Outdoor Entertaining
Is a Serious Business

Cynthia and Randy Buness have been entertaining guests in the backyard of their Paradise Valley, Ariz., five-bedroom house for years. But summer evenings this year are more elaborate affairs. As part of a continuing $225,000 backyard renovation, they now can have a cocktail with guests at their six-foot-diameter fire pit and children can play under the shade of a $1,200 canopy umbrella. Mrs. Buness, a 47-year-old lawyer, is currently figuring out which set of unbreakable tableware she should buy. "People keep knocking over and breaking their wine glasses," she says.

Fun in the sun is becoming serious business. Backyard patios have become more popular: 45% of new single-family homes have them, up from 37% in 1992, the Census Bureau says. "All of the higher-end houses I've seen lately have a major outdoor living area," says Steve Martino, a landscape architect in Phoenix. In concert with that, sales of outdoor furniture also have risen. In 2003, consumers bought $2.3 billion of outdoor tables, seating and umbrellas, up 129% from $1 billion in 1994, according to the American Home Furnishings Alliance.

Since retailers, like nature, abhor a vacuum, many vendors of home accessories and furnishings have ramped up their outdoor collections this year. Retailers West Elm and Hold Everything released their first outdoor-living collections this year, while Restoration Hardware devoted 52 pages to outdoor entertaining in its summer catalog, up from 25 pages last year.

This summer, consumers can buy unbreakable martini glasses in a variety of bright hues and patterns, weatherproof outdoor bars and even a backyard version of the media room. "Outdoor entertaining has become more of a grown-up activity," says Michael Aram, a tableware designer whose collections are featured at Barneys and Bloomingdale's stores. "It's not just paper plates anymore." Below, a look at some of the latest products for home entertaining that are taking things outside.

Unbreakable Tableware

Faux-glass, unbreakable dishes and glasses have been around for some time, but there were significant trade-offs. Products often were dull and colorless, and the "glass" would get scuffed or fogged up after regular use. Thanks to advances in plastics technology, however, unbreakable products can have a clarity that approaches that of glass, and can be made in vivid, solid colors and patterns that weren't available before.

"The material takes color very well, and colors like acid green come through even more brilliantly in the plastic than they do in china," says New York architect and interior designer Evan Galen. Sur La Table is offering a pitcher with four mugs made of polycarbonate -- a virtually unbreakable plastic that bounces when dropped -- for $64.95 and a similar set of six wine glasses for $58.50. Lands' End has a set of four polycarbonate martini glasses and a set of 12 iced tea, wine and other glasses, for $15 and $37, respectively. And, for the first time, Pottery Barn is offering a multicolored polycarbonate pitcher and a set of four glasses priced from $9.99 to $12.99.

Outdoor Bars

To keep those glasses full, retailers are pushing outdoor carts and bars, as well as standing beverage tubs as an alternative to the plastic-foam cooler. Brookstone is selling a 6-foot-long backyard "Swing Top Bar" for $500. Home-furnishings retailer Gately's sells a 4½-foot-long bar made from weather-resistant pine that comes in six colors for around $1,000. Sears has a $4,999 outdoor cedar bar with built-in lighting, a small refrigerator, a ceramic-tiled countertop, hanging wine-glass holder, dual mounted outdoor speakers. Among Restoration Hardware's new items are the 4½-foot long Montauk Bar, for $1,149, and a drink stand that comes with a copper ice bucket, for $100.

Canopies and TVs

Lest Mother Nature get too assertive, retailers also are offering expensive canopies to protect outdoor gatherings from the elements. For example, Smith & Hawken's 10-foot-long "papillon canopy," priced at $3,499, recently sold out. Frontgate sells a $4,995 "Atlantis pavilion," a 100-square-foot cream-colored weatherproof canopy with fabric curtains. For those who take the term "outdoor living room" literally, Frontgate also has a $10,000 inflatable SuperScreen outdoor movie-theater system with a 16-foot-wide screen, stand-alone speakers on stands, projector and DVD player.

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