3.26.2014

The Kitchen Reno - A 6 Day Whirlwind

Exactly 13 days ago we received the keys to our house. Immediately upon receiving those keys we (by we, I mean our contractors) went right to work on demoing and renovating our kitchen.

Let's take a quick look at what was (or wasn't) the kitchen BEFORE:
PHOTO BOMB!
Those cabinets are from 1979. I'm not even kidding. The counter is tile. TILE! Have you EVER in your life tried to clean tile counter in a kitchen?? OHMYGOSH it is THE WORST THING EVER. Getting that grout clean? For get it, impossible. Our former town home had tile counter tops and I DESPISED them. Getting different counters was nonnegotiable in my world.

After talking with our contractor about what we were hoping for in a kitchen he drew up a floor plan.
Just seeing the potential our kitchen held had us excited. 

During the transformations I took a picture at the end of each day.
Totally gutted. Doesn't it already look better?!
Island installed, and cabinets in.
Partial counter top installation, and partial hardware added to cabinets.
PHOTO BOMB!
Counter tops installed, hardware installed, moulding up, and electrical work complete.
Back splash installed and faucet installed.
For 24 hours we couldn't touch the back splash/grout, and couldn't use the sink, as the caulking had to dry. While we waited for all that we moved in immediately, cautiously unpacking and giving every kitchen item a home. 
It blew my mind how quickly and efficiently the contractor and laborers worked. In less than a week our kitchen was complete. 

We realized town home living wouldn't give us a huge kitchen. With that in mind we tried to utilize every inch of workable space. Here are a few details and features that we feel make the best use of the space provided. 
Left: A few cabinet doors with glass and decorative etching. Before now I'd never taken our china out of their boxes. I can now display them!
Middle top: A DISHWASHER! Prior to the new kitchen we had been hand washing dishes for the past four months.
Middle bottom: Pull out pantry cabinets. LOVE.
Top right: Pull out spice rack, gas burning stove, and a double oven.
Middle right: A place to hide our trash.
Bottom right: Under-cabinet lighting, and our backsplash. The lights are such a fabulous feature, and I love our pearl glass Subway tiles.
FINALLY - a fully functioning kitchen! 

32 comments:

  1. Ummmmmm..... GORGEOUS!!!!! Love it. From the subway back splash to the sweet pull out cabinets. It's perfect!

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  2. Wow! It looks really great!! I love it.

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  3. It looks awesome! How amazing that the entire install went so quickly too!

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  4. Wow, wow! It looks great! Love the white cabinets - it opened it up so much more. Awesome!

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  5. what a great transition. I love it!

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  6. It is gorgeous! I love the little details to give you extra storage.

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  7. Looks awsome! Love the glass in the cabinets!

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  8. That's so awesome that everything came together so quickly!! It looks sooo good! I love all of the little touches. Our closet of a kitchen is in desperate need of some renovations. 1980 called and they want their tiles back.

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  9. LOVE IT!!!! Omg it looks like the perfect place to blend up some margs :))

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  10. Love love love it!!! is it bad that I spotted the bottle of wine RIGHT off the bat!! lol!!

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  11. Two things. I'm texting you a picture of my 1960s kitchen that I cook in daily later on beacuse it's almost if not worse than your before picture kitchen. Second thing, I love your new kitchen and it's exactly what I would like to do with mine. Looks amazing.

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  12. it looks great! what awesome and fast work! :)
    btw i have never in my life had a dishwasher and with the new house having a gutted kitchen, guess what i get.... oh yeah!! sooo excited. even tho i have no idea how to work one bahaha

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  13. That is freaking awesome! I am still in shock that they finished it in less than a week!

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  14. Looks AMAZING!!! Holy moly that was a quick turnaround!

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  15. I seriously LOVE everything about this kitchen!!! Great use of space, love the counter and cabinets and backsplash! It's sophisticated and bright and totally functional. I can't believe they did it in a week! So awesome! We have been all over the place on our cabinets but you might have just sold me on white! I'm seriously emailing this to my husband to look at!!! :)

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  16. I love how your kitchen turned out! Beautiful. Can't wait to catch up on the rest of your posts I have missed while bring MIA.

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  17. It looks so, so, so incredible! Wow, can't get over how quickly it was done and how amazing it looks! I want your kitchen, lol!!!!

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  18. I love it! I'm not even kidding, I would probably want to sleep in there the first night... I can't believe how fast they got it done!

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  19. My gosh that was quick, and it is lovely!!! I have tile counters in the kitchen. Kill me. You cannot get it clean. Sigh. I loooove glass fronted cabinets myself. Great back splash. Love the dark with all the white. Love the molding and...whatever you call the 'hole' in the ceiling...the indent. I bet you are pleased as punch!

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  20. Love Love Love!! The white cabinets are so pretty!! I can't get over how fast it got done!!!

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  21. I love it. It's so beautiful and makes me want to cook 3 times a day! :)

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  22. That kitchen is amazing! I'm super jealous, so clean and pretty to look at! I'd live in there, I think! Now when do we a get a tour of the rest of the house?

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  23. Your kitchen is absolutely beautiful. We lived without a kitchen for 3 days when we had new cabinets installed, and they were without a doubt 3 of the worst days ever. I can't imagine going 6 days without a kitchen! However, I'm also really impressed that they were able to do a complete gut job in that short amount of time.

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  24. I'd be sleeping in this kitchen I love it so much. And no cooking would get done because it's too pretty to get messy!

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  25. I'm obsessed with hgtv so I'm all over this.
    its so pretty!!!!
    we looove all those features & want them too!
    amazing how fast & well this was done!

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  26. OH MY WORD! BEAUTIFUL! Well done!

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  27. Beautiful. They make stainless steel wipes for appliances... These have been my ammunition against grubby little handprints...

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  28. I LOVE this! I am particularly partial to the photo bombed pictures :) Your contractor is amazing for the plan he came up with, there is so much more space now, but it doesn't look cramped. I really like the choice of white cabinets too. and I completely feel your pain on the tile counter tops. the place we are renting now has them everywhere and I despise them. I don't know who in their right mind would ever choose tile for counter tops. It just looks dirty all the time.. yuck! Congrats again girl, it look great!

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