Forget Grazing Tables, I Spoke to London's Coolest Caterers About Their Design-Forward 'Feasting Tables' and the Lessons to Learn for Your Own Christmas Buffet

For me, Christmas is about turning food into theater — and while it's important, it's not just about what I cook, it's also about how I present it. The right styling delivers the magic, the sense of abundance, and the feeling of merriment of the feast, especially when you're serving in a 'help yourself' style. Who doesn't love a Christmas buffet, after all?

To elevate your serving game this year, I knew instantly who to talk to. Charlie and Josh Karlsen's home recently featured in Livingetc, a standout space for many reasons, but how perfectly suited it is to entertaining perhaps most of all. However, the couple not only have unfaltering taste and hosting skills at home — they're also the founders of Opus 11, the UK's leading luxury catering company that services not only ultra-high-net-worth individuals, but also puts on a show for a very important roster of brands. They count Chanel and Louis Vuitton among their clients, if that helps set the tone.

As well as throwing incredible dinner parties and staffing them with wait staff and chefs coming from Michelin-star backgrounds, their signature might just be the art of the 'feasting table'. Yes, that's right, forget the humble grazing table — after discovering Charlie and Josh's work, I've now elevated expectations for my Christmas table decor to new heights.

Yes, Opus 11's feasting tables are epic, theatrical, and bring a sense of storytelling that makes them magic, but there are also ideas I'm keen to steal, even if on a slightly less grand level. I caught up with Charlie, Opus 11's creative director, who walked me through some of the secrets to a successful feasting table set-up.

Charlie Karlsen

Creative director Charlie founded Opus 11 in 2018 with his husband Joshua, redefining the idea of luxury event catering. Working on events for everyone from top fashion brands to private individuals, the company specializes in dramatic, design-forward event styling under Charlie's watchful eye for detail.

"The idea of the feasting table is something that guests can talk about, and be the focal moment of the evening," Charlie tells me. "I always like to really make sure it's very design-led, and it has lots of interesting moments." Here's how:

1. Bring Theater Through Linens

Dramatic, ruffled drapery is a huge interior design trend this year, and it's certainly one that follows into the event styling Charlie creates. "This year, materials are not so boring, flat, ironed, and polished," he explains. Across many of the dinners and feasting tables Opus 11 has hosted this year, tablecloths are theatrically draped, bringing a sense of movement to the table, before you even get to the food.

"Give yourself a bit more room to play around with fabric," Charlie advises. "If you've got a big dining table, it's hard to find readymade linens that will fit, so consider having a tablecloth made."

And, if you want to channel the drama of a table like the one pictured, be generous with the proportions. "If you want to create the draped or ruffled effect, I'd suggest you leave yourself, let's say, an extra 20cm of fabric at the bottom of the tablecloth," he adds.

2. Use Your Height Advantage

It's rule 101 of good dining table decor, but things can get more out-there and theatrical when creating a feasting table than your everyday dining table centerpiece.

"We use a lot of plinths to create our tables," Charlie explains, "but if you drape the entire table with linen, you can really use anything underneath it to create some height."

Candles are another area to play with height, he suggests. "When you buy dinner candles, make sure that they are different heights to help you create levels," Charlie says. He suggests looking at ranges of candle holders, too. "You can find candle holders that come in 10cm and 15cm in the same style, but again, you could make that even more dramatic by getting candles that are 30cm or 40cm tall and really play with height along the table."

3. Embrace Cutlery Art

Charlie also introduced me to the idea of 'cutlery art' — "type it into Pinterest, and you'll find so much inspiration," he says.

These ideas can vary from as simple as an idea to laying out cutlery to "follow the line of the table", to more intricate set-ups, such as the above. Including it in the design of your buffet table is a much more interesting take than simply piling it up, especially if you've invested in a beautiful flatware set.

4. Use Food as Sculpture

At the heart of Opus 11's feasting tables is usually the food, and while it's meant for eating, a lot of it plays a crucial role in the design of the table too, especially when you can source amazing fruit and vegetables that steal the show.

Think cascading grapes, or figs scattered like a Renaissance painting — always, where possible, with the leaf on. "When I go to my suppliers, I'm trying to find things that look super fresh, organic, and alive. So I always get tomatoes that are still on the vine, carrots that still have the stems on, and radishes that still have their tails."

And it's not just fruit and vegetable elements that get the sculptural treatment. Charlie has a predilection for sculptural displays of fresh bread, mixes of long baguettes and loaves. "I love breadsticks, as well," he says. "I like stacking them into amazing breadstick towers."

5. The Art of the Coupe

I ask Charlie if there are any trends he's really embraced in 2025 for feasting tables. "I really love a silver coupe at the moment," he says, "because you can create little areas where you could stack them, put them in threes, have them individually."

The versatility of these chrome home accessories is their magic: "You could use them for nuts, olives, fresh fruit, or any kind of dessert that you're willing to serve," he suggests.

6. Leave Negative Space

Traditional grazing tables are often filled to brim, but a feasting table feels more luxurious, while also embracing abundance, by not being "afraid to leave some negative space on the table," Charlie says. "You don't have to fill the whole table, and it's nice to have somewhere your eye can see breaks."

Also, he explains, it's so important to leave space for people to put their plates down so they can actually fill it, rather than have them awkwardly juggle serving.

7. Size Matters

And that's where it's important to also consider your plates. You might think more is more with a feasting table, but "you want to have a slightly smaller plate than you would normally," Charlie suggests. "I wouldn't go for a dinner-sized plate, go for a starter plate and starter cutlery." It means guests don't overfill their plates, and what they do add to them fills the space a little better.

I could scroll for hours through Charlie's pictures of the amazing feasting tables, but let's face it, these beautiful designs won't make themselves. You'll need to do a little bit of extra prep ahead, and not leave your buffet table design to the very last minute.

Though if you do, you might just find yourself some Christmas table centerpiece inspiration that won't take hours to create.