture to use in these rooms to see if they have a knock on effect on fixing other things like chimneys and cupboards in place.

So, starting with the dining table.....

Great table (even in real life) It can be a small square (seat 4), add a leaf and it becomes a small rectangle (seat 6).  You can then add in the two separate half moon ends and make it a big table (seat 8).  The half moons can be used against walls when not needed or put together as a round table.  Very versatile.  Would love one.

Originally I made it up according to the instructions and then discovered it swamped my room.  I had a mad moment where I converted the music room to the dining room just to get this in comfortably but, fortunately, realised that it was crack-pot to let a table determine the house layout;  so I sawed it up and pulled it apart where I could and re-jigged it into this size.

now the 'old' chairs swamp it!

finished table - have added another layer of stain and it looks better than this.

On to the historically correct chairs to go with it.  I have six of these but decided to just make four.  So glad I did!

Caveat:  If I ever scream and shout about not ever doing something ever again please don't let it stop you.  We all have different talents and yours might be chair-making....  mine is not.

These look nice

these do not!

I had a pig of a time and ended up with sows' ears rather than silk purses.  There are so many angles between all the pieces it is really hard to get things set just right.  then there is the issue of whether to glue first or stain first.  If you stain first and the glue won't take as well, if at all!  If you glue first and the stain won't take over any bits of glued that squeeze out of the joins.  As I am very careful when gluing I opted for gluing first.  I have umpteen patches where I must have got glue on the surface (no idea how) and the stain now won't soak in.  Then - the injustice of it - even with gluing before staining, they aren't well-bonded and I can knock legs off and backs out willy-nilly.

Even if I finished them off with their padded seats it won't improve them much and I hate to throw nice silk at them.  They have been consigned to the charity box in case someone can make something of them.