Changes in the Kitchen

We have lived in our townhouse for four years now.  You might remember that before we moved in, we completely gutted it and made it our own.   Even though it was about 20 years old, we replaced the electricity, plumbing, windows, interior and exterior doors, remodeled bathrooms, finished the basement and added a bathroom there, created a designer garage, redid the kitchen, added hardwood floors and refinished the ones that were already here, knocked out walls, and redid the kitchen.  Whew!!!  It took  about four months and thankfully, we lived in a rental during that time.

 

Although I have always loved our kitchen, I also thought it felt flat.  That’s the only word I could come up with.  Flat.  I was itching to make some tweaks to make it more interesting but just didn’t quite know how to go about it without being frivolous.  After all, there are people who would love to have our kitchen, and I get that.  Over the past year I have become friends with Debra Hupman who also happens to be the top kitchen designer in Lexington.  I told her my feelings, and she said she could help me out.

 

Debra came over this week with her notebook, and measuring tape, and we had a kitchen consultation.  It was so freeing.  She came up with some great ideas that aren’t invasive and will make a nice impact on the room.

 

 

 

We decided that there isn’t a lot of texture in the room, and that is something that will be easy to add.  All of the counter tops are Carrera marble, the cabinets are white except for the peninsula which is  a wonderful gray, and the appliances are stainless.  It looks like many of the kitchens we see on blogs, online, and in magazines, and I want it to have a punch of something.

 

 The recently painted red pantry door will stay.

 

 

Lulubelle will stay, but she is going back to her original wall overlooking the table.  We are going to put shelves made out of reclaimed wood in this space.  Debra said the room needs texture, and reclaimed wood will help with that.

 

Call me crazy, but I have never been a fan of this hutch cabinet.  In fact, I wanted to live with a bare wall after we moved in.  I thought maybe a big French or English armoire or wardrobe would be nice in that spot, but our builder said it would be cheaper and easier to install the hutch when we were doing everything else four years ago.  So, that’s what we did.  The top of the hutch is coming down, and we will turn the bottom cabinets into a buffet.  Debra suggested adding big rustic lamps, so I will be bringing in the pair from our dining area.   I made them a few years ago out of demi-johns that are in  wooden crates.  She said their texture will play well with the wooden shelves.  We will add a big mirror to the wall so it will reflect light from our courtyard.  We might replace the marble on the buffet with reclaimed wood, but first we want to see it with the lamps.  That might be all texture the buffet needs.  (We could use the marble in our laundry room.)

 

 

The middle set of glass doors from the hutch will go in the middle cabinets here.  I will paint the interior to match the peninsula, we will add glass shelves and lighting in the cabinet.  It will continue to hold our everyday dishes.  The other hutch cabinets will replace cabinets in our pantry (I think.)  We will also add under-cabinet lighting throughout.

 

 

 We will also upgrade the disappointing cabinet hardware – possibly with an aged brass.  I have to think about that one, though.  I left a lot of brass in our last house and even though it is trendy right now, I might not want to go back there.  I have to chuckle because when we built our first two houses and remodeled the last one, brass was king.  We had it everywhere, but it was the shiny Baldwin brass.  Now the aged look is in, and I’m just not sure how I feel about it.  Time will tell.

 

 

So, that is pretty much it.  As you can see, it’s nothing major, but suggestions from a professional who can look at a room objectively are always helpful.  I gave myself a budget to work with, and these improvements will barely make a dent in it.  The biggest expense will probably be the electrical work.  That’s great news.  The plan is to get the work done in August.  Stay tuned.

Thanks for stopping in.

Take care.