The Top 6 Dining Room Trends for 2025, According to Designers

a dining room with green blue wainscoting and wallpaper above, dining table surrounded by cabin style chairs
Top 6 Dining Room Trends for 2025 RETT PEEK


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Dining rooms are one of those spaces that you either love or want to convert into a home office. But, if you’ve come to this article, we think there’s a good chance you agree with us that having a whole room dedicated to sharing classic home-cooked meals with friends is a sort of magical thing. If you’re wondering how to turn your oft-overlooked space into something a bit more, well, magical, then you’ve come to the right place. We polled some of our favorite designers across the country on what dining room decorating trends they’re most excited about for the upcoming year and... we got some surprising results. From saying goodbye to open floor plans to going all-in on bold wallpapers, it’s looking like 2025 is the year your dining room will get a major facelift.

Dedicate a Room for Dining

mountain cabin dining room

Allow me to metaphorically hold your hand as I say this: Open floor plans are (and, frankly, have always been) not all they’re cracked up to be. I know it’s incredibly brave to take this stance, but it needed to be said. At their very best, open-concept living and dining spaces are visually overwhelming, and, at their worst, they’re just a hot mess. So, let 2025 be the year we put up more (well-placed) walls, starting with creating an actual dining room. It’s not just me who feels this way, either. “People are starting to want a separation of kitchen and dining, which is a trend away from what we’ve seen since the early 2000s,” says Nashville-based designer Natalie Hager. “Formal closed dining rooms are back in style, and I’m here for it. I love having a room 100% centered around a table.” We do, too.

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Fill Your Dining Room With Personality

dining room with botanical patterned wallpaper and mismatched dining chairs
Mural-like botanical wallpaper, a collection of dining chairs, and shimmery gilt accents combine for one-of-a-kind personality in this South Carolina dining room. Brie Williams for Country Living

In that vein, separate dining areas will experience a bit of freshening up in 2025. Think exaggerated light fixtures (more on that later), daring wallpapers, and exciting paint finishes. You can expect dining rooms to start getting the powder room treatment, meaning an emphasis will be put on making the space feel like a show-stopping respite among the more livable, everyday backdrop of the rest of the home. “A dining room brings an opportunity to make an impact with pattern and color,” says Houston-based designer Katie Davis. “Don’t be afraid to make a statement.” Her preferred way? “I love to use mixed patterns in the same [color] tone to create cohesion and drama.”

Dramatic wallpapers are also a favorite of designers Max Humphrey and Kara Adam. Max prefers to go for a natural, mural-type look when it comes to picking dining room wallpaper. “Using something like a birch tree wallpaper creates this dreamy, fully enveloped escape. It’s almost like dining al fresco all year,” he says. And, to those who are wary of making such a splash, heed Kara’s sage advice: “A lot of people are worried they’ll get sick of such a bold print, but you won’t if you love it.”

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Take a Collected Approach

kitchen and dining room with green painted cabinets and ladder back chairs

Say goodbye to your grandmother’s matching dining room set. Well, parts of it, at least. Whether it’s mixing art styles or furniture eras, expect to see more perfectly imperfect dining rooms in 2025. Pinterest named this mix-and-match approach to design as one of their top trends for the year, focusing on mixing playful, over-the-top patterns and bringing in lots of layers.

Meanwhile, designers are putting their own spin on the trend. Sally Rotenstreich, a Georgia-based interior designer and wardrobe stylist, is going all-in on mixing eras, pairing modern accent pieces with classically rustic standbys. An easy way to introduce this look to your dining room, according to Sally: “I love having two different styles of chairs. You’ll make a great statement with interesting arm chairs at the head of the dining room table.” Designer Stephanie Sabbe did similar in the pictured dining room, replacing the head chairs with happily patterned wingbacks.

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Go for Statement Lighting

1820 georgian colonial home of justin reis and mark schwindenhammer in hampton connecticut dining area with round wood table and dining chairs

Gone are the days of a simple pendant light or chandelier hanging above a dining table. Multiple designers we spoke to hinted that statement lighting will have a major moment in 2025. “In the dining room, details go a long way,” says designer Aileen Warren of Jackson Warren Interiors, who loves to use eye-catching modern lighting in more traditional dining spaces. Texas-based designer Brelan Owen Pearson puts an emphasis on scale, recommending you also balance oversize lighting with equally oversize artwork. Regardless of what type of lighting you prefer, it’s good to know that sometimes bigger is actually better.

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Bring on the Millwork

beekman boys dining room with mirrors on the wall

If you scrolled for even a minute on either TikTok or Reels this year, then you probably have already seen this trend in action: decorative molding. “Adding molding is a game-changer,” says Sarah Fishburne, the director of trend and design at The Home Depot. “It’s an easy way to elevate a flat wall, especially with a rich, bold paint color.” While we might caution you against copying the exact style of molding you’ve seen on social media (not every house needs to feel like a grand Parisian apartment), we love the idea of returning some character to a space that might feel a bit more builder-grade. The best way to do that is by looking to your surroundings. Is your home in a historic neighborhood? Does your town have more mid-century or Colonial houses? Let those factors, along with the style of your house, determine what you want your space to look like before you head to the lumberyard.

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Set the Mood

dark green dining room

To round out the list, it’s time we take a serious look at color. If you're going to do anything to your dining room in 2025, be sure it’s in the appropriate color palette. Moody, saturated tones are set to overtake neutrals this year. If you read our Color in a Country House feature, then you already know that muddy paint colors such as these are loved by designers for their historic and inherently country feel. “Muddy tones—think olive greens, deep chocolates, plummy aubergines—reflect the countryside and bring the outdoors back in,” says New York-based designer Ariel Okin. Now that all the various Colors of the Year are announced, it’s clear that muddy colors will be rising to the top of the paint charts in 2025.

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