This project was by far the largest project we’ve ever taken on.
We packed a lot of smaller projects into this renovation, and learned a bunch of new skills along the way. The entire project was intimidating to take on, but it was an exciting challenge to bring our vision to life.
The main objective in this entire kitchen renovation was to utilize the dead space on the left side of the kitchen. In our <1200 square foot house, every inch of space should be used to its full potential and we saw a huge opportunity for that in this kitchen design.
The first project we took on in this space was adding beams. We wanted to highlight the architectural features of our home by drawing attention to the pitched ceilings. We used red oak wood to complement our red oak flooring.
The apron sink of our dreams was made possible with a simple Ikea hack. The Port Haven bridge faucet from Pfister brings in warmth and a nod to traditional design.
We ended up having a bigger gap than we had planned for on between the sink and the cabinet, so we added a drip rail made from red oak. It ended up being a very happy accident!
The backsplash is honed marble tile vertically stacked without spacers.
I had initially wanted a marble slab, but really didn’t want to pay to get that look. This was a much more budget-friendly option, and if you squint it alllllmost looks like a slab.
We poured our own concrete countertops with the help of the Z Counterform line of products, which made the process surprisingly easy. We are really happy with the result!
We removed our upper cabinets in favor of more lower cabinets and drawers. We took advantage of the blank space to create a feature of our range hood. We used Koni Materials Brick in Blanc for a worn-in but light and bright look. The texture is so lovely and gives our home a little bit of that old construction vibe that we love.
We couldn’t get the exact spacing we needed between the stove and the dishwasher with the dimensions of Ikea cabinets, so we opted to build a skinny cabinet out of red oak for cutting boards and cook books.
We repeated the brick element on the back wall in the kitchen to complement the range hood.
We have the same brick on our fireplace, so overall it helped add continuity throughout our entire home.
We swapped our open shelving (which I actually loved) for a more practical full height pantry. We now have more storage than I know what do with, which is not a bad problem to have!
The biggest project in this entire renovation was changing the window. We had a low window that was too low to add cabinets below, so we switched it out with shorter and winder windows. We had originally tried to hire this out, but the contractor ghosted us and I’m glad he did because we were able to learn so much with this project. It’s not something I would necessarily want to do again, but overall it was a good experience.
Our house is very much open concept, so it was important that the kitchen flowed well into the front room, but still felt like a defined space.
This entire renovation took us 11 weeks from the initial demo to the finishing touches. We worked on it in almost every free moment we had (which was every single weekend and many week nights). It was a ton of work, and it feels so good to have done it all by ourselves. We set a $15k budget for everything and came in under that at a grand total of $14,375. Look out for a budget breakdown post coming soon!
Sources
Cabinets: Ikea bases, Semihandmade Quarterline fronts in White, The Cabinet Face fronts in Natural Red Oak Slab
Appliances: Fridge, Range, Sink, Dishwasher, Wine Fridge, Range Hood
Hardware: Knobs, Pulls, Faucet
Everything else: Countertops, Backsplash, Marble Switch Plates, Brass Switch Plates, Brick, Window
