So I’ve shown you all my horrible to slightly less horrible kitchen that I will be renovating, and next I thought I’d show you the layout ideas I had for the new kitchen. Here’s a photo to recap what the kitchen looks like currently:


I’ve done a rough drawing of the layout to make it clearer where everything is located. (Sorry but I don't know how to use software to do this so you'll have to bear with my lovely drawings).


As you can see, this kitchen is really REALLY badly designed. Or not designed as I see it. And the craftsmanship everywhere is AWFUL. The cabinets are made of solid wood (MDF?) – so the drawers are heavy and are a total pain to open and close. Half of the magnet latches to keep the doors closed are missing. The little built-in china cupboard with glass doors got a serious chuckle from my contractor. He thinks they are bifold closet doors made into cabinet doors. The island was made with scraps of tongue and groove paneling and bits of trim, and was initially left unpainted/unstained. There was an ugly square table that was built at the end of the island that I ripped off and tossed the day I moved in, that came with 2 cheap wooden chairs that I also tossed. The cabinet over the island is a pain to get into because you have to lean over the island to see into it. So that’s the cabinets in a nutshell.

Then there’s the worst tile job EVER on the floor. Seriously, I burst out laughing when I first saw the kitchen floor. The tiles are ugly to begin with, and the grout is much darker than the tile colour which makes them look really dirty. When they were grouted, the excess was not wiped off so there’s grout everywhere. To make things worse, the person that laid them must have been drunk because there is not one straight line.

The appliances – UGH. The stove is not bad, but the elements take a long time to heat up. And it’s cheap. The fridge is just that – a fridge. There is no freezer in it. And I am the only one that lives here. So it’s HUGE. There is a big chest freezer in the basement so when I want ice in my drink, I have to go down there to get it (so I stopped using ice). If I am by the sink or stove, I have to walk around the dining table to get to the fridge – that has to be the most annoying thing about the space. The dishwasher, housed in the island, makes a total racket when it’s running.

The lighting is terrible. I have a ceiling fan with lights over the table, and that’s it. I had to put a lamp on the counter near the stove because it’s too dark when I’m cooking. There was a hood fan over the stove with a light but it was mounted so low I couldn’t see what I was cooking. I tossed that after the third time I smucked my head on it.

So that’s what I’ve been dealing with since December. You can imagine how elated I was to learn all this can go in a big dumpster...and SOON!

When I first began daydreaming about a new kitchen, I had figured I would go to Ikea, get some glossy white cabinets, and keep the layout basically as it is, galley style. The wall the fridge is on would come down, opening it up to the living room, and the dining table would be between the island and the living room. But then I got word that I would be getting Greentea's gorgeous solid wood kitchen cabinets and I knew galley style wouldn’t work. Their beauty would be for the most part hidden so I knew I had to come up with a different layout to expose them more. I knew the wall had to come down to open up the tiny space, and since I have 3 doors on the main floor that open outside, I thought I could seal up the door next to the island. So with that, an L shape layout seemed to work. This is the first drawing I sent to the guys at Greentea, with the door gone, the wall gone, and an L shape design (rotate this 180 degrees to get the same angle as the drawing above).


This is not the final design I ended up choosing, but I thought I’d reveal that with my next post, and show you the cabinets I decided on. I'd like to take this opportunity to get your opinions, and see what you guys would do with the new kitchen layout. Do you favour uppers? No uppers? Would you have done it galley-style? Greentea has a fantastic kitchen guide that helped me immensely - be sure to check it out, especially if you're looking to give suggestions.

Labels: layout, pre-demo

A little while ago I hinted that I had a big project I was working on. Well, I thought it was about time to let you all in on it. Several months ago Jo and I were contacted by Mike at Greentea Design who was interested in an ad on the blog. I was stoked about this because I had seen their timber, Asian-style kitchen cabinets before and thought they were fantastic. I thought about how horrible my existing kitchen was and a lightbulb went off – why not see if they’d sponsor a kitchen reno project?!?! And what do you know – they went for it!!! They agreed to supply me with the cabinets I needed, and in return I would blog about my kitchen renovation (most of which will be included on a new blog) from planning down to the finished product. A pretty decent tradeoff considering this is what I was working with:

(I had to use an old photo here because I know some of you will be sad to see the kitchen - as it is now - go in the dumpster).

I have never done a kitchen renovation before so this is all new to me and I am SO EXCITED about it. The guys over at Greentea have been so amazing to work with and are so unbelievably helpful to me. It’s been a bit tough with them based in Toronto and me being in Ottawa – so we have only had a couple phone conversations, MANY emails and unfortunately, I haven’t had the chance to see their products in person. Despite this we’ve made really good progress since the beginning.

Along the way I’m hoping to get some advice from our readers on decisions I have made or need to make, and hopefully they will help me with this and future kitchen renovations, and our other readers as well. Also, the folks at Greentea are hoping to get some feedback on their products and some of the features they have to offer on their website to assist potential kitchen renovators in making their choices. So I’m hoping you’ll leave tons of comments.

As I mentionned, I will be blogging my way through the entire renovation. You’ll see the plans we came up with, choices of appliances, countertop, backsplash and lighting. You’ll witness the demolition of the lovely existing cabinets, the flooring installation, the plumbing and electrical involved, cabinet arrival and installation, and decorating. I will be taking many photos along the way.

I thought to begin this process, I’d start off with some photos of my kitchen as it exists today, pre-renovation. Actually, I’ll even start with a couple photos of what the kitchen looked like before I moved in (the first 2) and when I took possession of the house in December.


As you can see, it was pretty awful, and soooo boring. It was difficult to spend any length of time in it. So one day, I went to my local Benjamin Moore store and decided, since I would eventually be getting a new kitchen, that I would go a little crazy with the cabinets and paint them pink. The backsplash was a terrible sort of terracotta brown colour so I found some semi-gloss white paint I had and painted the backsplash. Amazingly, it’s held up really well.


Next time I will show you some of the ideas I had with some not-so-good drawings I made up to send to Greentea, and some of the reasons why I was so desperate to get rid of this kitchen in place of something utterly fabulous.

Labels: pre-demo