Many of you dream of taking a sledgehammer to one of your kitchen walls, opening the room up to the living or dining area. More light! Interaction with your family and dinner guests! (Personally, I'm the opposite; I actually built a wall to close off my kitchen.) But this kitchen definitely benefitted from the former frame of mind. The result?
Definitely a light-filled, interact-your-heart-out kind of space.
The owners replaced the right wall with a substantial island that separates the kitchen from the living area, and they also tore out the old cabinets, using open shelving instead.
I love the tiling on the left wall, which defines that half as decidedly "kitchen" and looks so clean and bright. And it looks like the island extends even farther than the original wall, making the room feel bigger.
• Read more in this slideshow at Canadian House & Home.
(p.s. The rugs are great, too. I think I've seen them at IKEA but can't find them on the website. Anyone know?)
Related: Screening Off and Open Kitchen
(Images: Donna Griffith/House & Home)
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The kitchen looks great. But where the hell did the stairs go? That one thing turns this project from a kitchen makeover to an architectural feat of will. Given the price and the amount of sheer upheaval this would cause to daily life, I'd be happy with just new cabinets and countertops.
Some of those transformations are amazing... I just wish the photos were taken from the same angle each time to get the full effect of the changes.
Oh, I think the kitchen is photographed from the opposite angle in the second picture; it confused me too for a minute.
And yeah, I have one of those rugs from IKEA. Cute for two days, then turned into a pill-ball. Impossible to clean. Nice in theory but I would NEVER put one in the kitchen.
Given that the front doors are also gone, I can only assume this picture was taken looking toward the opposite end of the kitchen from the black and white picture.
Did they redo the ceiling as well? And they clearly got new appliances, but where's the refrigerator?
The new space looks fantastic, but it would have been nice to have the before and after pictures be taken from the same perspective.
I agree with Dave. Where DID the stairs go? And what about the outside wall moving? I don't think this is a real "before and after" picture. It's more like an inspiration photo. (I checked the photo gallery, too.) I do like the black and white kitchen though!
I, too, love the look of the new kitchen. But I, too, also wish the photos were taken from the same side of the kitchen. It makes me wonder what went wrong that they didn't want to show us . . .
Or you could just take the picture of the kitchen from a different angle, on a sunny day, with a color camera, and after removing some of the junk from the counter...
@txdave... I was laughing even before I read your comment when I said, "where the hell did the stairs go?!?". Yep - probably behind the camera. Still... looks nice.
What a beautiful result! I also opened up my galley kitchen and could not be happier with the outcome. You can see before and after photos here:
http://www.thekitchn.com/thekitchn/small-cool-kitchens-2010/cheryls-customized-chicago-kitchen-small-cool-kitchens-2010-own-division-115866
Okay, where did you get the framed enlargement of the Penguin book cover that's hanging on the wall?
The artist is Alanna Cavanagh:
http://alannacavanagh.blogspot.com/2010/06/reading-for-profit-prints-now-available.html
Love it. I just forwarded the picture to my designer so that she can do something inspired by this for my little basement kitchen. It's exactly what I told her I wanted but couldn't articulate (stainless steel, white cabinets, open up top "industrial" shelving, white subway tile, etc.).
Great job!