Happy Happy Friday, all!
So, as I mentioned yesterday, my parents are undergoing a complete kitchen remodel, and they enlisted my help during the design process. Today I'm sharing the design scheme & progress photos, and WARNING, it's a long one!
To give a bit of background, I worked in the home remodeling design industry a couple of years ago, so luckily I know what all is involved in a kitchen remodel (the good, the bad, and the ugly!), and even better, kitchens were always my favorite spaces to work on.
For my parent's kitchen, my Mom's main request was a light, airy space that would hold up to LOTS of cooking and overall use. Fortunately, her taste and aesthetics are very in-line with mine, so I was excited to work with them on this!
Before I got started, here were a few inspiration spaces that we zeroed in on:
We loved the white wall cabinets with the gray island - it's neutral but not boring... Interesting, but still pretty classic and timeless.
We loved this roman shade with the contrast trim, and of course the Hicks pendants are gorgeous (though, a little too pricy!)
We were initially thinking white subway tiles with gray grout for the backsplash, but ended up loving the contrast of these gray tiles next to the white cabinets. We're still deciding between a light gray or darker gray tile.
And here is the scheme I came up with:
The cabinetry is shaker style, with the exterior wall cabinet color a true, warm white, and the island color a light, warm gray.
Initially, we wanted to go with honed Carrara marble countertops because, dang, they are beautiful! But, realistically, marble counters aren't super practical for high-use kitchens... it tends to stain easily (so, red wine and tomato sauce would be a constant worry), and the surface etches from acid (so you have to be careful with things like lemon juice or vinegar)... not exactly stuff my parents wanted to worry about.
So, once marble was off the table, we considered going with a solid quartz surface that mimics the coloring of marble (Cambria "Torquay" was the front runner - it's very pretty), but eventually decided to go with a light-colored granite for its durability and no-fuss maintenance.
We chose "River White", and it's beautiful!! Similar in coloring to marble, but without the upkeep:
Anyway, I'll talk a bit more about some of the selections throughout the process, but feel free to leave a comment if you have a question on anything.
Now, as far as progress photos, here's what the kitchen looked like "before":
As you can see, they had a peninsula with overhead cabinets, which closed off the kitchen a bit from the family room. The new layout will be much more open without those overhead cabinets, and with a big island instead of the peninsula. It will be great for entertaining and cooking.
All of the new appliances will be stainless steel as opposed to white - And, fun fact, the appliances were the reason they decided to remodel in the first place - the built-in fridge, dishwashers, microwaves, and stove were all 25 years old, and were needing to be replaced. And, as often happens with remodeling, it turned into a domino effect - soon, new custom cabinetry, countertops, and lighting were on the agenda :)
Anyway, I digress. This is what the kitchen looks like right now:
YIKES!! Hopefully it will be a very different view in 5 weeks time (or, you know, in 1-2 weeks time!) ;)
So there you have it!
Pretty excited to see this thing come together! :)
Wishing you an amazing weekend!
