Thanks Beth. Our current kitchen is black & white, which I love! The only thing is how would the black go with brown joinery? We couldn't afford to replace or paint the joinery round the entire house. Also, the timber cbd fronts need to be replaced or painted, as they are very faded in places and quite marked. Definitely agree about the light fixtures!

can you show me the timber cbd fronts that need redoing?

as for the black trim,,where do you see the brown joinery issue? if you do the black around the window in the island,,,and possible the ceiling beams, what else did you mean? If you mean the casing around the doorway, you could do that black as well and that crown molding, I'd remove it or paint it whatever you paint the ceiling timber

Beth, we would really like to replace the cupboard fronts... especially those little glass ones up the top... whether they could be fixed or not;) Will post a photo of the aluminium windows from the exterior of the house.. This shows the colour of the joinery better than those inside pics.

I think I would prefer to paint the ceiling beams same colour as the ceiling or remove.

Thx.

ah,,ok then. yes, I'd paint. as for the cupboards, could you get them refaced? perhaps a custom cabinet maker can make new ones for you. or were you just thinking of ripping out the entire room?

I’m normally the first one to tell you to paint over wood cabinets, but I actually really like these! I think they could look really stunning with a dark textured floor - a simple almost black tile, kind of a slate look. You can find really inexpensive tile like this that looks great. The ceiling definitely needs some work - removing those beams, getting some recessed lighting, and adding a chandelier over the island will make a big difference. Would be cool to tile those whole walls by the windows so the backsplash extends from countertop to ceiling.

I know that you said that the countertops need to stay due to budget. But you also said that you’re replacing the floors - I would personally keep the floors, keep the wood cabinets, and then replace the counters and redo the ceiling and lighting.

For the glass cabinets - maybe you can replace the glass with a wire mesh or a different type of glass? That can change the look significantly.

Your wood cabinets sort of look like these wood cabinets, and I think these are very nice and contemporary and sort of Scandinavian in feel.

This is the type of dark textured tile I was talking about - we used it in the kitchen at our beach house and it looks great and was very inexpensive. You can also see how we tiled the whole wall around the window instead of stopping the backsplash halfway up the wall.

Thanks Beth. Definitely not planning on ripping out the whole kitchen. Although I do want to remove the end unit beside the fridge - too messy and no use to me. I would replace this with a tall tower cupboard to match whatever we do around the fridge. Hopefully paint to match whatever we do for the tower. So mostly just replace the cabinet fronts. We do need to remove the flooring though, because we have some internal walls at the other end of the room that we are removing... and because I really hate the flooring!! Hoping for a light wood look for that. Thanks for your help.

Hello Hduns. Will have a think about the tile idea... could look nice & tidy around the windows. We have to replace the flooring as there is a wall we're removing down the dining end of this room and I think the whole room would look better in the same flooring. Would prefer lighter floor also. Thanks for your help.

I really like the cabinets but the floor doesn't look good. Would go with wood look Salvage porcelain tile - it's light brown and for the lightest option you can go with Honey variety.

a black slate (more of a dark gray) can look great in a modern style kitchen.

The wood look tiles though, be careful as some can look rather cheesy. they are fast becoming dated because of this. have you considered some fossilized bamboo? this one from CaliBamboo is one of the better qualities. (they have all colors)

porcelain tile option

or, think about feathering in some of the black hex tiles like this, or doing a cool effect w/lighter and darker tiles in a herringbone.

If you are going to put in a faux wood floor, I prefer the Coretek flooring vs. tile flooring. Looks more realistic, is softer to walker on and not as cold. We are doing our basement in the Whitney Oak color

Thanks All for your comments & ideas. I've had a re-think on the timber cabinets... see pic below with what I have come up with. Will remove the timber beams and existing light fittings. Wondered about adding a large black centre light over the island, white tiles around rangehood and windows, and timber barstools matching the cabinets. Also will stick to the light colour timber look flooring. And black toekicks to match the tall cabinets. What do you think? Any further suggestions?

maybe a black sputnik light?

I think you have to be very careful with the wood floor and how it will coordinate with the cabinets. Something that matches it will look like too much of that orangey wood tone. Something really dark wouldn't read as wood but would look like just a dark floor. Something light might look a little strange with the tone of the cabinets depending on its color. So it is hard to know how this would look with the black cabinets without knowing the tone of the wood-look floors you're planning to get.

True point hduns.