Why Your Table Doesn’t Need to Match

Somewhere along the way, we were all convinced that a properly laid table required twelve identical plates, matching glasses and a dinner service that lived in a cupboard waiting for Christmas.

I would like to formally disagree.

Some of the loveliest tables I have ever seen have been made up of things that absolutely weren't designed to go together.

Matching is easy. Mixing is interesting.

I love an old patterned plate next to a very simple glass. Something delicate alongside something chunky. A beautiful linen tablecloth with a slightly ridiculous candlestick.

The trick isn't making everything match. It's finding a thread that connects it all.

That might be colour. Perhaps you've got a blue plate and pick up that blue again in a napkin or flower.

It might be material — warm amber glass with brass candlesticks and natural linen.

Or sometimes it's simply a mood.

Start with what you already have

Before buying anything, pull everything out.

And I mean everything.

Those two glasses you bought on holiday. Your grandmother's plates. The little bowls you usually use for olives. The candlesticks that live on the mantelpiece.

Put things next to each other that you've never considered using together.

You might be surprised.

Then add the piece that's missing

This is actually one of the reasons we created our Clementine & Moss Suites.

You don't necessarily need an entirely new table.

Perhaps you already have beautiful white plates but adding amber glasses completely changes them.

Maybe your everyday glassware is perfect but you want a patterned charger underneath your plates.

Or perhaps one spectacular candlestick is enough to give everything else a little more personality.

Buy the things you genuinely love and, over time, your table starts telling your story.

Which, to me, is infinitely more interesting than buying the entire matching set.