I'm not a designer by any stretch but I do know colonial. I grew up in houses like this. I like the brick. I would put forged iron drive hooks into the brick and hang cast iron pans from them. Anyway, to me the cream is a natural fit an antique home like this. Again, combined with black (wrought, forged, etc) iron hardware and it would look appropriate yet current.

I would paint the bottom cabinets red and use the cream for all the others. Im afraid if you paint the pantry cabinets that color it would be too overwhelming. I would also add some white open shelves to the areas on either side of the window. And just a thought, I actually like the brick. I think it adds character, and in a 1700s cottage Im sure you have alot of it. I would also change out all of your cabinet hardware with something in satin nickel. I personally like the look of a cabinet latch on your type of cabinetry. What type (if any) ventilation is over the range? Hope this info helps!

Cool house. Spend some time browsing at David Smith--they seem to specialize in kitchens like yours. You'll also see lighter blues and greens in addition to the barn red and creams. If your ceiling is original, I wouldn't paint it. Open shelves would be great. Granite would look wrong in that room and on those cabinets--very random and disjointed. Soapstone could be nice. Maybe the butcher block will be fine once you refinish it and lighten the room in other ways. Speaking of which, you might benefit from a lighting designer as well.

How wonderful. I'm an 18th century fan, so love your cottage.

Are you sure it's fake brick, and not real brick veneer? If it has real mortar it seems like that might be the case. I love it but think it's too dark and too "perfect" looking. I'd put a wash on it to (a) lighten and warm it up and (b) give it more of an aged look.

I can definitely see wood shelves on the brick walls, symmetrically placed on either side of the window, with some substantial wood brackets that have some nice curvature to them. Yum.

Then your wrought iron hooks, pot racks, etc. on the remainder of the brick. Panther Creek Farms is on ebay. They've custom made me a couple wrought iron pot racks. That guy is fabulous and can do anything you want.

I agree that granite wouldn't look right. I'd keep the wood, it's very nice. Some people have to wait to get some age on it! :-)

Now I don't know if it's historically correct, but I'd open and brighten it up visually by the cabinets a historic looking cream color, possibly with a French drybrush glaze to give them an aged look. Same color for the open shelves.

I'd keep the floors and ceilings as they are. Maybe use the money you saved on the granite to get some SS appliances, or if it's not too passe', put panelling on your fridge and DW.

Would also get some good heavy copper cookware to hang from those potracks, and a great big hammered copper pot to keep sitting on the range or cooktop. Gorgeous.

The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation is a great source if you want to try to stick to historically accurate design. I always just email them and we have a little dialogue. They are very helpful.

What a beautiful cottage. I've had to do my best to make builder tract homes look as 18th century as I can, it must be a treat to have the real thing.

Thanks all! So if I keep the brick, I'll need some good looking and paint-ready shelving - any sources? I liked some of the shelves on the David Smith site but assume that's all custom work. Great site, btw.

DH is a lighting designer, so we'll have some lighting help.

I'm curious if y'all think that the Camouflage could work as the creamy color against a red. I'd do the larger cabinets and the one upper (as well as any open shelves?) in cream and the lowers in red (love that idea - thank you!).

I kind of like the gray-green of the camouflage...but don't know if I should just go with a true cream instead.

It would be nice if we could just leave the butcher block and brick. :) Less work and less $$.

Oh, and nothing in this room is original, though the floors are reclaimed. The kitchen is part of a 1970's addition - the original kitchen is now a library and still houses the original big fireplace and beehive oven. :)

ballarddesigns.com has some called Cafe Shelving. They're not exactly what I'd want but could be fine. If I wanted to save $$ I'd go to a good lumber store and get some solid pine boards 12" deep x 1" (3/4" actually), have someone put an ogee edge on it (if it's a real lumber store, they might be able to do it right there) and buy some ready made brackets. NOT the shapeless ones they have in BigBox. More something like this:
http://www.ekenamillwork.com/pdf/ver.1.4.low.rez.pdf
download catalog, go to
p.224, first row, far left
corbels.com have some too, but not that one.

If you want to spend a little more, a carpenter can put an ogee edge on a solid board, or else on plywood (they say that's better for not warping), making it look thicker. Warping or not, I always like solid wood better.

I love Brick.
Bostonian here

Keep the brick use some creams to lighten the space.
I would not put in granite. Maybe soapstone but SS is
pricey. Keep the butcher block and go with cream.
And a few open shelves in the same cream would really
be pretty.

Here are some visual ideas of what I mean.
hope these help you love your brick.
~boxer

I love whitewashed brick for a soft cottage look

Painted brick is soooooooooo pretty. I am sure this
is a hard job as brick just soaks anything wet but
I do think this is lovely.

Look at the colonial / antique color selections on a paint chip pamphlet from the big paint companies. If they don't have interior color pamphlets, they will at the very least show you some accurate exterior colors to help you think.

I second the idea of doing some serious research into historical interiors through Williamsburg and other places. As long as you're doing this project and you currently have a functional modern kitchen, do it right from the beginning and you won't be re-doing it in a few years when you know more. You might want to talk to a local expert--it would be worth paying him/her.

An article I read recently sez that yellow brightens a room more than white does and it adds more warmth. Personally I love 18th century mustard yellow color, which goes with red brick nicely. There will be other suitable yellows to compliment mustard also.

Whitewashing the brick might also be an historic solution to the brightness problem and it would retain its wonderful texture yet defuse some of the dominance of the brick.

I adore your kitchen. I think a white/cream is the way to go for the cabs. I love red cabs, but I think in your case, red will fight with the beautiful orange floors.

Get the new lighting in first before you decide on colors.

Really cool place!

Welcome to Connecticut. We moved here last April.

I love your home, it has character.

If your brick is not orginal and not anything special, I would definitely paint it. I love that look. It takes away the sometime harsh oranginess of brick and just leaves the visual interest from the texture. I would paint it the same color as the cabs. It will be so light and airy! And I would stick with the countertops. Its warm, appropriate, and dare i say timeless?

Try Farrow and Ball pointing or for a lighter white but an aged tone, BM Cotton Ball.

Someone posted a great pot rack type thing I will try to find. Open shelves would be great if you have nice white pottery and dishes, imho. I can so see a tall Rosemary topiary in a clay pot on your counter.

I can't wait to see your progress.

Here is a link that might be useful: topiary

As for shelving ideas, I love the one LiveWireOak posted, only about 10% of the way down on this thread. Or before that, the shelves Cawaps posted.

HTH

Here is a link that might be useful: cool shelving

I have Camouflage in my bedroom and love it. It is very chameleon-like, reminds me of a eucalyptus grove on a foggy morning. It's a wonderful mix of gray and green, with hints of blue and yellow.

Philadelphia Cream is truly Satan's spawn. I have it in my small bathroom and it shrieks yellow. It serves to remind me that one needs to test paint colors better than I did with that one.

Keep in mind that almost nothing in your kitchen is "historically accurate" to the original period, except perhaps any original window sashes and possibly the ceiling if it's the underside of the floors above. This absolves you from any requirement to attempt a restoration or recreation. And also absolves you from any pseudo-preservationist need to have a "colonial" style kitchen, unless that's entirely to your taste. The "colonial" style dates to the very late 1800s through the 1950's. It can look odd in truly old houses, IMO.

True 18th c kitchens wouldn't be considered workable by most, if not all, modern users. I live in a period early (almost completely intact) 19th c farmhouse and while I am deeply preservationist about the "bones" of my buildings, the interior fittings not so much. And anyway the "fittings" of 18th and early 19th c. kitchens would have been next to nothing anyway as those kitchens are the definition of the currently-popular "unfitted" look.

The most useful advice I can give new owners of older buildings is to delay doing anything more serious than painting until you have been in your building for many months, preferably a year. Most early ideas are products of what you bring to the design, not what the house will teach you about what it needs. And old houses are very vulnerable to exogenous notions that end up being mistakes.

If your kitchen seems too dark, then experiment with a lighter color(s) of paint on the cabs. This is the time to take risks with paint alone. It will alow you to feel that you are putting your stamp on the house without putting you (and your building) at risk for irrversible mistakes.

And keep in mind that old houses were dark by intention. That lack of external light was inherent in the design, technology, sociology and style of these houses. Many old houses are severely damaged when new 21st c owners move in and start messing around with the fenestration to make modern "light-filled" rooms. If you must have such a space for a kitchen, or principal rooms, then consider building an addition to accomodate it.

You can rarely go wrong by going very slow when renovating old buildings. You will save money, time and avoid the dismay that comes from later realizing your earliest plans (and hopefully, not alterations) were mistakes in the understanding and care of your house. I've lived in my 75-year younger house for decades and I am still discovering new facets of its long history. Yours has even more to teach you, if you take the time to listen.

HTH,
L.

We have a very similar situation. Most of the house is from 1770, but the kitchen is a 1950 addition. Actually, where we chose to put the kitchen after living in the house for a year. The previous owners had a kitchen in an 8x10 walk-through space and 2 living rooms on opposite ends of the house... Funny enough, the location of our kitchen is probably where the outdoor kitchen was in the 18th century.

Like yours, our kitchen has low ceilings, and we wanted it to fit in with the character of the house. We went with sage green - more just because we loved the color. I'll never forget the day, though, when my mother-in-law called me as she was touring a house in colonial Williamsburg, and had to tell me right away that the cabinets were exactly like ours!

We went with wood and soapstone counters. Our kitchen has a brick floor (original to 1950), but the rest of the house has the 1770 yellow pine.

I agree with other posters that muted color paint finishes, natural materials and avoiding "shiny" is the way to go.

Good luck!

I love the brick but think that a bit of limewash (historically correct) would go a long way towards making the space brighter. I wouldn't want to make it completely opaque, like paint would. You just want some translucent white to allow the red tones of the brick to show through the white, like Boxerpup's 2nd pic. I would definitely do cream uppers and open shelving and pot racks to get more storage into the space. Ikea sells a great wrought iron look rail organizer system that would be perfect for your space.

I may be in the minority, but I like the green base cabinets and I would seek to repaint them a similar color. I think they are a good traditional color and work well with the other elements, Add in a rag rug or two and the space will be just fine.

My opinion is that the modern/fake brick is the big problem - it's dark, visually dominating, & looks too perfect. Possibly painting it a whitish color would help but it still won't look like 18th brick work.

Thanks folks.

Antiquesilver, as I said in my first post, I don't like the brick, but it's going to be hard to remove - really hard, if I don't want to redo my walls, which I really can't do right now. So for now, washing them will have to do. I have real 18th century stonework in this house - and a real beehive oven - just not in the 1970's kitchen addition. :)

I put a coat of red on the lower cabinets today and I love it. I'll post pics once I get a second coat on. I posted pics in another thread of the brick washed in Light Cream Milk Paint - I think they need a bit of sanding to be more lime-y but for now, this will do.

The room is looking much lighter and more put together, much more pleasant to work in. :)

Thanks all,
Mary

I'd love to see that beehive oven.

antiquesilver, as soon as I can plane down the door that it's behind, I'll get some pics! Right now the door opens about 6" and then hits the wide chestnut floor planks and scrapes (ugh!).

We looked at another house of the same period, and the college age son was home. He said that his family still made pizza in their beehive oven around the holidays. :)

Mary

I understand completely about the scraping doors, LOL! And I'm so envious that you still have the old oven - my outside kitchen (although a century younger than yours) was demolished in the 1930's & I have to live vicariously thru others!