If the dining room is not symmetrical (Is it open to another room?), then I would not consider it formal, and there would be no need for the canopy to be in the center of the ceiling, meaning that you can relocate the J box. If the room is symmetrical, then you would want to keep the J box where it is and use a swag IMO.

If you can sketch a plan of the dining room with dimensions, it would help. I think that that particular chandelier would look fine with a swag in either case.

Thank you. I've attached a rudimentary sketch. The room is 13 x 13. The star represents the chandelier. It's exactly centered in the room, even though it may not be in my sketch. The table (not actual dimensions) is slightly to the left. The passthrough on the top is to the kitchen, and on the bottom to the living room. The dining room walls end at symmetrical points - the passthroughs are the same width.

The original homeowners did actually have the table centered under the chandelier so it's not outside the realm of possibility, but their table was extremely narrow (much more so than ours) and the passthrough felt uncomfortably tight to us.

Despite the large openings on either side that make it quite visible from the living room and kitchen, it is its own separate room and is considered a formal dining room.

This post was edited by MJ2012 on Mon, Nov 17, 14 at 21:43

To me, it looks like you have room to center the table, and when you get a hutch, it will go against the wall that is not part of the pass-through. In your sketch, the dining table appears to be no wider than 42". When you replace the dining table, you can consider getting one that is a racetrack oval.

I would not move the J box in this dining room.

The table is 35" wide (I didn't quite draw it to spec). We won't be moving the box or swagging it for now - just keep everything in place and re-think the table strategy when we purchase one.