Musing on kitchens...
The kitchen we have here isn't really DREADFUL per se, but it's not great. The cupboards appear to be decently made hand made cabinets from the late 1970's - functional (if you don't include the drawers that don't close all the way properly) but not exactly pretty, standard ol' 70's laminate countertops, vinyl tile floors, and an island that isn't attached to the floor make it kinda....
So one of the plans for the house when the property in Western Bay sells - is to update the kitchen. Any kitchen reno starts getting pricey and honestly I'm not inclined to drop more than $10K on a kitchen that even completed will not be the kitchen of my dreams (see below). So we're trying to keep it to a simple updating ... new tile on the floors, (terracotta I think), replace the cabinets - we're even looking at picking up some used cabinets in good nick, (there's always a few ads for them around in various colours and configurations), and then there's countertops.
The problem with countertops is that a) pretty much all laminate looks cheap and dated b) granite and stone which is THE thing - is more than my entire kitchen budget in one go. Concrete is possible but also pricey if done professionally, and a huge pain done yourself, and the maintenance of the stuff still makes it impractical. So the upshot is - tiled counters and backsplash. Frankly I've always liked tiled counters anyway. And now I've found a really lovely website of handpainted Mexican talavera tile. My general kitchen theme has always been a bit classic, french provincial, folky, homey sort of theme - and I think it might fit it well.
So I've been playing with colour schemes...
Mexican hand painted talavera tiles
Possible tile scheme I'm working on for the kitchen.
The blue with the random geckos for the counter tops, with the borders in the blue / green / yellow / terra cotta pattern, with the gold trim / counter bull nose. Might put a row of blue between the patterned border and the yellow. The white / yellow / blue patterned tiles for the backsplash with the same patterned border.
But I'm still playing.
Why not wait until we can afford the kitchen of my dreams? Welllllllllllllll really the kitchen I want won't fit in this space, it'd require expanding the house out ... don't see that working here.
The kitchen of my dreams is all kinda french provincial meets Ratouille, meets apothecary shop, meets steam punk ...huge, antique, glorious, wood burning bread bake ovens, huge wood work/gossip tables, rock and brass, and..
Well that's my dream - and I hope one day we can make it a reality, but until then I'll keep playing with Mexican tiles and this kitchen shouldn't turn out too badly.
So one of the plans for the house when the property in Western Bay sells - is to update the kitchen. Any kitchen reno starts getting pricey and honestly I'm not inclined to drop more than $10K on a kitchen that even completed will not be the kitchen of my dreams (see below). So we're trying to keep it to a simple updating ... new tile on the floors, (terracotta I think), replace the cabinets - we're even looking at picking up some used cabinets in good nick, (there's always a few ads for them around in various colours and configurations), and then there's countertops.
The problem with countertops is that a) pretty much all laminate looks cheap and dated b) granite and stone which is THE thing - is more than my entire kitchen budget in one go. Concrete is possible but also pricey if done professionally, and a huge pain done yourself, and the maintenance of the stuff still makes it impractical. So the upshot is - tiled counters and backsplash. Frankly I've always liked tiled counters anyway. And now I've found a really lovely website of handpainted Mexican talavera tile. My general kitchen theme has always been a bit classic, french provincial, folky, homey sort of theme - and I think it might fit it well.
So I've been playing with colour schemes...
Mexican hand painted talavera tiles
Possible tile scheme I'm working on for the kitchen.
The blue with the random geckos for the counter tops, with the borders in the blue / green / yellow / terra cotta pattern, with the gold trim / counter bull nose. Might put a row of blue between the patterned border and the yellow. The white / yellow / blue patterned tiles for the backsplash with the same patterned border.
But I'm still playing.
Why not wait until we can afford the kitchen of my dreams? Welllllllllllllll really the kitchen I want won't fit in this space, it'd require expanding the house out ... don't see that working here.
The kitchen of my dreams is all kinda french provincial meets Ratouille, meets apothecary shop, meets steam punk ...huge, antique, glorious, wood burning bread bake ovens, huge wood work/gossip tables, rock and brass, and..
Well that's my dream - and I hope one day we can make it a reality, but until then I'll keep playing with Mexican tiles and this kitchen shouldn't turn out too badly.