Doug’s kitchen

Hey it’s Doug…my new house is so small I have to drag these posts out or else you’d see the whole thing at once!  Today I wanted to share a few photos of my kitchen with you and to talk about its design a little bit.

The floor plan of my 1942 attached bungalow is funny, it’s sort of an L shape wrapping around the neighboring unit, which places the kitchen in the far back corner of the house.  Down a short and angling  hallway from the main living room, the kitchen is kind of an unexpected surprise you don’t discover until you’ve seen the rest of the house.  The overall footprint is only 8 feet by 10 feet so as with the rest of the house, space (or the lack thereof) was the driving factor in much of the room’s design.

When this building was renovated and turned into condominiums in the late 1980’s a less than spectacular white melamine kitchen was installed which featured among other things a combination sink/dishwasher.  It was definitely time for a new kitchen so Glenn Sharp, the contractor for the renovation, and his team gutting the space down to the studs and started over.  In a house this small it was important to have as many continuous elements as possible so new flooring was installed to match that elsewhere in the house.  I debated painting some or all of the cabinets grey, but in the end decided to keep everything the same color as the rest of  the rest of the house — Benjamin Moore ‘China White’

 

The two walls with cabinets are tiled from the counter tops to ceiling with tiny ‘Cararra Blanca’ mini bricks from Akdo.  The counter tops are also Cararra which I love in combination with all the stainless steel appliances.  The cabinet design is very simple Shaker-style.  I tend to eschew upper cabinets when I’m designing  a kitchen but here it was a necessity to have some if there was going to be any storage in the room.  Ribbed glass inserts keep the uppers from feeling too ‘in your face’ but also hide enough of what’s inside to allow for the storage of not so pretty things close to the range.   I like the silhouette of objects that’s created with the glass.  You can still see through enough that I keep pasta, cereal and anything else I can transfer out of a box in glass jars instead. 

Because there’s no real dining room in my house I wanted to create an eating area in the open corner of the room.  I ordered a stainless steel restaurant work table online to give more prep space in the room and also to make a spot to eat.  I actually find that I end up sitting here a lot when I’m working from home (like right now for instance!)…it’s a great place to perch with my laptop and the back door open on a nice day.  I looked for a long time to find stools that were right for the room–I am so indecisive about my own home sometimes!  I knew I wanted something vintage or industrial looking but couldn’t locate just the right thing.  I was emailing back and forth with Erika about it one day and she sent me a link to a site with lots of cool options, where I finally found this pair.  I love that they are adjustable because the work table isn’t quite normal counter height, and I’m tall, so being able to set the height wherever feels right is helpful. 

Did you catch the skinny little spice shelves beside the range?  Rather than have the side of the range just hanging out Glenn built this little cabinet where I have spices and wine glasses stored…we talked about making the space a cabinet that opened from the front for cookie sheets and trays but I liked the open solution better.

On the shelf beneath the table a big wooden crate from an Argentinian winery serves as my “pantry”…I have a slight addiction to Wheat Thins and these little bags of chocolate chip muffins one of our clients got me hooked on (actually their kids got me hooked on them!) so I throw things like that  down in the crate to keep the cabinets free for more important things.  Inspired by my friends Andrew and Laura’s giant bowl of wine bottle corks, I ordered the vintage locker basket off of Etsy to start my own collection.  I won’t say how fast it’s filling up 🙂

There’s not much else to say, but I’ll be glad to answer as many questions as I can in the comments if you have them.  I almost didn’t post the room yet because there’s about to be some more construction taking place.  The back door is literally the only thing left from the original condo (besides the windows); Glenn and his team spent a lot of time stripping and rebuilding it.  Sadly though it’s developed a big crack right in the middle this winter so we’re retiring it in favor of a new, full glass divided-lite french door.  I think the extra light will be nice in here this summer.