The dinner party has terrible public relations. It sounds formal: linen napkins, complicated menus, someone panicking about whether eight people can fit around a table built for six.
But the useful part of a dinner party was never the centerpiece. It was the duration.
Most social plans now have a strong activity at the center: see the film, attend the concert, go to the class, meet for one drink. Dinner is different because the activity and the conversation happen at the same time.
There are natural phases. Arrival. Food. The point where everyone has stopped being polite. The second conversation after someone clears the plates. The strange tangent at the end that becomes the part everyone remembers.
Perhaps the dinner party declined because we raised the production value. A successful dinner does not require matching plates. It needs enough food, enough chairs, and a reason for people not to leave immediately.
The point of a table is not to impress the people around it. It is to keep them there a little longer.