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The Old House Remodeling Kitchens

Finally done - 1940s Kitchen Remodel

3 years ago

We are finally done with our kitchen/laundry remodel! Five years ago I posted here asking for advice on updating the layout of our small 1940 era home:

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/3185147/can-the-awkward-layout-in-my-little-old-house-be-fixed#n=27

I hoped to update the layout and functionality of the kitchen while retaining some of the 1940s charm of the house. It was a long road getting here but I am happy with how it turned out.

Before pictures:

Old kitchen as viewed from the breakfast nook.

Old dining room view- see kitchen through the doorway. The kitchen pantry was located behind the built-in cabinet.

As part of the remodel we ended up opening up the pantry/built in cabinet so that traffic from the garage/laundry doesn’t have to go through the kitchen. We also removed the wall separating the kitchen from the breakfast nook and extended the countertop run into the nook. Two large pantry/utility cabinets were added in the laundry room since we lost the old hallway pantry.

New kitchen pics, same vantage point as the old:

The tile has a little bit of blue in it that is hard to see in the pictures. We also had the dining room hardwood refinished.

I still need to find a small table and couple of chairs to put in the breakfast nook, and add some decor to the walls and shelves, but that will be the easy part!

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Comments (7)

mama goose_gw zn6OH
3 years ago
Very nice! I love that you stayed true to the vintage style and made the floor the star of the show!
eam44
3 years ago
How beautiful! Enjoy it in the best of health.
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Beautiful Kitchen it is exactly what I would like to do. Did you paint your cabinets? I have custom red oak cabinets from the 1980's. I know they are made very well all solid oak with the shelving that pulls out like drawers. I would like to have my cabinets professionally refinished in a painted white finish. Last week we brought one of the doors as a sample to a cabinetmaker/refinisher & he said you can not paint oak. He also said that the quality of the cabinets are so good that they could not be replicated now. He said he could either stain them another color or whitewash them. I am hoping he is wrong & I can find someone to do a great job refinishing them in a white paint finish. Laura
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I love the kitchen! Once you cook in it for a while, you will figure out what you really want to change. You may find you just love being in such a charming place. I wanted to keep my vintage kitchen, but desperately needed counter space. I spent a lot of time figuring how to have both. Give yourself some time to decide your priorities for your kitchen. Here is a link to my reveal. http://ths.gardenweb.com/discussions/2705950/vintage-kitchen-update Lisa
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Thanks @Dream, I am loving it so far! Extremely functional, went moderate on appliances and spent a little more to get the functionality things I wanted (2 tier cutlery drawer, lower lazy Susan to avoid dead corner [which holds every appliance I own], roll out bottom trays). I think it was all worth it, its so easy to use. I've forgot to mention this earlier but I have been VERY happy with my Woodland Cabinets (Artizan line). About 6 months post-remodel and have had no issues at all. The faucet (Moen Indi) works well, I like it! I picked it for its relatively minimalist appearance and thought it would work well with the understated cabinet faces and louder counter/backsplash, and of course to match the finish of the sink and appliances.
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megs1030
3 years ago
Love it! Especially the floor tile. Great job!
Toronto Veterinarian
3 years ago
Lovely!
lafdr
3 years ago
Beautiful!
User
3 years ago
last modified: 3 years ago
Its lovely-- very cute floor tile. But I gotta say I kinda like what you had to start with. I know those hinges are just not what the designers of today think is best but they do have such a cottagey charm. I am a little sad they are gone. And why remove the beams from the ceiling? That's another pure cottage element that is unique to this era of house.
mandyann_
Original Author
3 years ago
Thank you! I hated to have to get rid of any of the original elements of the house, and tried to salvage what we could. The cabinet hinges and hardware were not original though and were probably added sometime in the early 70s when the house was moved to its present location. The wood ceiling did not extend to the breakfast nook and unfortunately when we removed the wall between the nook and kitchen, we found that the ceilings did not line up properly and had to do some work to correct that. There have been a lot of changes to the house that predated us. When we took down the walls in the breakfast nook we found that there originally had been 5 windows- at some point previous owners decided to board them up and drywall over the top!

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