Attending football games and tailgate parties is a rite of the season. Many of us are miles away from the stadium–but we still can get into the spirit of the game. With our flat screen, high-definition TVs, we don’t have to miss out on the fun, food, and excitement. Just take a seat on the 50-yard line in front of the entertainment center in your family room. Go Team and have a great time with these winning plays:

1. Be the quarterback: Score big with your family and friends by making them part of the party team. If you’re inviting friends, invitations can be made to look like admission tickets. For make-ahead refreshments, involve the kids and their pals. While chopping and arranging munchies, play a CD of the team’s marching band to get everyone in the mood. Consider serving hot dogs [...]

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Tags: design ideas, gaming furniture, home entertainment center furniture, stay-cation

Gone are the days when, if your house no longer fit your lifestyle, you put up a “For Sale” sign and moved. Today’s economic reality has ushered in a new “improve not move” approach. With just a little creativity, a dual-purpose mindset toward furniture and an investment as minimal as a can of paint, you can reinvent your space to enjoy your home more.

Writing Desk Winner Karil Kaylor & Author Gale Steves

Perhaps no one so embodies the “live better where you are” philosophy than Gale Steves, former editor of “Home” magazine and author of the book, “Right-Sizing Your Home: How to Make Your House Fit Your Lifestyle.” Steves, who was in the Triad area of North Carolina recently to attend the Fall High Point Furniture Market, presented a “Right-Sizing Your Home” ideas seminar [...]

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Tags: budget decorating, design ideas, design trends, desks, furniture design, home office, wood home office furniture

Backyard picnics are now pleasant memories and gatherings are more often around the dining room table.  What a joyous season autumn is and what great possibilities to enjoy nature’s bounty from your front row seat tableside. Here are some natural inspirations to make your dining experience beautiful and special:

1.  On a nature walk…gifts from the trees: Shop woodland paths for decorating materials, yours for the asking.  Two quick table decorations–a bowl of pinecones and a vase with small branches arranged creatively. Keep an eye out for brightly colored leaves. What could be prettier and more seasonal beneath a clear bowl filled with orchard fresh apples?

Summerglen Sideboard

2.  At the farmer’s market–the vivid colors and great textures and shapes: The plump pumpkin always gets center stage, as well as it should. But it can keep wonderful company with all the colorful gourds, lined [...]

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Tags: design ideas, design trends, dining room collections, dining room furniture

Gone are the days when furniture buying meant you had to purchase “sets.” Today’s homes are all about reflecting our personalities, and there’s no rule that says everything in a room has to match!

The dining room is an excellent space to show off some personality and style, from the furniture you choose to the table settings you use. Maybe you’ve found that when you shop for a dining room set, you find a dining room table you like, but you don’t like the chairs that go with it, or vice versa. Or, maybe you love the buffet or sideboard in the set, but not the table or chairs. Don’t worry!

Braxton Gathering Table

You should love every piece of furniture you buy, so don’t be afraid to mix and match the pieces you like to get the look you want. Consider these helpful hints for [...]

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Not sitting down to a formal dinner as much as you used to? You’re not alone. In fact, casual dining is a growing trend in dining room furniture these days. In part 1 of, “How to Create a Casually Elegant Dining Room,” we offered several ideas to help you blend both sophistication and relaxation at mealtime. Here are more tips to help you have a dining room that harmoniously brings together rustic and refined style:

• Choose a buffet or cabinet with open storage shelves above. They’re a refreshing alternative to glass china cabinets. Open shelves let you casually store dinner dishes in open view, or artfully mix them with books, pillar candles or woven bins.

• Think buffet parties as much as formal dinners. A buffet, sideboard or china cabinet with counter-height serving surface is a handy feature in a home where fancy [...]

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Tags: design ideas, dining room collections, dining room furniture, Hooker Furniture, kitchen dining furniture

Not sitting down to a formal dinner as much as you used to? You’re not alone. In fact, casual dining is a growing trend in dining room furniture these days.

Casual dining doesn’t mean you don’t cook up a storm or don’t have friends over for beef bourguignon.  It just means you don’t get worked up over it. You’re also perfectly ok dispensing with fancy china. In fact, you may or may not own any.

If a more casual lifestyle sounds right for you, but you’re not ready to give up a little sophistication at mealtime, it is possible to bridge the two! Along with choosing the right new dining room collection like Legends by Hooker Furniture, and a few simple tips below, you can perfectly blend rustic, refined and relaxed.

Legends Dining Collection

•    Choose a style of furniture that doesn’t fit just [...]

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Tags: design ideas, design trends, dining room collections, furniture design, kitchen dining furniture

Many houses today combine the kitchen and living room to allow for entertaining and family time that flows effortlessly. These rooms often have soaring ceilings that capture your attention, but what the rooms sometimes lack are the warm and wonderful feeling that makes guests want to linger. That can be accomplished with warm colors, comfy fabrics full of texture, and furniture that links the rooms and allows you to do more things together: cook a meal, get homework done, or catch up on the happenings of the day. So, let’s point out three ways that you can pull rooms together and make them warm and functional:

Copper Top Server

Color. Look towards warm tones like caramel, terra cotta or coffee infused latte.  You can go warmer and richer on your walls to help bring balance to an otherwise oversized space. A high ceiling [...]

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Tags: design ideas, design trends, dining room collections, wood home office furniture

As a creative person, I find that inspiration can come from almost anywhere or anything. Sometimes it’s more difficult to be inspired by furniture, particularly when you’ve searched so much for one thing that everything starts to look the same.

This week I saw some photos of Hooker Furniture’s new Envision Accents Collection that they will introduce at the High Point Market in October.  I fell in love with this one piece in particular, a block front metallic chest. I had an immediate reaction to it, meaning I sighed and thought, “Oh wow… that is so gorgeous.” And I was definitely inspired by this piece to create a space in my home for it immediately!

The details on the drawers are so intricate and beautiful, but it’s so subtle that I feel it can co-exist nicely with the pieces I already have in [...]

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Tags: budget decorating, design ideas, design trends, furniture design, interior design, living room accent furniture