BenM's Chelsea Gray.

I very much relate to having to work with what you have! You could do a few things with your space (obviously), but it depends on your style. So the easiest way for me to understand what your style is, is if you could find a pic of your dream kitchen on Houzz and post it here (and maybe a pic of what your dh likes).

From there, I can suggest a great cabinet color for you. :)

Patina green or patina green on the bottom and white on top. hey, you wanted eccentric!

or just do all of the cabinets in this pale green.

and here's your white. You could also do all white lowers and just the upper glass cabinets in the patina color.

No dark greens. it will look like a cave. You'd have to do the ceiling, a super bright white and bring in some more lighting.

I think I'd paint the back splash instead. lol And yeah, I totally caught creepy face!

I was thinking that tealy green color also.

Love the weird backsplash! Play off of it.

Consider Pashmina (Ben Moore AF 100). Fabulous neutral. Brighten up this kitchen!

All. Thanks for your suggestions most helpful. A few responses.

Teal green would be a different type of color added to darker more jewel toned palette, so really don't want to do that, the idea is to work with what we have for now and tone it down, not make it more um.. unique.

It doesn't matter what my favorite kitchen looks like as we are working with these constraints for now ( we are still debating on knocking down a wall in the next two years but in the interim we have to live here).

I don't want eccentric but as said, am dealing with what we have for a while. There were a lot of super odd things about this house that we dealt with quickly, including painting the entire interior, most of which was faux marble painted pink and orange.

I can't paint out the back splash as it's got smaller glass and mirror elements. And, the creepy little doll face doesn't freak me out as much as it used to. : ).

More accurate view of the colors in daylight.

One more thing, since the rest of the house as redone has a lot of blue and white I thought of navy blue cabinet below and white above, but again, adding another color to this kitchen seems crazy..

I'd paint the bottom cabinets dark espresso brown and leave the tops as is.

how about dark espresso brown and white above?

On 2nd viewing, I was thinking a clay color might work, but you would basically be the same color as now, so I think dear hubby is right - white might be the way to go. Actually a similar color to the grout. Which would make your floors look better also.

Please post when you have done whatever you are going to do.

Angel - The grout is pink-sand colored. Not my favorite.

Can you tell the house was last redone in the 1990s?) Some neighbor told me that the owners liked Wolfgang Puck's restaurant style but I couldn't find a pic that matched the mosaic (which some artist apparently designed)...

If it matters the style of the house is a pastiche of Spanish-mid century, it's a two story with a white stucco exterior and mostly clay tile floors on the first floor.

Anyhoo - you probably right as the bright white (that goes well with the rest of the house's color schemes) would be too jarring.

I do like Brickin's suggestion of espresso brown just below... in just looking at the picture and envisioning the bottoms as dark brown, it immediately made sense. But I am also trying to brighten up the look a bit which is why I thought about brown and white.

I think I need to do one of the web sites where you put a pic in and then try different colors.

Will let you know where we end up...

Then just do a nice white or creamy white. I'd at least do the inside, back panel of the upper cabinet(with glass) in the soft, patina green color. General Finishes has a Patina Green milk paint that would be perfect. It would just give a touch of color

two more which highlight the lovely counter tops.. The 90s have a lot to answer for..

this was eccentric, even in the 90's! if you replaced the countertops w/a standard white quartz, it wouldn't look half bad. ;)

You're right, you can't have your dream kitchen as you said, but knowing what you like can help me help you better. I know what it's like to have to work with things you don't like.

Based off of what you've written, though, if your dh likes white, I would pick a white for your cabinets that belongs to the orange family because otherwise you'll be contrasting (even if slightly) and not toning down. Your floors are "orange/brown" family and your favorite wall tile pattern is already bright enough. If you choose a stark pure white it will not tone down your kitchen.

Go to your nearest Home Depot or wherever you want to get your paint, find your tile color, then pick the white in that family. They should have paint cards like this:

Prize for most interesting backsplash of the day. A pro painter may charge a few thousand dollars to do an excellent job on the cabinets. If it's the mosaic backsplash (complete with broken Heineken beer bottle?!, etc.) that really is the number one thing not to your taste, then replace it for the same amount of money instead of painting the cabinets. Don't spend money to decorate around things you don't like.

The cabinets look like the "designer English cottage" style popularized by the Smallbone cabinet company in the late 1980's and early 1990s. Several US companies followed suit with similar fish and diamond fretwork and wooden dish racks. They were often shown with colorful handmade square tiles, not this style of mosaic. There's a Smallbone kitchen image (very much like yours) on this page: http://www.alamy.com/stock-photo/1980s-decor.html

Well I think the wine bottle holders really are a hoot.

apple pie and Beth H - your comments are well thought out. But to get what I want I would would have to both rip / out-replace the back splash and and the counter tops - I priced out both and ended up around $10K for what I want which is a blue & white Mexican tile back splash with white granite counter tops..

Also, we are still mulling over opening up one wall in two years, which would mean that some of that new counter top would be removed to blow out part of the island.

Painting the cabinets a neutral color seems like an acceptable short term solution given that I am not a huge fan of knotty pine, which means that they are getting painted either way.

This site is a great resource, glad I was able to amuse with my crazy kitchen.

PS apple pie that is totally our kitchen - excluding the back splash and the counters. What to you want to bet that the priortowners renovated that exact kitchen by replacing the back splash and counter-tops...

Thanks for explaining about the pine.

I don't remember where Smallbone labelled its cabinets. I think they had a small brass label somewhere, perhaps inside a drawer. Worth a look.

Thanks apple_pie will do. Like I said, this site is a great resource particularly when you are dealing with a fixer upper.

We have owned several residences, but this is the first time we bought a place with so many design decisions that have had to be made both inside and outside of the house. Much renovation was done in the last year and a half, but it's probably a five to six year total time frame to complete everything at the this point.

Skippy, I have been to Barcelona, but didn't make that connection! You may be right, of course Gaudi didn't used beer bottles.

Another source could be local for me, Watts Tower.

https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images?p=watts+tower+la+la+land&fr=mcafee&imgurl=http%3A%2F%2F3.bp.blogspot.com%2F-xBlQ4xhuE-U%2FUi6KQOitVzI%2FAAAAAAAAF0Y%2FAlUwv8GgCUA%2Fs1600%2FThe-Watts-Towers-23.jpg#id=0&iurl=http%3A%2F%2F3.bp.blogspot.com%2F-xBlQ4xhuE-U%2FUi6KQOitVzI%2FAAAAAAAAF0Y%2FAlUwv8GgCUA%2Fs1600%2FThe-Watts-Towers-23.jpg&action=click

And Watts tower could well have also been inspired by Gaudi for all I know.. Kind of fun to see the similarities..

How about painting the lower cabinets the green and the uppers match the white tile color?

Lots of good ideas suggested so far. Have fun! but first just one little dab of paint--asap--to cover over the doll face tile :)