Journal Entry No. 8
The Kitchen Table
My kitchen table - made from the original posts and beams of the 1912 house we renovated.
The kitchen table has always been where everything happens in my house and in most houses I love. A table at the centre of the kitchen - to work at, to eat at and to gather for an impromptu coffee with friends - always fills me with warmth. Kitchen islands are foreign to me, they seem too limited in use and I find them uncomfortable to eat at as everyone ends up in a line, military style. They are great additional storage, I’ll give them that, but I rather have a work surface at a lower height to knead bread or make pasta so I can really put my shoulders into it.
Growing up, my kitchen table was used for nearly everything. While in theatre school I would spend many a sleepless night working on stage maquettes for deadlines that were all too near… we would of course gather for meals but also prepare food, often working with family friends to make Silician arancine or mamma and I would make ravioli with porcini to bring to Christmas dinner. After dinner, the kitchen table was where I would watch my parents and architect friends pour over plans for projects, graph paper strewn about, scale rulers and velum… and quite often the green felt would then be rolled out for a game of cards (burraco or scopa) and Marsala liqueur.
My zia Silvia’s kitchen table in Tuscany is one of my favourites: it’s the heart of her home (really, she is the heart) and we always gravitate to it on our visits. Her sons will bring her crates of fresh produce from their little farm - artichokes in spring, tomatoes and beans in summer, bitter greens in the fall - and she’ll roll up her sleeves and make everyone jars of tomato sauce, or sit down at the table to shuck kilos of beans while happily chatting to her friends. Days are planned and discussed at this table, breakfast, lunch and dinner are all veritable feasts at this table (the dining table in the other room is rarely used) and I know that, when I send her a note, that she is likely reading it at the table, cat at her side.
When designing our home I never looked to having an island as I new our family needed the workhorse of a kitchen table. I designed and had the 9’ table made bespoke by a local craftsman using the original 1912 beams that had to come out of the house with the renovation. With a history of furniture refinishing in the family we knew very well that we wanted a beeswax finish so that the table, its wood wonderfully nicked and dinged already, would continue to evolve with the labours it would support. I’ll scrub and apply a couple layers of beeswax to it using fine steel wool, a job that takes a half hour at most, replenishing the warmth of the wood every couple years. I smile knowing that many more scuffs will come with the use of this table, with family life.
The kitchen table in our home is a workhorse as well as being the place everyone goes to when in the house. We host our Italian cooking workshops at this table, 8 eager people around it making pasta, afterwards we dine together and share the enjoyment that comes from cooking and eating together. Next week, as spring is quickly approaching, the table will see rolls of velum and graph paper again as I revise some planting beds in the garden and create some new garden projects for my husband. Tonight we’ll simply eat dinner at the table, this too is tradition, and we’ll discuss our upcoming trip to Italy when we will find ourselves gathered at zia Silvia’s table once again.
Everything happens at the kitchen table.