Freya Morris
It’s always an exciting day when you can write a blog post with the word “reveal” in it! I can’t exactly say we purchased the home for the kitchen, haha, but I knew that we’d be able to spruce it up because we’ve done it before. This isn’t an HGTV type of reveal where we tear down walls, get chef-grade appliances, custom cabinetry, and completely transform a kitchen. We kept the layout the same (which can be the most expensive thing to change) and instead of replacing cabinets, we painted.
By keeping those two things the same, we had to work with what we had, but it did save tens of thousands of dollars. This is a home that we enjoy, but don’t plan to be in super long term, so our goal was finding the balance of improving the space and personalizing it, all without investing too much.
And yes, I know my style is not “typical” and it may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but hey, I still have to live here too. Real quick, I don’t want to repeat myself, so make sure you check out this post first. It’s the kitchen progress update and I give all the nitty-gritty and details about the actual work, such as removing the bulkheads, painting, doing the backsplash, etc. If you look closely at the photo above, you’ll see that the trim above the window is too short and cut wrong (not by us). We actually *just* put in a custom bamboo shade to cover it up and provide privacy to the street-facing window. And now the chandelier doesn’t fit properly with the new shade so we’ll have to switch that out too.
First, I ended up painting the open shelving white instead of keeping the rustic lime-washed look. The photos don’t portray it super well, but the kitchen is actually pretty dark and since we weren’t going to add or enlarge a window, little things like paint were the way to go! We were going to enclose the fridge with a custom surround but didn’t get to it in time before we had the countertops measured. I’m sure it would have looked more custom, but we weren’t up to the build and it wasn’t worth it enough for us to hire out. Floors- Burlap Birch Engineered Hardwood, Lowes Not because the house is “done”(if that can ever actually happen), but we are just focusing our energy on key rooms and projects instead of trying to do it all.
