Linon Home Decor Products Chelsea Breakfast Coastal Style Dining Set (Blue/White)

This dining nook looks wonderful. It's made with real pine and although it's cheap pine, it has a great feel and finish. Its durability is comparable to any piece of furniture you can buy at places like Kmart or Target - good enough for adults who are not excessively heavy, and who are careful with their furniture. This is not the quality you would get from a custom wood shop, but it is also easily a grand less than what you would pay for that, and this set looks and feels nicer than any other store bought furniture I've sat on before, a lot of which is crap. I was in the market for a dining booth and was looking at custom ordering from stores that supply for restaurants but prices were over a thousand dollars, and if you shop around and wait for sales, you can find excellent deals on this set. What I decided to do is get two of these on sale and put them together - you can reverse the directions and assemble them as mirroring nooks. I put the two tables together (both of which are surprisingly sturdy and don't rock or wobble at all) with the intent of putting a table runner between them, and topped it off with some candles. It even looks okay without the table runner hiding the seam so far. I also ordered the seat cushions for it and bravo, we have a winner. I now have a wrap around bench and dining nook in my dining area that can accommodate plenty of people. I opted to use the two side benches elsewhere because they are the only two really concerning parts of the set, I would not trust two adults on those for long. The main seating is pretty good, although the whole setup is not meant for heavy adults; any overweight adult would make me nervous on this set. If you're within a healthy weight range, I wouldn't be concerned. Anyone handy can also easily beef up the main stress points.There is storage under the main seats, which flip up. This sounds handy until you realize the bottom of the storage is basically cardboard. Cut a piece of real wood to size and screw it into the set instead of the cardboard, and you'll have something useful. Otherwise, don't expect to store more than a tablecloth in there. But it is a cool idea and easily made more useful with a little diy enhancements.Assembly can be a bit of a pain because they didn't always make things line up the best and the directions are pretty weak. While most can certainly figure it out, expect a bit of time to go into the assembly, and plan your attack especially if you're making mirroring sets, it's easy to get confused.The seat depth is short and there is a lip at the top of the seats, the top trim molding kind of pokes your spine. What I decided to do was buy the matching cushion set, and use the cushions from the side benches as backrests. It's still a short depth seat, but much more comfortable now, and it's a meal nook to offset my kitchen island dining bar that I use typically. All in all, I wanted a booth setup that I could eat or work at, and this does the job.Photographic evidence of stuff like this I find to be necessary for users to determine if it's the crappy cheap stuff, or that hidden gem that balances cheap cost with surprising quality. I say this one strikes the desired balance - insanely cheap, and pretty impressive quality, not excellent, but almost certainly better than any other dining nook you can get for two hundred a pop.

Well it is definitely solid wood, but I can't really say much more than that. No matter what torque I used on the drill, I wound up having to hand screw all of the short screws. Then when it came to the longer screws, I could only one halfway into the holes. I attempted the drill again at that point, and stripped the screw. I guess I will have to attempt drilling the hole wider. I did purchasecwood glue per other reviewers recommednations, and good thing too, because the dows are not always a good fit. I know that these things can't always be precision, but this is a bit over the top. So is my frustration level, and I am a pretty patient person.EDIT:I updated my review after completion, added a star, and a photo. So, after what felt like an eternity, I finally got this thing together. The "predrilled holes" were not drilled properly on most of the pieces. This made using the Phipps head as suggested, impossible in most cases. I had to drill the holes out myself, and then drill the screws in. Even still, I was met with resistance, stripped bits, and stripped screw heads. I'm not a carpenter, but I am very handy. This was not an easy undertaking. If you don't know how to hand drill holes straight enough into a thin piece of wood, you are going to be in for it. The holes that were precut for the dows weren't always drilled deep enough. This wasn't much of an issue until it came to the table, and stand-alone bench. Considering they use the locking bolts, and Alan keys, the Dow started to push through the wood as I tightened. I had to hammer the dows down to reshape them until they fit as they were meant to. You aren't supposed to over tighten the screws when you build furniture, but I found it difficult to find a happy medium with that. I'm certain that there are spots where my screws are too tight, because loosening them, meant that the pieces wouldn't be flush at all in many cases. The wood glue is an absolute MUST. I purchased Gorilla wood glue along with this order. The instruction manual ironically tells you "simple." No. Not simple at all. If the manual has to tell you this in the first step, that is probably a fair warning haha. Now that it is complete, we love it. It fits perfectly in our kitchen, and matched up with the architecture of our windows. If I had to do this again, I would probably pay for assembly. I see many reviews almost shaming buyers for complaining about difficulties considering the "low price." No this isn't an $800 dinette. That doesn't mean that it should be defective. If "you get what you pay for," I paid for a table that was supposed to be "simple" to assemble as it claims.

I am probably the worst person on the planet when it comes to building anything and I was able to put this together with little help, it took me all day...but the fact that it actually came out looking like the picture and I didn't end up throwing it out a window leads me to believe this would be a relatively simple table to put together for any semi handy person. It seems sturdy and I'm really happy with it.

When I see four stars I have to temper the feedback with what you are paying for this item. I feel it's being unfairly judged by people who aren't used to assembling wood-kit furniture. If you have some time spent with a drill you won't have any trouble putting this together in a couple of hours, and it looks good when finished.PROs:+ About $1200 cheaper than a "real" corner nook+ Assembly and build quality is good also, packing is pretty insulated against being cracked or scratched+ Finish looks good, like a medium honey pine with polyurethane+ Good options for configuration and cushionsCONs:+ Finish is delicate - It's not like solid wood furniture, where scratches add character and can be refinished without issues.+ Regular use will show, highly recommend cushions/cloths, or an epoxy finish over the seating/eating surfaces+ Not every hole is pre-drilled. You may want to drill pilot holes for the corner seat unit.

Very sturdy actually, you have to use wood glue. If you know what you're doing that should be a no brainer, but people that complain it's flimsy obviously don't know how to put wood furniture together. Also don't over tighten the screws, if you're using a power drill of some sort put it on a lower torque so it'll click at a certain pressure.