Do you have a china cabinet?

[Junie]

4 minutes ago, school17777 said:

I love the color!

I love the color, too!  It would perfectly match my display dinnerware (which was also my grandma's). 

[theelfqueen]

12 hours ago, Pawz4me said:

Nope. Even the idea of one gives my naturally minimalist self the shivers.

My problem is I'm not naturally minimalist... I'm naturally gonna shove stuff into every inch of a shelf lol I must avoid excess shelves. 

[Loowit]

I use the buffet that my MIL gave me when they sold their house to store the china which she also gave me.  I also got the table and chair set that matches the buffet.

I got a china cabinet when we moved to our new house a couple years ago.  I have always wanted one.  I kept an eye on craigslist and found one really cheap.

My dining room is too narrow to put either of them in there so they are in the living room which opens to the dining room.

[theelfqueen]

Just now, Loowit said:

I use the buffet that my MIL gave me when they sold their house to store the china which she also gave me.  I also got the table and chair set that matches the buffet.

I got a china cabinet when we moved to our new house a couple years ago.  I have always wanted one.  I kept an eye on craigslist and found one really cheap.

My dining room is too narrow to put either of them in there so they are in the living room which opens to the dining room.

Beautiful!

[Annie G]

We have the dining room set my grandmother bought when WW2 ended. We use the table, the China cabinet holds my fiestaware (and puzzles stored in the bottom), and the buffet is in my sewing studio where I use the entire top for ironing when I sew.  My dad made a nifty custom ironing board to cover the top but it doesn’t damage the buffet in case I ever want to use it for other things. Lots of storage under it. 
Hope you love your China cabinet, Dawn!

[gardenmom5]

1 hour ago, Junie said:

I love the color, too!  It would perfectly match my display dinnerware (which was also my grandma's). 

I love it when someone uses some of the older patterns. My grandmother had Francisan's Desert Rose.  (her everyday dishes) My sister has it, but doesn't actually use it.

Edited November 8, 2020 by gardenmom5

[Junie]

2 minutes ago, gardenmom5 said:

I love it when someone uses some of the older patterns. My grandmother had Francisan's Desert Rose.  (her everyday dishes) My sister has it, but doesn't actually use it.

I used them (I think) until I was expecting ds20.  Unfortunately we don't actually eat off them anymore because of the lead paint issues. But I love them and think they are so beautiful.  Maybe I'll eat off them again when I'm old and don't have kids to take care of.  I mean, my grandma ate off of them every day and she lived into her 90s. :)

[Carrie12345]

I do not have a china cabinet. I have a box of my parents’ wedding china in my shed, lol. My parents have been divorced longer than they were married. It’s very cute china though, that would display nicely 46 years later, as it’s gray and silver.  There’s just literally nowhere to put it. It wasn’t displayed while growing up because my childhood home also had wall space issues, lol. It was kept in a sideboard table and used several times a year.

Someday I’ll have space for it and will drive myself nuts finding just the right thing for it.

[Ausmumof3]

I do but I must admit the entire bottom half is mostly used for hiding books (shhh don’t tell eh).  I initially bought it second hand for storing kids school stuff in but then we made a schoolroom so I had China in there till I ran out of bookshelves again.

[SKL]

We do, along with various other cane / wicker furniture, from actual China!  (It came with the house, which was owned by a person from China before us.)

We don't really use nice dishes, but we have some nice china and crystal glasses, so those are in the china cabinet.

I'm supposed to be working on a big deadline, so I can't go take a photo now.  I can't find anything online that is similar.  It's like most of the above, but all rectangular prism shaped and made with honey-colored cane and wicker instead of wood.  (The shelves are wood though.)

Edited November 8, 2020 by SKL

[Scarlett]

13 hours ago, Loowit said:

I use the buffet that my MIL gave me when they sold their house to store the china which she also gave me.  I also got the table and chair set that matches the buffet.

I got a china cabinet when we moved to our new house a couple years ago.  I have always wanted one.  I kept an eye on craigslist and found one really cheap.

My dining room is too narrow to put either of them in there so they are in the living room which opens to the dining room.

I love that buffet.  It is gorgeous.  

[lmrich]

No - sold it when we moved along with all our dining room furniture. We use the dining room for dh's office. In my kitchen, I stacked two closet organizers,  put a board over them, skirted drop cloth over it. It actually gives me tons of storage and cost $30. 

I also have huge kitchen island in this house so everything fits with ease and I got rid of what didn't. 

[DawnM]

6 hours ago, SKL said:

We do, along with various other cane / wicker furniture, from actual China!  (It came with the house, which was owned by a person from China before us.)

We don't really use nice dishes, but we have some nice china and crystal glasses, so those are in the china cabinet.

I'm supposed to be working on a big deadline, so I can't go take a photo now.  I can't find anything online that is similar.  It's like most of the above, but all rectangular prism shaped and made with honey-colored cane and wicker instead of wood.  (The shelves are wood though.)

 

Cane and wicker?   Is it bamboo?

[fairfarmhand]

On 11/7/2020 at 12:00 PM, Amethyst said:

We were given china as a wedding present 30 years ago. We rarely used it, but when we did, I had to get it from the basement. Two years ago my husband built us this...

I love the simple lines of this one. Most china cabinets are too ornate for my taste, but this one is lovely.

[DawnM]

So I am remembering that in CA our house had a built in China cabinet.   I loved a lot of things about that house.   It was a Craftsman home and had several built in nooks and crannies.

[PeterPan]

4 minutes ago, DawnM said:

So I am remembering that in CA our house had a built in China cabinet.   I loved a lot of things about that house.   It was a Craftsman home and had several built in nooks and crannies.

That's like me remembering when I used to have hair on my head, before the hair butcher got a hold of it.

[SKL]

6 minutes ago, DawnM said:

 

Cane and wicker?   Is it bamboo?

I guess so ... I mean, I might have used the wrong words ....

[SKL]

It's kind of similar to this.

https://marjorieandmarjorie.com/products/faux-bamboo-and-rattan-china-cabinet-by-american-of-martinsville?variant=29447988871243

[Carol in Cal.]

1 hour ago, DawnM said:

So I am remembering that in CA our house had a built in China cabinet.   I loved a lot of things about that house.   It was a Craftsman home and had several built in nooks and crannies.

The two houses I grew up in here in CA both had some built in glass door cabinets.  One nice thing about one of them was that the house (1910 era) had tallish ceilings, and the cabinet went all the way to the ceiling.  One of my big hesitations about buying a China cabinet for our current home (ca 1922) is that the Victorian ones that are tall are way too ornate for the Craftsman style of the room, and the others on the market are so short that there would be a lot of difficult top dusting AND a lot of wasted space.  That is one of the reasons I’m considering having built ins made—so that they can really match the proportions of the room.  My secretary (that I use for a curio) is really too short for the ceilings in the home as well, and it makes it look a little bit funny.

Edited November 8, 2020 by Carol in Cal.

[Jean in Newcastle]

I use a barrister bookcase (bookcase with glass doors) as a china cabinet. 

[TechWife]

I received this one after my mother died. It came to her from my father’s aunt. We don’t know where it was before that. 
 

[Emba]

This is mine. It came with the house (owners didn’t want to move it) and I love having a good place to display most of my teacup collection ( top two shelves) I do also have china (stored on bottom shelf) inherited from a great-aunt. I use it infrequently, but I do use it. It looks a little cluttered on the bottom shelf, but I prefer it there than any of the other less accessible places I could put it. I was also given a set of silver by an aunt, and that I’ve only used once.

Eta: no idea how old this cabinet is. I’m sure it is not an antique, or vintage.

Edited November 8, 2020 by Emba

[DawnM]

4 hours ago, TechWife said:

I received this one after my mother died. It came to her from my father’s aunt. We don’t know where it was before that. 
 

I just looked this one up.   What an interesting piece.    Is it a Horner Brothers?   Used they are worth well over $2,000.   Beautiful.

[DawnM]

We got it home!   I am cleaning it up and one of the lights doesn't work right now, so I need to replace it.   

My mother had a huge collection of Friendly Village pieces, she loved them.   That is one of the dish sets my dad brought out.   I looked online and found another piece to the set that I would have bought my mom as a gift had I known it existed.   I have ordered it to add to the set and will display it in the cabinet.

https://www.amazon.com/Johnson-Brothers-Friendly-Village-Dinnerware/dp/B00484MRI2/ref=sr_1_6?crid=K2A8Y6R71P1J&dchild=1&keywords=friendly+village+by+johnson+brothers&qid=1604892403&sprefix=friendly+village%2Caps%2C1014&sr=8-6

[TechWife]

1 hour ago, DawnM said:

I just looked this one up.   What an interesting piece.    Is it a Horner Brothers?   Used they are worth well over $2,000.   Beautiful.

Thank you. We had it restored early this year. There were no furniture company tags on it. They dated it to late 19th-early 20th century. The feet and the lions are hand carved.  It had a lot of weak joints and the glass was wiggly in some places. The big thing was that someone along the way had painted it and the restoration guy had to remove the paint. 
 

This is what it looked like before - I took this picture before I emptied it at my moms house and had it shipped to mine. 

[easypeasy]

I have one.

I love it.

I have nowhere to put it. We repurposed our formal dining room into dh's office and the china cabinet is now there (AFTER a couple years of being in our living room).

We are about to have to move it again because I need to paint that room. I have two sets of china in it and really need to re-think what I want to do with all this stuff. I LOVE my china but have nowhere for it. I wanted to just "start using it" (my grandmother and my great-grandmother's china), but I just can't bring myself to actually DO that except on holidays.

It's the one piece of furniture I have inner conflicts about. 😏🥴

[DawnM]

5 hours ago, TechWife said:

Thank you. We had it restored early this year. There were no furniture company tags on it. They dated it to late 19th-early 20th century. The feet and the lions are hand carved.  It had a lot of weak joints and the glass was wiggly in some places. The big thing was that someone along the way had painted it and the restoration guy had to remove the paint. 
 

This is what it looked like before - I took this picture before I emptied it at my moms house and had it shipped to mine. 

 

Interesting.    I just googled "lion head china cabinet" and the same lion carving was on the ones I looked at.   There are some others out there, but the one I saw was the same lion as yours.   And the feet are lion paws.   And the irony?   It says it is made of tiger oak! 😂   I don't know what tiger oak is, but I thought it was funny, going with the lion theme.

Was it expensive to get it restored?

[DawnM]

14 hours ago, SKL said:

I guess so ... I mean, I might have used the wrong words ....

 

I was just curious since you said it came from China.

[J-rap]

Aw, china cabinets give me warm feelings, because my mother and both grandmothers always had one.  

I don't have one~ I prefer to keep things tucked away.  But, I do have nicer dishes I use on special occasions, or heirloom pieces, or even just extras of my everyday that don't fit in my kitchen.  

I have something more along the lines of this:

 

Edited November 9, 2020 by J-rap

[Carol in Cal.]

On 11/7/2020 at 8:29 PM, gardenmom5 said:

I love it when someone uses some of the older patterns. My grandmother had Francisan's Desert Rose.  (her everyday dishes) My sister has it, but doesn't actually use it.

I have a little bit of the Franciscan Strawberry, which is similar.

[Guest]

I have a built-in one because I’m a pampered princess. 👑

 

[PeterPan]

9 hours ago, TechWife said:

We had it restored early this year. There were no furniture company tags on it. They dated it to late 19th-early 20th century. The feet and the lions are hand carved.  It had a lot of weak joints and the glass was wiggly in some places. The big thing was that someone along the way had painted it and the restoration guy had to remove the paint. 

What a phenomenal restoration! So much better! Very lovely.

[matrips]

On 11/7/2020 at 8:21 AM, DawnM said:

Extra points for pictures!   (HINT HINT!)

I am strongly considering getting a China cabinet.   I don't know how I will make it fit in our dining room, but I will figure it out.

My dad moved here and brought both sets of my mom's dishes with him.   I also have a lot of curio/keepsakes I have always wanted to display but didn't know how.   I would like something that would work as a curio cabinet and China cabinet.

What do you have?

 

I have one that I emptied out.  I bought it when my parents moved and they didn’t want the china, glassware etc thrown away.  But it’s really not my thing.  After my mom died, I got rid of most of the glassware and out the dishes in a cabinet.  Now I just need to get rid of the cabinet.  I just want a simpler cleaner look.  I’m getting old and hating clutter 😂

[DawnM]

On 11/9/2020 at 9:02 AM, Quill said:

I have a built-in one because I’m a pampered princess. 👑

 

 

I have something similar, but without the glass, but I use it more as a beverage and/or serving area.   It is longer than that though.

Is yours in your dining room?    Maybe that is the difference.   Mine is not.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, DawnM said:

 

I have something similar, but without the glass, but I use it more as a beverage and/or serving area.   It is longer than that though.

Is yours in your dining room?    Maybe that is the difference.   Mine is not.

Yes; it is built into my dining room wall. On the original house plans, it was an alcove, presumably for a china cabinet. We didn't have one, so I persuaded dh to build it in. 

[ktgrok]

On 11/7/2020 at 9:12 AM, Pawz4me said:

Nope. Even the idea of one gives my naturally minimalist self the shivers.

See, I don't want one for china (although DH insists on holding on to his grandmother's tea set, and I do have my great grandmother's child's tea set that is actual china), but it would be great for storing homeschool stuff!

Or, alternately, to have a place to put the few tablecloths, etc we do have. we have one SMALL closet in this house that functions as linen closet and shoe closet for 6 people plus clothes for the lawn goose and seasonal garden flags and a bin for sunscreen/bug spray. It's not enough, even with minimal shoes/linens. 

On 11/7/2020 at 4:03 PM, Ellie said:

I managed to figure out how to get my own pictures here:

china cabinet, where I display my china (and yes, I actually use it), plus some extras on the bottom shelf; cloth napkins are in the drawers, and there are a couple of random things in the spaces on the sides. I wish I knew what the manufacturer had intended, lol.

 

buffet, where I store all the extra china pieces, plus some other random serving pieces

 

My mom has this one!