Plastic plate tablescape! Can it actually be beautiful?

Nobody wanted to wash dishes this particular night, so it was obviously time for the plastic plate tablescape!

But before we delve into that, let me give you a bit of background.

I get a lot of what you might call push-back from people who just don’t want to mess with “fancy” plates. I hear things like “I can’t have a nice table when I just use plastic plates all the time!”

Well, my friend, I beg to differ!

I took pictures of this table just to prove that it can be done! With just a little bit of creativity, your plastic plate tablescape can be a lovely casual place for your family and friends to gather.

How the plastic plate tablescape happened

So – as I mentioned above, nobody liked the idea of washing up on the last night of our visit to my sister-and brother-in-law’s house (SIL and BIL) in Walla Walla. There were five of us, and we’d all done our fair share of washing up during the previous three days.

As also frequently happens during these visits, those of us who weren’t cooking were lounging around with our glasses of wine! We were totally not paying attention to the progress of dinner prep, and were quite surprised when all of a sudden it was time to eat!

So since I’m usually the one who gets to set the table, I hurriedly found some disposable tableware in SIL’s picnic stash, and went to work. They were a cheery color, so that was helpful!

Cloth placemats and napkins

SIL uses cloth placemats and napkins like I do, so there were plenty to choose from when I wanted to class-up the plastic plates. If you don’t already have a set of cloth placemats and napkins, I would highly recommend it. They don’t have to be too expensive, and they’re more eco-friendly than paper, too.

Choose a color that works with the plates you use most often, and store them close to the table. Once you’re in the habit, taking an extra minute to put them on the table is a cinch!

I chose this maroon since it was in the same color group as those cheery plates. It also created a little depth and a slight texture. I like the tone on tone look for more sophistication. (If you can call plastic sophisticated, but you know what I mean!) If I had wanted our plastic plate tablescape to be more playful, I could have used blue or yellow or some other color or pattern placemats.

Using cloth is really not much more work than using paper, but it really elevates even your plastic plates. If you keep the cloth ones handy, it’s just a matter of pulling them from a different drawer. And instead of throwing a paper napkin into the garbage after dinner, you just throw the cloth into the laundry.

At my house, I keep a laundry bag practically in the kitchen, so it’s literally two extra steps from the garbage bin to the laundry bag. Totally worth it to have a prettier table!

Flowers or another centerpiece

But the thing that really makes even a plastic plate tablescape beautiful is flowers. In this case, I didn’t even use a regular vase – just a big red mug that I got out of the cupboard.

If there hadn’t been red, I could have found some other interesting color, or even just a regular drinking glass. I didn’t have time to make a real “arrangement,” but a few blooms in the mug were just enough.

And as you can tell from the pictures of the yard, SIL and BIL have beautiful gardens full of lovely flowers.

If you don’t have as many lovely flowers as I was lucky enough to choose from that night, you could pick whatever’s going on in your yard. Even some ivy, small sprays from a green bush, or tall-ish grass stems would add some greenery and a focal point at the table.

Or maybe you live somewhere where you don’t have outside access? In that case, maybe a potted plant or herb could stand in for a centerpiece. Or something completely different. Centerpieces are made to have fun with!

Give the plastic plate tablescape a try!

So any time you don’t feel like washing dishes and/or don’t have time to do anything “fancy,” remember you can still have a beautiful dinner with the plastic plate tablescape.

You could also use paper plates instead of plastic. We’re really trying to limit how much plastic we buy. In this case, the plastic plates were already on hand, but if I were starting from scratch, I’d buy paper.

Besides, there are TONS of gorgeous paper plates out there these days. I was at a party a while back where the paper plates were so beautiful and substantial, I had to give them a really close look to see that they weren’t china.

I’ll link some pretty ones in the boutique recommendations below.

Do you use plastic plates? Or paper plates? Let me know what you think in the Comments – I always love to hear your thoughts!

Barbara’s Boutique Recommendations – Shop the Post

Click on the pictures below for links to the pieces I mentioned in this post. If something’s not available, I chose a similar replacement.

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