The Kitchen Chairs of my Childhood Can Now be Found in a Funky Retro-Café

Growing up, we ate all of our meals around the kitchen table. We had a big eat-in kitchen with a round melamine table which had four matching chairs. Being the fifth family member, however, my chair was the desk chair from the desk in the playroom, but I digress.... My parents had bought the set in the sixties when they married and moved into their first apartment. Yes, we were the epitome of coolness back then!

Sometime in the late nineties, the round melamine table was replaced with an even older drop-leaf antique table. The chairs, however, remained. When I moved to Ottawa in '98, I dragged the table out of the basement and brought it with me. It has been with me ever since and currently resides in the centre of my eat-in kitchen.

The chairs, on the other hand, kicked around the new old kitchen table for a while, until that table made its way into the livingroom (leaves down), to fill in the gap where the piano - which had been moved to my brother's place - had resided. Another new old kitchen table - and chairs - were acquired for the kitchen. The old chairs ended up in the basement, tableless and alone.

Just under four years ago, the chairs were again given a new life. This time with a young family that had recently immigrated to Montreal and were setting up their first Canadian home. Currently in their forty-somethingth year, the chairs and table now live 8km from each other across the Ottawa river. Just the other day, we were wondering how long the chairs would/could last....

... Enter the newest and hippest café in my quickly gentrifying neighbourhood; Raw Sugar. After months (and months) of speculation, Raw Sugar finally opened its doors two weeks ago. A bit of a cross between Café Santropol in Montreal and Leave it to Beaver, Raw Sugar offers an eclectic mix of 50s and 60s tables, chairs and furnishings. Nothing matches and everything matches. Massive Formica tables are surrounded by a hodge-podge of retro kitchen chairs, including I might add, the Kitchen Chairs of My Childhood, nestled in among the orange vinyl and purple velour.

Who knew? And suddenly, we are once again the epitome of cool!