I remember the day we had our kitchen remodeled like it was yesterday.
Part of the makeover included changing the kitchen’s blue and white color scheme to an earth-tone motif anchored around brick red as the primary color. (Goodness, listen to me … I’m actually beginning to sound like Vern Yip.)
The reason I bring this up is because we never bothered replacing our old cobalt blue and bright white dinnerware — even though the kitchen is now bathed in a soft sea of brick red, muted golds and soothing siennas. (I know what you’re thinking — and you’re right: Mom and Dad always made sure I had the giant 64-pack of Crayola crayons in my desk drawer.)
Anyway, the contrasting colors have always been rather embarrassing.
Then again, dinnerware ain’t cheap folks — which is probably why we’ve continued to tolerate the blue plates with the brick red walls up to now.
It’s no secret that fine china costs a small fortune. Awhile back, Macy’s offered a 5-piece set from Lenox consisting of a dinner plate, a salad plate, a bread plate, a tea cup and a saucer for $111.99. True, that was 40% off the regular price of $186. The trouble is, anyone interested in having a service for eight people has to shell out $895.92 plus tax to make it so. Even worse, that price doesn’t include soup bowls — which is a real problem for a soup lover like myself. (Although, I guess you could try serving your hearty beef barley or chicken & rice soup in the tea cups.) Besides, my family prefers beans & franks and macaroni & cheese to foie gras and ratatouille, so we really have no need for fine china.
With unsophisticated tastes like ours, one might think paper plates would be a reasonable alternative. In fact, our local Costco sells packages of 150 heavy duty cardboard dinner plates for $14.89. But at that price, a family of four eating breakfast and dinner six times per week would shell out $247.77 annually — before sales tax. That’s hardly a bargain — and, again, paper plates are no help for people who like to eat soup.
Up until recently, I had resigned myself to eating off our old dishes forevermore.
Then a miracle happened.
Finally, after years of trying to find a reasonably priced dinnerware set that matched our kitchen color palette, the Honeybee finally stumbled upon a very nice 16-piece dinnerware set on sale at Kohl’s that included four dinner plates, four salad plates, four coffee mugs and, yes, four soup bowls, for $64.99; that was almost half off the regular price of $119.99 — and it matched our earthy kitchen color scheme almost perfectly.
Hallelujah!
Needless to say, we are now the proud owners of a perfectly color-coordinated complete dinner service for eight — plus four additional dinner plates, four large pasta dinner bowls, a large pasta serving bowl, and a fruit bowl.
Best of all, after getting an additional 20% promotional discount for using our credit card, we ended up paying only $299.01 for everything. I know.
Wanna guess who’s having soup for dinner later this week?
Photo Credit: Pfaltzgraff
We have a similar problem with our now periwinkle blue bedroom. The burgundy bed coverings just DO NOT work. Gotta get on the stick and finsh the new quilts!
Uh huh. Thanks for sharing another example, Olivia, of why changing a room’s color usually ends up costing the homeowner much more than just the price of a few gallons of paint!
China prices are crazy! But all those dishes for under $300 is a great deal! It makes me want to go shopping for new ones. 🙂
Then go buy some, girlfriend!
can’t imagine replacing our entire set of dishes… what did you do with the old??
We currently have them boxed up, Garrett. We’ll donate them to charity — unless someone in the family claims them first.
I guess I’m a weirdo. I have heavy, plain white dinnerware that I call “diner ware” because it looks and feels just like the heavy stoneware you’d find at the old roadside diners. If I want to dress it up, I put decorative charger plates under it and fancy-fold a linen napkin on top. When I got married the first time, I got a set of the expensive “good” china. I think it was like $1200 for the set and I never used it; because it was so expensive, I was afraid to. So many times I wished I had that $1200 instead of the fancy dishes that we never used.
I’m glad you waited and finally found exactly what you wanted, Len. That is a very satisfying feeling to get what you want at a price that makes you happy. I love that feeling.
I had to look up what a charger plate was, Allyn. That is a nice way to dress up otherwise drab dinnerware.
You make a great point about the care required to maintain fine china. It’s just another mark against all the extra expense.
The new stuff we have now is really cool. Last night at dinner Nina said, “The new plates make eating dinner more fun!” You gotta love kids.
Haha that sounds like something I would do… wait I am doing it! We have all sorts of crazy mismatched dishes but it doesn’t bother me. We still have to remodel our kitchen and will likely move to a bigger house in 10ish years… we will see when I break down and buy some dishes.
Presentation definitely becomes a bit more important for a lot of folks as they get older. When I was in my 20s all I cared about was what was on the plate — not what it looked like, or if it matched my kitchen decor!
It always kind of bugs me that these sets come with coffee/tea cups. I enjoy kitshy coffee mugs, and have no desire to have my cups match everything else exactly. Also, the ones that come in sets are never substantial enough – I usually end up tossing the extra cups to the back of the cupboard.
Oh well, this isn’t too much of an issue for me at the moment, since I’m still eating off of the dinnerware set that I bought 15 years ago, when I first moved out on my own – maybe I’ll get around to upgrading someday….
I prefer a nice hearty coffee mug too, Betsy — but the kitsch is optional.
Were just putting finishing touches on our kitchen remodel after about 1.5 years. Sanding and painting molding and trim. Luckily, the wife still loves the very old dishes that we have. One set was wedding gifts, the others are the remains from my grandparents first restaurant, in the 50s. Those are like heirlooms to both of us. And I like to think of my food tastes as being mostly of the peasant variety. Lots of pasta fagioli or greens and beans in our house. But we love it!
Mmmm. You know, a big bowl of pasta fagioli right about now sounds delicious, Joe!
Well, congratulations on your new dinnerware Len! We are like you – we hate to spend money on stuff like that. Unlike you, we have zero embarassment. First of all, we are anti-social. Therefore, nobody is ever invited over to our house to see them.
In the rare event that somebody does come over, they are treated to dinner on either our lovely avocado green or our beautiful blue trimmed ivory plates. Sometimes, we even mix and match. That is how lame we are. Both sets were bought at garage sales and are littered with small chips. Not potato chips mind you. Chips in the dinnerware.
When you think class, think Holly and Greg;)
LOL! Well, Greg, being anti-social just makes life easier on so many levels, doesn’t it? 😉
Anyone else searching for blockbuster deals on fine china, try Craigslist and estate sales. “Fine china” is not fashionable at the moment, with people living more casually, not cooking at home as much, take out, decorating Euro minimalist, that sort of thing. I’ve sold a number of sets of fine china at estate sales, service for 8, 10, 11, 12, for in the $75,-$350 price range. You can also look on ebay and use “50 miles” in the search feature to find what’s available in a reasonable driving distance. Advertise your “wanted set of dishes” on Craiglist. To save money, get a great set of dishware, save the environment, and keep the money circulating in America instead of buying stuff made in China and further ruining our balance of trade, buy pre owned / antique / vintage / used. In most states if you buy from a “new stuff” store, you also pay sales tax. If you need more pieces, comb ebay for replacment dishes inexpensively. Need a cobalt and bright white set of dishes for you new blue and white kitchen? Contact Len P. and I bet you can negotiate a good deal!
We have found dinnerware that suits us at affordable prices on eBay, also.
Great deal on dinnerware, Len! When I was first married in the early 70’s I had a set of exprensive “Calico” dinnerware that my sister gave me. Always set my table with cut glass (not expensive)serving bowls. Used real cloth napkins in calicos and ginghams. Now, we use Tupperware and paper towels and eat in front of the television.
Reminds me of a very uplifting thing that happened to me when newly wed 40 years ago. I saw a very pricy set of dishes in a store display and knew it would be my lifetime set. I had just been stung by a stereo salesman who mocked us when we asked about the advertised pay interest-free in 3 installments. Just looking at us, modestly dressed newlyweds, he laughed and told us to take a hike. We never buy anything we cannot afford; just wanted to stretch the payments to get more interest in our savings. Now the man in the dinnerware store was different. We intended to slowly buy an entire set over years if necessary, but he said here, you can buy any pieces and pay when you can! He did not ask for a credit card (which we had) or anything. Needless to say I was sad when that man passed away many years later. I still treasure every piece of this set and never wanted another.
Len, don’t worry about those blue and white dishes. You may well be sending a kid (or two) off to college one day,, but certainly out on his or her own at some point, and you can say, “Here kid, you WILL take these to your new apartment.” My nephew headed off in adult life with my parents’ old dishes, and my kids got my parents’ old pots and pans.
As a “dish-aholic”, I have (blush) four sets of everyday dishes and one set of fine china — BUT– I use them all, really! Even the china gets used; it comes out at every holiday. I bought everything used, estate, or on deep sale, and it took me years to amass it all, but I love it.
“We” just HAD to HAVE white bone china dinnerware and water and wine glasses, all with a gold rims.
Collected what was needed, from eBay.
Our great room Has a large dining table which I fashioned from an old square grand piano base by adding a hand-planed walnut top and false stretchers over its 4 inch thick pine harp bed.
The room is decorated in burgundy and gold (“we” is a gifted decorator and portrait painter).
In earlier years, the dinnerware there was Noritake, which I bought in Kobe, Japan when I was a draftee in the Army, during Korean war times. I sent it home to my bride-to-be.
There was a human interest story connected with that: I was in line at the cashier’s station to pay for the china and came up short. I started to put the china back but an infantry officer in line behind me insisted to make up the difference and he would not let me treat it as a loan.
I suppose I was destined to be one of the responsible offbeats on Len’s blog, way back then. Many of the guys were buying silk Kimonos. and the like …
Great story, RD. That kind of kindness is so inspiring!
Our everyday dishes are Correlle….inexpensive, fairly chip resistant, sold in any Walmart. Wife inherited a nice set of Noritake, sent to MIL from someone like RD stationed in Asia, but the rarely get taken out.
I inherited a nice set of sterling silver, which collects dust in my gun safe, and we use plain ole stainless steel for every day.
Like Greg….we’re not much at company, and with no kids, little family left, holidays are every day and no day…ahahhaaa
Reminds me Len….have you done, or are you looking at doing, an article on exit plan for couples like us…no kids, no close relatives, but have a decent sized estate I’d really hate to see the lawyers and govt get….what to do ?
Interesting topic. Let me see what I can come up with, Andy.
Have you considered hiring an estate sale coordinator now and setting up a will to send the proceeds to your favorite charities for after? We just hired one to clear out Dad’s house now that he’s in assisted living. Sometimes they go by senior move coordinator.
Corelle, available in dozens of patterns, right now service for twelve is $129. Plus you can buy coordinating serving pieces open stock, or replace broken dinnerware pieces.
And you will never worry about putting them in the dishwasher.