We'd gotten a little casual about where we ate, with most meals at the butcher block island, its wood top sometimes kale or beet stained from dinner prep, and usually still damp from a quick wipe-down. I was craving some formality. Not the kind that dictates which side of the plate the fork goes — I admit I still get turned around on that one — but the kind of formality that comes from giving something its own special place. The way a dancer has the stage, a photograph has a frame, or a tree has its earth. The formality I craved was to give the food bound for our bellies its own place of honor.
So we have a new dining table in our home. Nothing fancy: three pieces of old Douglas Fir fixed together as a top and steel gas pipe legs. When I imagined how our new table might look and feel, it felt so significant, and yet it turned out so simple; a blank canvas, ready for the spirit we'd spill and drip and smear into its fibers. Before it came, it was almost like imagining a baby still in the womb.
Our table came from Chicago where a wood-working woman named Erin True sources old growth industrial wood from dilapidated structures in Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan and turns them into furniture. I originally found Erin on Etsy and quickly struck up a correspondence with her when I wrote in saying I thought most dining tables were too wide and could she help. So together we designed just the right size.
Sixty inches long and just 30-inches wide, we can fit eight people around cozily, ten even if we squish two on each end. Most dining tables are at least 36-inches and often up to 45-inches wide. Do you feel connected to the person sitting across from you at such a distance? I don't. We wanted cozy. Erin also made matching benches, so we can squeeze in tight and children can fall asleep across grown-ups' laps.
The wood is old-growth Douglas fir from a corn crib (a place used to dry and store corn after harvest) in Forrest, Illinois. Erin tells me Forrest is a very small town: one restaurant and one stoplight. She also tells me that Douglas fir will last forever. The table she built for her own home is from wood from the same corn crib. Erin says that sitting down to the table for me is one of few places and times where there are no distractions. I believe the same, so long as our phones are off.
A table is an altar to what we believe in. No matter where we buy our groceries or what kind of pans and appliances you use to cook them, what we put on our tables to feed ourselves is food we believe in. Our tables hold that nourishment. They hold not just the food we eat, but the warmth from the soft part of our forearms, maybe an elbow or two sometimes.
I remember the way my grandfather used to trace the figure eight on the table when he was explaining to me the way something works, and so his table held wisdom and stories from "the olden days." A table absorbs tears and makes a space for stories. People fall in love at tables, say prayers, hatch great plans, and solve the most difficult puzzles.
It feels so good to sit down at that table, significant in the thickness of wood but slight in its width on purpose so even a simple meal laid across it feels bountiful and so that people are closer to each other, warm and connected, formal only in the way table honors the meal, just as I wished. The meal above was mostly leftovers cobbled together for my daughter and her babysitter. She brought wilted flowers from her school's garden and we placed them in water for the table. There she shared lunch and stories from her day. One day she will remember this table. Maybe it will even be hers.
Why do you gather around your table? Is it to be nourished inside and out? Help me tell the stories of all our tables. What does your tabletop hold? How do you honor the food you believe in?
• Handmade dining tables, made to order from Urban Wood Goods. (Tell Erin I sent you!)
(Images: Sara Kate Gillingham-Ryan except Corn Crib from Flickr member mullica , licensed under Creative Commons)
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Wow! So much substance to this post - I love the consideration given to the exact size of the table, down to the source of the wood and the forethought to envision the kiddos crashed across the lap of mama, auntie, grandma or besty friendies!!!! The mention of wilted flowers only exemplifies that Sara has really, really become mom....no time to worry about wilt!!!
Of all the writers for thekitchb.com, Sara Kate, I love you best. Your words are poetry and your descriptions cut right to the heart. Thank you for sharing this.
Stacy
I love the story you tell about eating around your special table. There is nothing more special that sharing a good meal around a table with family and friends. It really is where memories are made. This table is really beautiful and exactly the kind of new table I am looking for as well. I have a small space and the width of a nice table is always a challenge, but I love this one and the fact that is made from reclaimed wood makes it even better. I hope to have many of my own memories around my new table as well. Thanks for sharing your story.
How ironic! I just bought a "new" table this weekend and had it delivered yesterday. It really is an old oak desk - 5' x 36" wide. It has a drawer in it also. I have had 4 tables in this dining room over almost 8 years. I want the room and the table to be more than just for dining. When we aren't using it to eat from, books will be stacked and cherished items. Eventually I hope to find the perfect settee to put in front of it and use the 2 arm chairs I kept from my old dining set to anchor the ends. When more than 4 of eat there, slipcovered , padded fold out chairs will act as extra seating.
Thanks for a wonderful piece!
QUOTE: A table is an altar to what we believe in.
A profound statement. Words of wisdom, they are, they are. Lovely table and lovely post which near brought tears to my eyes. Ahhh, what a gift you have Sara Kate.
I love this post Sara Kate; but I seem to remember you had a lovely round (French?) table with Cherner chairs -- how come it didn't work out?
Right now, we have a donated table. It is small, just right for the 4 of us, and a bit uncomfortable to 8 (it's maximum) due to leg placement. It came with a sideboard, which we needed. It has an interesting history -- designed by a well-known designer when he first emigrated to Canada from the Netherlands, and very avant-garde in its own way, it sat in the home of the former Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod, and the then-equivalent of Chief of Defence Staff.
For most of our years together, my husband and I have used a scrubbed pine farmhouse table that he got for free from friends who had been using it in their garage.
I still dream of *our* table and sideboard though... Something big enough to seat 12, with an unfussy surface -- I don't want to worry about rings from wineglass or stains from spills. Rather like yours :-)
What a lovely post and table. My dad and I just built a table together, from reclaimed pine. Ours also measures 30 by 60 and is just the right amount of cozy. It's where our family gathers for the everyday ritual, for sustenance, for treasured conversation... Here's my ode to our table: http://sustainablediet.blogspot.com/2012/02/heirlooms-tomatoes-and-otherwise.html
For years I had a beautiful pine trestle table that was 6 feet long and not too wide. Our children grew up around that table from coloring Easter eggs to doing homework. I loved that table. After 40 years of marriage we were finally able to purchase a matching dining room set. It's white with cherry tops. Don't get me wrong, it's nice being able to seat 8 comfortably around that table which has two leaves and I love the big china cabinet and buffet that came with it, but I miss that trestle table. The new one has a varnished finish so I constantly worry about it and have to keep a pad and table cloth on or something to protect it, so you can't see the pretty cherry top. I passed on the trestle table to our son and daughter-in-law who enjoy it, but if I had it to do over again, I would have kept it and just added the other pieces. New is not always better. Thanks for sharing this. I enjoyed looking at her website.
Sue in FL.
When our family was larger we had a 4' x 8' table. Now that we are empty nesters, we're turning the dining room into a dining room/library with a 4' x 4' table that I plan to seat 4 and squeeze 6. Love your words and your spirit and simply worship: A table is an altar to what we believe in.
Lovely meditation and handsome table! The (lack of) finish is so inviting. I also get frustrated by wide tables, but worry that something smaller won't fit all the food (not to mention all the crapola we push aside when we're too lazy to clean before eating). We have a pretty small dining room that is round-ish and walk-through room and a hand-me-down round table that fits and has leaves for Thanksgiving purposes but doesn't look so hot - scratches and stains and burn marks and a homely varnish. Finding something custom is a brilliant solution.
@ Island Girl: I sense your loss. But at least you get to revisit your memories when visiting the kids! What a sweet/bittersweet story. Thanks for sharing.
Sara Kate, this is so lovely. Thank you for sharing it with us.
I feel similarly about the importance of tables, of what it says of the life you are building. It's important to have a place to come together, to gather and eat and celebrate and console. I just spent two years looking for a picnic table for the garden at my mother's house, and it felt like so much more than just a table. It was an investment in the family and a shared future.
I found the perfect table on her birthday last week. It's now set up in the garden, waiting for memories to be made.
Beautiful pictures and furniture! How appropriate to use resources which already have a history to construct a table around which new memories will be made!
WOW, that's a beautiful table. I've just bookmarked her site, as I am thinking about a new table for a year or so out ... I don't sit down as often as I'd like on a daily basis, but love having dinner parties and have resurrected my ideal of the Sunday Dinner - typically a more involved meal at the end of the weekend. But even the simplest ones are sacred, and worthy of candles, a glass of wine, all the trimmings. I hope to incorporate that spirit into my weekday meals, too, 'round the table ...
touching :)