Good restaurant and café furniture starts with the floor plan: decide how many seats the room must hold, keep clear aisles for service, then choose chairs, banquettes, tables and bar stools whose heights work together and whose upholstery can be cleaned every day. Comfort should match how long guests stay, so a fine-dining room and a busy café need different seating even when the pieces look alike.
This guide follows the decisions in the order a furniture maker takes them: layout, seating types, bar heights, chair comfort, materials and what bespoke production changes. The photos come from Radisson Blu Leogrand in Chișinău, where Sitdesign was the interior architect, and from our stand at IIFF 2026.
Start with the floor plan: seats, aisles and zones
Before looking at chairs, set the number of seats against the floor area. A common rule for a restaurant dining area is about 1.2–1.7 m² per seat: a café with small tables sits at the lower end, a fine-dining room with generous tables at the upper end. That figure already includes circulation, so it falls apart quickly if aisles are an afterthought.
- Main aisles: typically 90–120 cm, so a waiter with a tray can pass a seated guest.
- Between chair backs: at least about 45–60 cm where two neighbouring tables sit back to back.
- Zones: the window line, the centre of the room, the bar and the terrace are used differently and usually deserve different furniture.
Draw the service routes from the kitchen and the bar first, then place tables around them. Furniture chosen before the routes are fixed often turns out a few centimetres too deep, and those centimetres can cost a whole row of seats.
Banquettes along the window line at Radisson Blu Leogrand, Chișinău.
Banquettes, chairs and table shapes
Banquettes are the most space-efficient seating along a wall or a window. One continuous back replaces several chair backs, tables can be pushed together for a larger group and separated again, and only the aisle side needs loose chairs. They also give the room a calm, ordered line, as the window seating above shows.
Loose chairs bring flexibility to the middle of the room. Round tables suit groups and conversation, while square and rectangular tables join easily into one long table for a booking. Most restaurants work best with a mix: banquettes on the walls, chairs and two-tops in the centre. Our benches and poufs can be made in custom dimensions on request, which helps when a banquette has to fit a wall exactly.
A terrace has its own rules. Plan for sun, wind and a deck floor: table bases that stay level, chairs that do not shift with every gust, and materials agreed with the maker for that exposure.
Terrace dining at Radisson Blu Leogrand.
Bar and lounge seating: getting the heights right
Bar stools are where most measuring mistakes happen. A common rule is to leave 25–30 cm between the seat and the underside of the counter, which gives these typical pairings:
- Counter height: a counter of about 90 cm takes a stool seat of around 65 cm.
- Bar height: a bar of about 105 cm takes a stool seat of around 75 cm.
- Footrest and back: the longer guests stay, the more a footrest and a supportive back matter.
Measure the finished counter, including the top, before ordering. Our guide to counter-height and bar-height stools goes into seat depth and spacing along the bar.
Lounge areas next to a bar need a different seat altogether: lower, wider chairs with arms, set around small tables, for guests who order a second drink rather than a main course.
On the Sitdesign stand at IIFF 2026.
Restaurant chairs: comfort versus table turnover
A dining chair seat is typically 45–47 cm high for a table of 74–76 cm, which keeps the same 25–30 cm gap for the thighs. Within those numbers, the chair should follow the format of the restaurant.
A café that turns tables quickly needs upright, lighter chairs that guests can move easily and staff can stack or lift for cleaning. A fine-dining room or hotel restaurant can take deeper seats, upholstered backs and arms, because guests are expected to stay. If you choose armchairs, check that the arms slide under the table top, otherwise every chair stands further out and the aisles shrink.
For sizes and spacing in detail, see dining chair dimensions and our notes on upholstered dining chairs with or without arms. Current models are in our dining chairs collection.
Tub chairs and a pedestal table on the Sitdesign stand at IIFF 2026.
Materials that cope with daily service
Restaurant furniture is sat on many times a day, wiped every evening and moved constantly. That changes the priorities:
- Upholstery: genuine leather or high-abrasion fabrics; both should be agreed with the maker for commercial use.
- Cleaning: surfaces that can be wiped, and removable covers where fabric is used.
- Bases: stable frames and table bases that do not rock on an uneven floor.
- Floors: glides or castors chosen for the actual floor, stone, wood or carpet.
Our upholstered frames are made from kiln-dried beech, and seats use high-resilience (HR) foam with sprung seating. We work with genuine leather only, in 76 colours across 12 colour families, with Italian leathers as our top leather group. Fabric upholstery is possible, and we accept the customer's own material (COM) when a restaurant has a fabric chosen for its brand. Samples are available on request.
How bespoke production helps a restaurant project
Restaurants rarely have standard walls. A banquette that ends 20 cm short of a pillar, or a bar stool that is slightly too low for the counter, is visible every day. With bespoke production you can order custom dimensions on request, use one leather colour across chairs, banquettes and stools, and adjust seat heights to the counter you actually built.
Every piece is handmade in our own factory in Büyükçekmece, Istanbul, where we have been making furniture since 1983. Lead times are 3–4 weeks for upholstered pieces and 6–8 weeks for wood. Beyond production, we offer interior architecture and design work and technical support at the design stage, as on hotel projects such as Radisson Blu Leogrand. Our article on hotel and hospitality projects covers that side in more depth.
Frequently asked questions
How much space does a restaurant need per seat?
A common planning figure is about 1.2–1.7 m² per seat in the dining area, including aisles. Cafés with small tables need less, fine-dining rooms more.
What height should restaurant chairs and bar stools be?
Dining chairs typically have a 45–47 cm seat for a 74–76 cm table. Bar stools are around 65 cm at a 90 cm counter and around 75 cm at a 105 cm bar.
Is leather or fabric better for restaurant chairs?
Both work if they are chosen for commercial use. Leather wipes clean easily; fabric should have high abrasion resistance and ideally removable covers.
Planning a restaurant, café or hotel restaurant? Send us your floor plan or ask for leather samples, and we will suggest seating that fits the room. You are also welcome to visit our factory in Büyükçekmece and see the showroom.
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