I Had A Good Thought For My Kitchen

A few weeks in the past, I shared what I’d do with the breakfast room (after we construct our addition) if I may do no matter I wished with no constraints. You possibly can examine that right here, however the very quick model is that I’d double the scale of my kitchen, increasing it into the breakfast room and shifting the sink in entrance of the home windows within the breakfast room.

There’s in all probability no approach that may ever occur, however as I’ve been serious about how I wish to use this house as soon as we have now our addition completed, I feel I’ll have give you a strategy to maximize this house with out doing a significant flooring plan shift.

Let me again up and clarify just a few issues.

First, the entire concept of fixing something in my kitchen took place some time again as a result of I desperately wish to do away with my concrete counter tops. They’ve lengthy outlived their welcome (I’m so uninterested in combating stains), and I need quartz counter tops a lot that I dream about them.

However I’ll be actually trustworthy with you right here. I don’t see any approach that these concrete counter tops will be eliminated with out destroying the cupboards. It’s not like they had been poured elsewhere, after which moved into place like some other stable floor and easily glued right down to the cupboards.

So it’s not like I can simply unscrew one thing and transfer the counter tops out. No, these screws are buried beneath concrete. I can’t even think about that they are often eliminated with out destroying the cupboards.

With that realization, I’ve resolved myself to the truth that if I ever wish to get new counter tops, it would in all probability contain getting new cupboards as effectively. Whereas it’s a bummer, I’m not too unhappy about that, both. The cupboards I’ve are low cost (it was all we may afford a decade in the past), and a few of them are so slender that they gained’t even maintain a dinner plate. I’ve made essentially the most of them, and I’ve had enjoyable including my very own group to those plain inventory cupboards, however I gained’t cry about eliminating them.

So the entire concept of redoing the kitchen is one thing I resolved myself to a very long time in the past. That’s why I’ve felt the liberty to mess around with concepts like including a passthrough from the kitchen to the brand new household room, which might require all new cupboards, new counter tops, and so forth. Since this stuff appear inevitable, I’ll as effectively dream about precisely how I need it to look and performance.

So I began off with the thought of a full opening between the 2 rooms…

After which that advanced into this concept with a passthrough between the 2 rooms with “pocket home windows” in order that the rooms will be closed to one another when the passthrough isn’t wanted. A reader did this wonderful mockup for me.

Anyway, our kitchen may be very small. It appears to be like and feels open because of the cased openings I added to the kitchen, however the precise room is one thing like 9.5′ x 14′. The cupboards and drawers which can be truly within the kitchen maintain issues like pots and pans, skillets, spices, cooking utensils, cooking oils, cups and ingesting glasses, plates and bowls, consuming utensils, plastic wrap and foil, and so forth.

Do you discover what’s lacking from that record? FOOD! Now you may assume that the meals goes in our pantry, proper? Mistaken. The pantry does maintain our upright freezer, the place I retailer meat and Cooper’s meals. However the remainder of the storage is stuffed with issues that I don’t wish to do away with, however I don’t use usually sufficient to maintain within the precise kitchen — meals dehydrator, juicer, Prompt Pot, meat grinder, air fryer, giant soup pots, baking pans, and on, and on. However there’s no meals in there.

So the place do I retailer the dry meals, canned meals, and so forth? Proper right here in these cupboards on the breakfast room aspect of the peninsula.

To say that it’s not handy could be an understatement. It’s a really small space again there behind the chairs, so when Matt is definitely sitting in his chair and reclining whereas I’m cooking, it may be an actual ache.

I’ve determined that I’m not going to maintain this as a sitting room. I wish to flip it again right into a breakfast room, however even with a desk and chairs there as an alternative of recliners, it’s simply not handy to have our meals pantry in that space.

However I’ve come to comprehend that I don’t want an entire kitchen growth with main reworking like shifting water strains to the room with the concrete slab basis, which might additionally require messing up a whole lot of the hardwood flooring. All that I would like is a extra environment friendly space for a meals pantry.

So now my concept is that I can take away the cupboards on the again of the peninsula and create an precise bar with bar stools there. I feel that space will match 4 barstools. After which I can add cupboards right here to make use of as a meals pantry. That will be a lot extra handy!

I really like these areas on both aspect of the walk-in pantry, with the lovable lights, the colourful art work, and the bench. However these benches are by no means used, so proper now, that is simply wasted house.

And if I’ve wasted house sitting proper subsequent to a kitchen the place I don’t have sufficient storage, it might make a lot extra sense so as to add a pantry right here!

And I wouldn’t simply do it on one aspect. Y’all find out about my want for symmetry, so if I add a pantry on one aspect of the walk-in pantry, then I’d need to have the identical on the opposite aspect.

So the present walk-in pantry (which not has these French doorways as a result of I used these right here) could be flanked with cupboards.

They might be the identical cupboards I take advantage of within the kitchen, painted the identical coloration because the kitchen cupboards, so it might simply appear like a continuation of the kitchen. No structural adjustments wanted.

And there’s additionally the potential for including the identical decrease cupboards to this wall as effectively. As of proper now, I wouldn’t wish to change the cabinets or TV. Since these are above countertop top, I feel they will keep. I really like the colour they add.

As a lot as I’d miss the colour that the art work, pillows, and credenza add to the present sitting room…

I simply preserve envisioning what it might appear like to show this entire space into an eat-in kitchen with a great deal of helpful pantry storage, and with cabinetry persevering with into the present sitting room to create the look of an enormous kitchen with out truly spending the hundreds of {dollars} it might take to alter the format utterly. I can envision the cupboards flanking the present walk-in pantry, and I feel it might look nice!

I’m fairly enthusiastic about this concept. It feels much more peaceable to me than doing one other enormous transform that may require tearing up the flooring and the concrete basis. And whereas I’d love to have the ability to stand at my sink and look out of these home windows, I additionally actually like that my present sink faces the TV, and can, sooner or later, face the small breakfast desk and chairs. That approach if somebody is sitting there, I can simply converse with them as an alternative of getting my again to them like I’d if my sink was on the home windows.

So these are my newest ideas. I completely love considering via the assorted plans and potentialities, and dreaming about find out how to use these areas. And it might take me just a few extra tries earlier than I land on the right kitchen plan, however as of this second, that is my favourite concept thus far.

Addicted 2 Adorning is the place I share my DIY and adorning journey as I transform and beautify the 1948 fixer higher that my husband, Matt, and I purchased in 2013. Matt has M.S. and is unable to do bodily work, so I do the vast majority of the work on the home on my own. You possibly can study extra about me right here.