Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Our finished kitchen - 9 months later

It's 9pm, I have a cold, my baby is sleeping, and I should be, too.  But I can't go to bed because I've been meaning to share the official 'after' pics of the kitchen for over a week.  Finally, here is the finished kitchen!  
Here is a before, just for funsies.
We mostly finished it in February and since then we had a baby, realized we hate our appliances, procrastinated on putting up the shelves, and lived without switchplate covers.  
I wouldn't change anything.  Except our KitchenAid appliances, which are crap!  That range is supposed to have a power burner that boils water super fast, but I swear it takes longer than a regular one.  This next picture is the best representation of the paint color, Behr Lotus Leaf.  
Here is a before of the sink wall.  Yikes.  Notice the sweet trash compactor.  Hello, 1980!
Our faucet is so good looking, and it only cost me $85!
The counters are a quartzite called Phantom Green.  It is pretty much black, but the veining is a slightly aqua-tinted white.
We hate this KitchenAid counter-depth refrigerator.  We have had four service calls on this thing (the ice maker, of course) in the first 5 months we owned it.  Unacceptable.  
I can barely remember when the frig wall used to look like this!
The lighting is all from Rejuvenation except for the can lights and under cabinet lights.  
Our gorgeous shelves!  I couldn't be happier with them.  All of our daily white dishes fit perfectly and we use them so quickly there is no way they will get dusty.  Well, maybe the small plates will - who really uses those, anyway?   

We LOVE our Sharp drawer microwave, by the way.  This is the best place for a microwave, in my opinion!  This counter is raised up to 42" to make it easy to use.  The Restoration Hardware Lugarno pulls and knobs on the cabinets make me giggle with glee, they are so shiny and beautiful.  I am not even mad that I had a mental breakdown installing them.     
We spent a lot on this kitchen, but walking into the room and loving what you see is worth it to me.  
Last details - I have to actually make the curtains (right now it's just fabric pinned to the rods) and I'd like to cut the table down to a more reasonable height and get some stools.  
Until then, I'm enjoying walking in the back door and seeing our finished space!
If you have specific questions about stuff in the kitchen, I'm sure a search on the blog would find it for you - but I love getting emails/comments, so send them my way!   

32 comments:

  1. LOOKS AMAZING!

    Great work. Sorry about your appliances though.

    (We got Jenn-air and haven't had any issues except our fridge drawers are absolute shit.)

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  2. Sara, it looks amazing. I LOVE it! I'm so happy for you and am in awe of all the work you did.

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  3. Interesting, a microwave drawer? Looks really great!

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  4. just as nice in person. nice looking shelves! :)

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  5. Your Kitchen looks great, love the wooden shelves and never saw a microwave drawer, ever! Looks interesting.
    Really nice work, thank you for sharing;)

    Lovely greetings...

    http://pudel-design.blogspot.de/

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  6. Love it. Love love love everything about it. It's one of my favorite kitchens I've seen on a blog in a LONG, long time. It's exactly what I would do if I had my dream craftsman bungalow. NICE WORK!!!

    P.S. That table is CRAZY tall. Wtf? lol

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  7. GORGEOUS! You guys did such a great job, it looks amazing. That seriously stinks about your appliances, though - good to know about KitchenAid! Jerks.

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  8. LOVE the entire kitchen! It looks so good! Sucks about your appliances though!

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  9. Looks awesome!!! So happy for you that you get to check it off the list :)

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  10. it's beautiful, great job! isn't having a finished kitchen fantastic??

    sorry to hear about the appliances. so far we've been very happy with ours, we have a kitchenaid dishwasher (that we've had for i think 4 years), and the fridge and range are samsung.

    that table is crazy tall!

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  11. Gorgeous kitchen!! I'm amazed at the crappy quality of your appliances. My parents have a Kitchen-Aid range purchased in 2005 that they LOVE! I hate the oven (they have a wall oven too which is what I use when I bake there) but it's the fastest boiling machine I ever used! My husband and I have builder grade GE and I wouldn't wish those on anybody. Everything is falling apart after TWO years. WTF...


    Oh, PS...I'm one of those people who uses the small plates as my dinner plate. It's all about portion control for me to stay slim! No seconds either!!

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  12. It looks modern AND timeless. Great job!

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  13. Fabulous! You guys did a great job, particularly considering you popped out a kid in there too. My favorite things in the room are the lungaro pulls (I'm pretty sure I need those when we redo the kitchen) and the counters. I'm so sorry to hear that you don't like your appliances. What a drag to spend big bucks on something that should be trouble free for years and years only to have them fail you.

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  14. That's a shame about the refrigerator; in my last house, I got a counter-depth Kitchen Aid and it worked fine for many years, at least until we sold the house.

    In our current kitchen we have a counter-depth SubZero which is working just fine. We've had no problems in the first year+ if you go looking to replace it.

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  15. So stunningly beautiful...so nice!!!
    ENVIOUS!!

    Love it when you post because you are so honestly funny, your photos are perfect, love seeing your adorable child, and your house is great.

    B

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  16. I adore your counters. So, so luxurious looking (can anything in a kitchen look luxurious?). And that micro area is so great.

    I think your stove is the updated version of the one we bought six years ago. Incidentally, this is our second time buying this stove as we LOVED it in our loft. But I've noticed the same thing you mention about the lack of power on the supposedly power flame. We didn't experience that on the last one. Also, we've had problems with our oven that we didn't have the first time. I heard KitchenAid has changed manufacturers so that might be it. Eight years ago I would have sworn by the quality, but between the problems with this stove and a completely dead microhood we had to replace after three months I probably won't go this route in the future.

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  17. Katie (x2!): Yes, the table is veeery tall, a friend of the family made this for specific barstools they had that were very tall, so when they didn't want it anymore I took it - it's really nice quality, but too tall for standard 30in bar stools. I'm still figuring out what to do!

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  18. Love love it!!! I was looking forward to seeing your afters for quite sometime, lol :) I love your the door in your kitchen! That's the exact style we want for our front door :) Is that new for the kitchen??

    I also love your micro wave drawer fancy! :)

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  19. Wowowow! This is a showstopper. I love it all. The wall color. The cabinets. The hardware. The open shelves. It's just awesome. The inlaws love their microwave drawer, too. Ilove that its out of the way and not above the stove

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  20. Wow amazing. I'm totally digging the Lotus Leaf paint color and am pretty sure I'm going to copy you. I love your style!

    Cut that table down! Awesome project to show us :)

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  21. That looks awesome. I kind of forget what it was like to have a kitchen but remember it being a real help to my life. AMAZING job!!

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  22. gorgeous! May I ask where the runner rug and door rug are from? I am currently looking for rugs for our finished kitchen. So spacious and clean!

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  23. The runner is from Overstock, but it's out of stock and has been since I bought it early this year. The Chandra rug at the door matches the one in our dining room, got it at Wayfair!

    http://www.wayfair.com/Chandra-Rugs-Rowe-Multi-Chain-Rug-ROW11125-CUG8472.html

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  27. Awesome job, room looks amazing,enjoy!

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  28. Your kitchen is GORGEOUS, Sara!

    That's so upsetting about your KitchenAid appliances (and Becky's)! I love the ones we have, and I haven't heard any complaints from my parents on the ones they purchases a year or two ago. I wonder what the heck is up with them being hit-and-miss?! Maybe it's just certain lines? Regardless, it's seriously not cool!

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  29. Ahhh!! The wonders of kitchen renovations. I can completely relate to your quote "procrastinated on putting up the shelves, and lived without switchplate covers."

    :)

    In my house, there are rooms where I'm still waiting to add trim, curtains still need to go up, and then there are the kitchen cabinets in my dining/living room. All in due time, I know. :)

    Your kitchen looks amazing and I love the color choices.

    -Kelby
    http://peachypains.com

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  30. Beautiful Kitchen, I love the paint color and your countertops. Where did you purchase the countertop? They are beautiful almost reminds me of soapstone.

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  31. Ann, the counters are a granite called 'Aqua Grantique' and they also go by the name of 'Phantom Green.' The top selling point of this stone is that it looks just like soapstone without needing to be oiled! I purchased them through a local stone yard, and had a local granite guy install them. They did get these little silvery marks on them easily, though. Not much you can do about it.

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Thanks so much for reading....your comments mean a lot to me!
Sara