Renovation Reveal: The Kitchen!

The kitchen, the heart of the home and all that. But mainly… FOOD!

But seriously, more so than ever, the kitchen is an area you gather and socialise, so when we started planning the renovation for this cottage I knew that we needed to turn the kitchen into a focal point for the whole project – rather than the afterthought it was in the original house.

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Before

OMG. I swear I almost forgot about how bad the kitchen was when we bought the house. I mean, it worked as far as cooking and washing up goes, but it wasn’t a space that you actually wanted to spend time in. You’ll remember it was tacked on to the back of the house, with one little window. It was definitely not the sort of place you would flex your chef’s muscles.

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Pin It Before: Before

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What We Did

Pin It Studwork in.: Studwork in.

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Pin It Before the kitchen went in.: Before the kitchen went in.

Pin It We have some semblance of a kitchen!: We have some semblance of a kitchen!

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Testing paint colours

Pin It On site!: On site!

Pin It Putting the doors in.: Putting the doors in.

After

I mean. Come on. It doesn’t even seem fair to compare the two, but you know how much I love a before and after so I wasn’t going to miss this opportunity.

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Designing the Kitchen

A Space Saving Layout Obviously, we took out the original kitchen and then extended the house, locating the new kitchen along the northern wall in that new open plan living space. The big windows were added to let in some much needed light. This long kitchen is about as simple as it gets, but it works so well in this open plan living space. You’ll remember that Ben fell head over heels in love with a long industrial bench, so we essentially designed the whole kitchen around it. As soon as he saw it he knew it could have lots of different uses – like an island bench, kitchen table and dining table. I think he loved it so much that he would have chosen to have a baby with it instead of me if that was at all possible. Lol.

Bespoke Style Kitchen Cabinetry The aesthetics of a kitchen really come down to the cabinetry you use. When I was putting together our mood boards, I really wanted a bevelled cabinet profile, but they were really hard to find in a great colour AND at an affordable price. It was tricky! Luckily I discovered that Kaboodle had a very affordable option (called ‘alpine’), which we hand painted ourselves in a gorgeous shade of green – this one is ‘Bay Berry’ from Haymes Paint. To make the kitchen feel even more bespoke, we used black wooden doorknobs from Kethy – in a bowl shape for the big pantry cabinets and in a small cylindrical knob shape for the smaller cupboards. I’ll be sharing the full how-to for this soon!

A Minimalist & Affordable Backsplash One thing I didn’t know before I got stuck into this was how expensive some things are, backsplashes surprisingly being one of them! I wanted marble, but after costing up all the options, we found that using the tiles we used for the bathroom was a fantastic option and just about the cheapest way to create a gorgeous backsplash…. We had some leftover from the bathrooms so it was a no brainer. We used Tilecloud tiles and had them installed in a vertical layout.

Simple Benchtops You just KNOW my Pinterest boards were overflowing with marble bench tops… But once again when it came down to it the marble was going to be ten times, yes TEN TIMES, the price of wooden bench tops. So we went with a warm wood instead. These one were also from Kaboodle, and I think they look really great in the space.

Simple Matching Hardware I really wanted brass hardware for the upstairs kitchen, but after testing out the green paint colour, we decided that it didn’t go well with brass hardware – meaning the taps, fittings and doorknobs. We chose a simple matte black which I think really suits the space. For the kitchen mixer, a black matte Caroma mixer from Bunnings was the perfect durable and streamlined choice.

Streamlined Appliances We really wanted classic silver appliances for the kitchen, ones that were streamlined and minimalist enough to not overpower the simple design. And we didn’t want to blow the back on them! The appliances we chose are Bellini, which have that perfect minimalist look that we were after. And they are super affordable too!

Industrial Lighting For the lighting, these incredible lights are another favourite of Ben’s, and something he sourced years ago from an antique market in Europe… He’s been sitting on them this whole time waiting for the right project! And by sitting on them I mean they have been taking up room in our studio for all that time. I had contemplated something a little bit more beachy, but I have to say that by mixing the industrial elements and the tropical details of the room I think we struck a good balance!

Matching Shelving DIY Project To make the whole space feel more complete, and to tie the aesthetics of the cabinets together, we built some DIY floating shelves. All the materials from these we got from Bunnings – wood planks that we painted in the same shade as the cabinets, and matte black shelf brackets.

The Finishing Touches Kitchens aren’t complete with a few little decor touches, meaning I simply had to fill the shelves with plants, ceramic pots and a fave print from Jasmine Dowling. A rattan lamp from Bach Living in the corner of the room was great for balancing the more masculine elements of the kitchen. Ben’s my go to man when it comes to cooking, and I know he’ll create some delicious things in this space!