A kitchen makeover...

After being back in our house for a little over a year, I finally decided it was time to paint the kitchen. Originally I left the kitchen alone because it had been repainted only a couple of years before by the friend who had rented the house while we were in California. The colors she chose were lovely and I managed to make it all work together with my stuff.

Here’s what the kitchen looked like before:

The main kitchen, which is what my friend painted, had sage green walls and dark oatmeal cabinets. I used red to tie the kitchen and breakfast nook together originally since the breakfast nook still had the old yellow paint on the walls. It looked fine, but there was something not quite right about it that bothered me more as time went on and the other rooms in the house were completed.
Also, the breakfast nook really did need painting ~ the walls looked fine from a distance but up close they were a bit dingy, as was all the white wood trim in the nook and the kitchen. Then I accidentally broke the clock in the kitchen and had to buy a new one. The one we liked turned out to be more French country than the old one and I took that as a sign it was time to go ahead and move the rest of the kitchen in that direction.
While our ultimate plan is to gut and completely redo the kitchen, that’s a few years down the road. In the meantime, I figured it was worth a couple of gallons of paint to have a room that suited us and our style better.
So here’s what the kitchen looks like now:

I love yellow and red in an old kitchen. Since I have plenty of red accessories and I wanted to use the same curtains if possible (I did design the fabric and make them, after all), the walls needed to be yellow. I decided to use the same yellow in the kitchen and breakfast nook that I chose for the front door because it has a lovely warmth to it (it’s called Cork Top). I wanted the cabinets to be lighter, too, so I painted them my favorite neutral color, Sandstone Cove, which is a lovely warm beige/gray. The wood trim got a coat of bright white for the first time in years and it was surprising how much of a difference that made.

Since I had a black rug up in the attic that I thought would be perfect for under the old door table in the breakfast nook (that area has hideous old linoleum that must be covered), I decided to use black as a subtle accent color. I painted the little shelf over the stove black and put a little black rug in front of the door to the mudroom. 

The rug in front of the sink is actually a chocolate brown, but it’s so dark most people can’t tell the difference and the pattern plays well with the rest of the kitchen. I found a lovely red runner for the old door table and rearranged and put away some things to make cooking easier (more on that later, when I show you what I’m up to in the mudroom).

I love how it all turned out. The kitchen and breakfast nook feel brighter and warmer, and the look is much more cohesive and more in keeping with the rest of the house. It’s amazing what you can do for an old kitchen with a little bit of paint and a few new accessories. What do you think?

Photos by The Pink Home