Let There Be Light

Jumping ahead here, as I’m in need of making some decisions in regards to lighting. Since I’ve already shared my inspiration photo with you all, I figure why not skip ahead for a day. I’ve realized that I’ve never updated any of the lights in our home because, well, I like lighting too much to make a decision. Theres so many pretty fixtures out there – how can I possibly choose? So I’m trying to stick with my inspiration photo to base my decisions off of…

I’ve shared the above photo with you before, but what you don’t see is the lights above the window. I’m currently trying to figure out what to put above mine. My dilemmas? Well we have 2 windows vs the 3 in the photo (and two sconces would just look like antenna to me) and our sink won’t exactly be centered anymore.

So I’m thinking of just doing one fixture above our windows to avoid the antenna look. Can you see it? Or am I just crazy?

Anyway, so now to picking a fixture. I totally love the old bronze finish with the brick wall so that I’m set on. Especially cause I’m currently loving this guy (courtesy of Colleen) for my dining room. Eldridge Rectangular Chandelier:

So here’s my likes so far:

1. Hudson Valley 122 Edison 38 Inch Island Light   – Love that this splits into two fixtures, so even if I keep it centered over the window I’ll still have light spread over the sink.

2. Hudson Valley 771 Monroe 6 Inch Wall Swing Lamp –  The side arm swing of this is perfect, allowing me to place the light where it looks the most balanced. The shade is much more rounded than the inspiration.

3. Hudson Valley 8322 Garden City 8 Inch Wall Sconce  – I’d get this in the old bronze finish as opposed to what it’s shown in, but this may be the closest option to the inspiration.

4. Hudson Valley 3416 Petersburg 16 Inch Mini Pendant  – School house pendant – I can’t help it, they’re so cute. Too much? Does it go? Too much white with white cabinets?

 

As you can see I’m a bit torn.  I still need to weigh in on Ryan’s opinion (as an electrician, the lights in the house is maybe the only thing he has an opinion on).
But what do you think? Are you liking the rustic/vintage light fixtures or are you thinking I should go in a totally different direction? Which fixture is your favorite? Wall Sconce or Mini Pendant? Opinions please!

She Found A Brick……House! (and a final design)

Hammer and chisel in hand, I took on the plaster that covered up the brick wall in the kitchen. This wall is the separating wall between us and our neighbors, allowing us to keep it exposed without having to build a wall and insulate it properly (which we would have to do it if  was an exterior wall).

It was a slow process, I’ll be the first to admit it, luckily it was only one wall.

 

Unfortunately I didn’t take process photos, but hammer, chisel – I think you get the point. We’re cleaning it up as much as possible and sealing the brick to make it nice and pretty. In the corner, like I mentioned before I found the plumbing:

 

Not that this photo shows anything, but behind the hole is the plumbing and some awesomely rad wallpaper. That’s right. Rad.

 

Anyway, after I took down the plaster and the wall was all brick and in pretty good shape I was able to make some design adjustments.

Design 4:

In Design 4 I tried to keep the glass cabinets. I switched around the configuration a bit from Design 3 swapping the range and the fridge back to their original locations. As much as I love love love the glass cabinets, something about it didn’t seem practical. Though we’re able to use the “mudroom” as a pantry, the thought of going down a step every time I wanted something from the pantry irritated me. Heck, I hated having to do the same when the fridge was down there. So in my final adjustments of the design:

• I nixed the glass cabinets and put a full pantry next to the fridge.
• I had to box in the plumbing in the corner – if you see in the renderings above, I still hadn’t solved that issue
• I went crazy and decided to close off the basement door – allowing us more space to put an additional 36″ cabinet (explained in a bit)
• I fell in love with open shelving on brick….

I found this image on Pinterest and just about died. There it was: My Dream Kitchen. White cabinets, brick wall, grey countertop – basically what I had been envisioning the whole time. See that in the corner? Open shelving. I was a little back and forth on the idea, seeing as our water is really hard and it’s insanely hard to keep dishes sparkling. But then I thought if we nixed the upper cabinets and put shelves instead we could use that extra money into installing a water softener (which we desperately need). Brilliant. The open shelves just show off the brick so much more and really let it become a focal wall of the kitchen.

Now for the changing of the basement stairs. I know I just threw that wrench out of nowhere up there. But hold tight, it makes sense. So one day I was sitting at my dining table staring at the wall that holds a closet and a hidden staircase (yes we have a servants staircase in the back of our house that’s been closed off and unused). I then realized that looking at the elevation that we could flip (like completely mirror) the basement stairs and enter the basement through the dining room closet instead of through the kitchen. This is where I show you my Revit floor plans as I simultaneously did plans in the Ikea Home Planner and Revit, just cause I like giving myself extra work.

Existing Plan:

 

New Kitchen Plan / The Final Design: 

 

I hope the floor plans help explain the stair swap, but again I’ll be taking photos along the way so it may make more sense later.  I also decided to get rid of the breakfast bar. The more I looked at the plan the more forced it felt. I mean the dining table is right there. We have a buffet (granted it needs to be refinished) for serving. And frankly,  I liked the idea of making the kitchen feel as open to the rest of the house as possible. You’ll notice I also boxed in the plumbing, I realized that if we put a sink corner base cabinet (but not use it for the sink – I hate corner sinks, such wasted space) the back of the cabinet is angled so it can fit around the boxed out section. The shelves will just but up to the boxed out area, and the countertops will be templated around it. Easy peasy.

Here’s some elevations and perspectives as well to help get the idea:

There you have it! Our final design! I know it’s not all rendered and pretty like the other Ikea ones, but that’s what will make the final reveal that much better 🙂     And yes, you’re looking at the elevations and floor plans we submitted for our permits (minus the red markups) drawn by yours truly.

Framing is beginning today and I couldn’t be happier to see some progress. Demo posts to come soon!

 

For those of you who think I’m crazy for getting rid of a closet (especially in an older home with basically no closet space) you’re right. I am crazy. But the idea was to give that space to the kitchen allowing us to have more storage in there. We mostly stored our coats in that closet, which will now move to the mudroom. Our basement is also quite large, but not a lot of headroom for finishing and using as living space, so we intend on using the basement as storage space as well (you know once we get it organized and shelved).

Raise Your Hand If You Like Drop Ceilings

Drop ceilings. The bane of my first homes existence. We had it in our bathroom and also in our kitchen. Well, after cooking under fluorescent lights for too many nights I finally decided to rip it down. I just couldn’t take it. This actually dates back to last fall (2011 as well, but before I can show you all what’s been happening as of late, I need to catch you up on the project – my bad for not blogging as I went)

 

Haha, don’t judge the hanging light fixture. It was secure   …enough.

 

 

So I ripped down the drop ceiling and found the lovely mustard yellow plaster. Nothing a little ceiling paint couldn’t fix for a temporary solution. We ended up purchasing a track light from Ikea – the Barometer for $50. It was at that point when I realized how much I hate fluorescent lights. The new light made a world of a difference. Not that you’ll ever be able to tell in photos, but it just felt better to be in there.

 

From that point, I lived with the kitchen for a while. Though it didn’t last long. A few months later, I ripped out the upper cabinets. (Ryan, if you’ve learned anything from these posts –  you should hide the hammers). But I couldn’t be more happy that I did!

We picked up this shelving unit from Target with gift card we had been holding on to (for whatever reason, I collect them. It’s an issue. And it drives my friend Colleen nuts. Haha)

I decided that since we had such nice new dishes from our wedding (from Crate and Barrel) that I’d much rather show them on a shelf in the dining room than keep them in our dingy upper cabinets.

 

And thus, the removal process began. I don’t think I ever really got a good shot of that corner cabinet…but it was shallow and awkward and weird. The whole fact that we didn’t have proper corner cabinets (not that anything in our kitchen was proper or standard to begin with) made me a little worried that there was a reason why. But first, hammer and cabinet removal..

BOOM!!!! THERE IT IS! DO YOU SEE THAT!?!?!?!

Once I ripped down the exhaust hood the wiring that was plastered into the wall peeled back and revealed something I could only wish dream for. Do you see that slice of red? The slice of goodness that could only mean one thing: brick.

 

 

A closer look at my new discovery. Who woulda guessed that somewhere along the line there would be faux brick – on top of plaster – on top of real brick. Blows my mind. It’s sad to say but the cabinets came down insanely easy. Too easy. Made me feel much better about taking my new dishes out of them, I mean who knows how long they would have stayed up. Shoddily made, shoddily installed. I guess they go hand in hand.

 

 

Ah so much better! I didn’t end up removing the soffit above the sink for a while because there was a light installed (via random ceiling outlet if you can believe it) and all the wiring was knob and tube > wasn’t ready to mess with that just yet. So when I started this mini project I had every intention of removing the cabinets and painting the wall behind them to make it temporarily pretty. But now that I found the brick that just meant I had to take down the rest of the plaster to reveal all the pretty. Not to mention at the time I was planning a surprise 50th for my parents that we were hosting at our home in just a week. So that plaster wall came down fast. But that’s for my next post.

To wrap up, let’s break down what this mini demo project revealed:

1. there was no purpose for the drop ceiling. the lowering of the ceiling made me think there was maybe some kind of new piping or electrical that was running through the ceiling – but this was not the case – aka – we get to keep it nice and high for our remodel.

2. BRICK WALL! this requires some design adjusting – if you notice our Design 3 we had lots of cabinets and a tall fridge on this wall, which if we kept the design the way it was, most of the brick would be covered. Back to the drawing board.

3. Ok, I didn’t get pictures of it, but in the corner is actually piping. Great. No corner cabinet and a roadblock in the corner L shaped kitchen. Like our kitchen doesn’t have enough traffic patterns – now I have to design around pipes. Designers challenge. I accept.

 

Soon to come on the blog – removing plaster from brick & our final kitchen design! Then I can finally get you all caught up on what’s been happening these past few weeks!