Grove Street Kitchen

laurenmacke

4 years ago

I will forever remember this as the kitchen we renovated while the world was on lockdown and we were under government order to stay at home. Never did I ever think I would be saying those words! This has been such a strange past few weeks with everything going on around Coronavirus, and this project was a welcome distraction from it all. My first instinct in these situations is to get busy and be productive — to work on things that I can control when everything else is so uncertain. We have a few more small projects to work on in the next few weeks (before we do a gut renovation on our main bath later this summer!) and a new schedule for our life totally at home has really helped my spirits lately.

Well, let’s get right into it!
(All sources are linked at the end of this post.)

Our kitchen has been one of those rooms in our house that has gone through lots of “phases” and “edits” since we’ve moved in but has never been a room that I was too excited about. When we bought the house, we immediately replaced the countertops, sink, hardware & faucet, plus gave all the cabinets a fresh coat of paint. A year or so later we ripped up the cracking floor tiles and replaced it with flooring that was a close match to the original hardwood. Then last year we added a mudroom to the back of our house (you can read that post here) which is just off of the kitchen:

It gave me some direction and new ideas for how to make changes to our kitchen I would be happy with and would flow with the rest of our home — but wouldn’t be a full overhaul.

A few things I knew I wanted: taking out some of the upper cabinets, building out the range hood, open shelving, a better lighting plan & some kind of panel detail on the sink wall. I didn’t have a complete design plan when I convinced Tyler on Sunday afternoon to tear out the upper cabinets without having it all figured out… thankfully it ended up being just fine!

It was actually really helpful to see and feel how open it was without all of the bulky upper cabinets in our small kitchen before making decisions on how much open shelving to have, what kind of lighting to install, etc.

BEFORE

My original design plan included a lot more open shelving and different types of lighting, but ultimately I decided to simplify everything and keep as much of that open and airy feeling as possible. I’m so glad we ended up with just the two shelves on the far wall because it feels like the perfect amount of visual interest in the room without being too busy.

Tyler built the shelves by gluing together (one at a time) four pieces of maple plywood and then using brad nails to secure the pieces together. To make sure the face and sides of the shelves finished nicely he wrapped the shelves in 2″ maple stock, again gluing and nailing the pieces on. Once the shelves were all set and dry he moved onto filling the seams and nail holes with wood filler & sanded the shelves down to 220 grit.

The most important thing about hanging floating shelves is using strong metal brackets and securing them into studs, especially shelves that will hold substantial weight like stacks of plates & large bowls. We used four brackets for each shelf and they are good to hold about 100 pounds. To install these brackets, you first mark the studs & install the brackets on the wall first, making sure they’re level and in line with each other. So once the brackets were secure we rested the shelf on top of the brackets, making sure that it was centered underneath the sconces, checked that it was level, and marked the bottom of each shelf where the brackets fell.

Tyler then used a long, 1/2″ drill bit (the size of the rods on our brackets) to drill into where each of the brackets would be mounted. He also used a router on the back of the shelves to countersink the brackets since we wanted them to sit flush against the drywall; if you are installing these against a tile wall that wouldn’t be necessary.

(If you’re taking on this DIY yourself, we recommend watching this video to give you detailed instructions on how to drill out your shelves & install them properly.)

I was so excited for this skinny shiplap + marble trim + subway tile plan to come together. I chose to use the shiplap only on the sink wall so that it could seamlessly wrap around the hood and have its own moment uninterrupted by shelving.

I had added subway tile to the kitchen when we first moved in, so rather than tearing all of that out, we just carried more of it up to the hood and marble trim. I like that it ties in with the laundry area while also feeling a bit more special. And the marble trim is probably my favorite little detail in the kitchen — the different veining in each piece looks so pretty against the clean white of the shiplap, tile, and shelves.

One thing I knew from the beginning was that I wanted the hood to feel clean and streamlined. Since our range isn’t a focal point in the kitchen, I kept the design really simple with modern lines that are a nice balance to the traditional nature of the rest of the kitchen. All of those vertical lines wrapping perfectly around the hood make my brain so happy!

I went back and forth for a long time on lighting. I knew I wanted sconces over the shelves but was unsure of what else to do in here. Ultimately what won out is the fact that we needed more lighting in the kitchen, and it made more sense to install can lights over the countertops plus the sconces so that the room was appropriately lit. These old houses tend to have a single electrical box in the middle of a big room, and I wanted something other than a large pendant or chandelier in the center.

We installed three straight-arm brass sconces that are the same finish as the laundry room lights but different in shape, so they speak to each other without being exactly the same.

The opposite side of the kitchen houses are fridge, pantry, and closed storage. We have plans to build a pretty butler’s pantry eventually that will make all of my storage dreams come true!

I am so glad that we decided to do this project— I think we were able to breathe new life into this kitchen of ours without starting from the ground up, and I’m really happy about that.

THE DAY WE GOT KEYS TO THE HOUSE

Thanks to everyone who has shared in my excitement about this project and followed along on Instagram. It makes it all the more fun to share it with you now! Happy Wednesday everyone —

XO,

Lauren

SOURCES