Before & After Kitchen refresh: Blue Skies! (note: many pix!)
Greetings! Wanted to post to thank the Houzz community for insights and advice as I’ve been working on refreshing the kitchen. My original post (link below) asked questions around a quartzite countertop , and I got a lot of feedback and food for thought and rethinking.
Cristallo Blue as Countertop - is bleeding inevitable?
It’s been quite the journey, but as of today I’m happy to report that we’ve finished the basic refresh of the space. Have not yet finished the repopulation, but I’m just glad we got through this stage! Sharing some of the story and photos that they may provide thoughts for others with unique design challenges; also submitting as proof that the kitchen was clean at least once 😊 Sorry the post is so long, but didn't want to miss anything; and I find that the completion has brought genuine smiles and a sense of happiness that, for me, has been sorely missing for some time. So, here we go....
Before: standard suburban kitchen, late 90s construction, honey oak abounds. Dinette area attached, with sliding door that opens to the deck, open connection to the family room on the non-kitchen side. Original cabinetry; we added the hardware a couple years in.
Main kitchen area. 30 inch upper cabinets, no backsplash aside from the 4" attached to the countertop. The stove and microwave were about a week old when this picture was taken late last year; you can clearly see the outlines of the amateur paint job where our old stove used to be :)
Pantry area (drywall enclosed, wire shelving inside ) and side drawer below. Opening to the formal dining room is to the right, main hallway is to the left.
Sink area: original dual basin sink, double hung window and flush-mount light.
And now, After:
The Ceiling is the Star, the other elements support it. Hadn't planned to originally go all-white on the cabinetry, but that's where we ended up. Purposefully sought elements with cooler undertones - if I'd put warmer tones on the cabinets, they likely would have read yellow against the clouds and sky.
We cut the soffits back, which allowed us to expand the upper cabinets to 36 inches high (ceilings are standard 8 ft). Really helped to give a sense or space and 'air-y' ness.
Pantry and microwave area below. Reconfigured the space a bit to get rid of the drywall 'wall', and replace it with an actual pantry cabinet. The removal gave us about 4 inches of extra space (you can see vestiges of where it was on the reduced soffit above), and that plus another inch or so gave us a new home for the OTR microwave - it's not yet a year old, has all the features I want on it (finally!), works great, and for holidays, it is my second oven - couldn't part with it. It doesn't know it's not above a range..... but we mounted it similarly. The light now works great to illuminate the 'drop zone' below it.
Pantry interior - Yay, no more wire shelves! This was a custom configuration with the cabinet manufacturer; glad I was workign with a kitchen designer to help convey what I was looking for. I'm not a fan of pull-outs; went older-school instead, strongly inspired by British larder/pantry cabinets. The door shelves help to maximize use of the space, and the cut-back interior shelves keep them from getting too deep. The difference in door cabinet depths is intentional. Will be adding lighting to the interior.
Fridge and stove wall: happy to have a true vent hood that vents outside. Found one that goes farther over the stove than the microwave did, so there's a chance to catch effluent from the front burners. Couldn't see doing open shelves on the upper surfaces; too much dust and grease accumulation. And, finally added actual backsplash; kept in the blue/white color scheme, but had fun adding a feeling of moving water with the textured tile behind the hood.
Trying to reduce clutter on the counters, looking forward to using this pull-out to keep utensils and knives close by, but out of sight. The vertical board storage will (hopefully) help remove a long-standing source of frustration, trying to search in a horizontal stack for the desired one. (and, it will help with decluttering - only so many will fit in there).
Sink wall: new sink, new faucet (the one countertop seam in the kitchen is where the faucet hole is), swapped out the dual-hung window for one that was slightly longer, and casement style. Replaced flush mount light; my one ode to recessed lighting in the whole kitchen is here - flush with the reduced soffit, a flat pancake-like LED assembly thingie. Gives great light for the space configuration; I can work there without casting shadows.
And, I'm a long-time dual-basin sink person; but will have to give props to the Houzz community for convincing me to try a single basin sink . I'm liking it more than I thought I would - so much more space! And I have a smaller bin under the sink if I feel a need to run a smaller basin of washwater for something.
The Island.... The KD was really helpful in giving us ideas to reimagine this a but: coordinating color, going with stained vs. painted for some textural contrast. Trash bin pullouts on the right side. One purposeful addition of a cabinet here, for a couple of appliances that will go on pullouts.
We had an outlet on the previous island (it was on the end, which I didn't like) and needed one here for code regulations. Thankful that the KD had a good suggestion for how to utilize the space underneath it; rather than be filler, it houses a small stepstool - so I have one close by, and I'm able to actually reach the tops of those new higher upper cabinets!
The lighting. This took some thinking: putting in the standard kitchen recessed lighting would have resulted in seriously disrupting the Sky Ceiling, which was a non-starter; and I'm really not a fan of recessed lighting in any event. Instead, we opted to go with a track pendant configuration - utilized the one junction box available, configured track to center over the island, raise it a bit (since it's being used as general lighting here more than task lighting), and add some higher watt-equivalent LEDs to brighten it up. With three of them, it really lights up the space well - a lot of light reflects off of the ceiling and cabinets; and combined with the under cabinet lighting added in, the layers fill in any spots that would have been dark/shady. The shade glass gives a greenish tint when they're off, but it still blends pretty well with the other colors.
And last, the dinette area. The current table and chairs will be replaced. Overhead lighting keeps in sync with the motion/round theme. Had a major case of decision fatigue by the time it came to select a window treatment for the sliding door - needed something that would be easy to open, give a bit of light filtering during the day, but some privacy at night as our neighbors aren't far away. Sheer shades seemed to fit the bill for that; they were on sale; and they came in white - decision made :)
Didn't think we'd be done before Thanksgiving, but here we are! Will gather a resource list and post.
Comments (35)
Leslie P
5 months agoLeslie P
5 months agoLeslie P
5 months agolast modified: 5 months ago
Paul F.
5 months agoSince you are an out of the box thinker, I suggest you install an LED channel along the ceiling to do some thin upward lighting to really highlight the sky during the day. You can use smart LED strips to adjust the color temperature to change throughout the day to match the light outside. I use this technique in my cove ceiling and a couple unseen lights in my bathrooms. It might look something like this. Kudos to the creativity!
Leslie P thanked Paul F.Leslie P
5 months agoLeslie P
5 months agoSharing a Pantry update; and looking for input!
We finished putting up the pantry lights last night - don’t know if ’fridgeatize’ is a word, but i really like that we no longer have, literally, a black hole into which foodstuffs go, never to be seen again :)
The light sensor (upper right in the detail photo) is door-activated, versus motion-activated; that would’ve driven me nuts!
All components obtained on Amazon, save some spray paint for the light channels.
Looking for advice on whether it’s worth trying to source a piece of marble for the lower shelf. I’m not looking to use any appliances within the pantry, it’s purely for visual effect; but want to save myself from one of those ’just one more cute thing’ decisions that ends up being one thing too much.
Thoughts please! Marble shelf or no?Leslie P
5 months agoLeslie P
5 months agoLeslie P
4 months agoLeslie P
4 months agoLeslie P
4 months agoLeslie P
4 months agoLeslie P
4 months agoLeslie P
last monthGreetings all - back to finally add a photo of the new kitchen table and chairs. We chose a wood and color that can serve as a transition to the family room. The style isn't particularly unusual, but we ended up with a wood type that I wouldn't have thought to look for: Elm.
Sharing photos of the tabletop here, in case it sparks ideas for others - wouldn't go in every decor, but if you're interested in such things, this natural grain is wild and amazing!
When DH and I shop for furniture, we tend to gravitate towards different styles, and come to compromise at the end. This one made us both stop: "Ooh - what is that?" We figured we were on to something...
rebunky