The side table is one of those pieces people underestimate until they don’t have one. Somewhere to put a drink, a book, a lamp that needs to be at the right height. It sounds modest and yet the wrong table ruins a corner and the right one pulls a whole seating area together.

Brown is having its moment and we think it deserves to stay. Warm tones in wood, in rattan, in walnut and oak do something to a living room that cooler palettes simply cannot. They make a space feel lived in rather than staged.

What we looked for here goes beyond colour. Proportion matters enormously. A side table that is too tall looks awkward and one that sits too low is practically useless. We also thought about surface area, about whether the base crowds the floor, about materials that age well rather than just look good on day one. These are the ones that earn their place in a real room.