The “Why” of Our Table Setting

Reduced to its simplest terms, arranging the flat silver is only a matter of placing it in the order of use, so that as he picks up the implement for each course, the diner will be working from the outside in.

Table setting is a simple enough procedure if you understand that the silver is placed as conveniently as possible for the user. Once you have decided on the menu and the silver to be used for each course, begin setting the table by spacing the place plates. Allow about thirty inches to each cover. And naturally if the table is larger, the places will be a little farther apart.

Reduced to its simplest terms, arranging the flat silver is only a matter of placing it in the order of use, so that as he picks up the implement for each course, the diner will be working from the outside in. Following this rule, you will have at the left the fish fork, the meat fork, and, nearest the plate, the salad fork. At the right: the soup spoon, fish knife, and, nearest the plate, the meat knife. The cutting edges of the knives should be turned in to face the plate. For the placing of flat silver see the sketch above.

Convention has decided, broadly, that soup spoons and knives go on the right of a plate because they are used primarily by the right hand, and forks on the left because as long as their fellow utensils, the knives, are in action, they are left-hand implements. If you eat according to the English method, as many Americans do, you do not change your fork to your right hand while there is anything on your plate to cut. You use the two implements continuously during the meat course. 

If, however, you prefer to eat according to the American method laying down the knife every few minutes and transferring the fork to the right hand-there is no rule against doing so; it is a manner of eating upheld by many. Of course, when a fork is the only implement necessary, it is always held in the right hand.– From “Table Setting and Service” by Elizabeth Barnard, 1935

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