So I think the secret with kitchen remodelers (or any sort of house remodeling contractors), is that you get so sick of living in weird, convoluted living spaces that you end up being happy with whatever the end result is, as long as it is finished!
Yes, we are remodeling the kitchen (and the little first floor bathroom and the pantry area). Here are some pics of what we started out with.
Hard to see the non-matching pendant lights because of the glare from the window. You can see the big cement slab on the floor, probably due to a wood-burning stove there at some point (the house is over 100 years old). The dishwasher is the only thing we are keeping from our appliances.
While the cabinets didn't look all that bad, they were REALLY cheap - you could hear the panels in the doors rattle when you shut them. And you can just barely see over our paper towel holder the self-applied (by a self other than us) undercabinet lighting. Halogen lights that got really hot and that were held up by little skinny nails with all the extension cords stuck to the cabinets with double sticky foam tape, which obviously didn't stick too well since you can see that bit falling down.
More non-matching pendant lights. I guess they matched in that they were all brass (non-matching) hardware and antique (I guess) shades. The refrigerator butted up against the wall, so I couldn't completely open the right hand side. And the red paint wasn't made to use in a kitchen - if I tried to wipe something off of it my paper towel came away all pink.
Our pantry area. A weird empty space between the kitchen and the bathroom. We found an Ikea shelf to use there, but we are getting a real pantry put there now. Not sure where we are going to store the brooms, etc., in the new configuration though.
The old bathroom. You can't see the horrible plumbing job under the pedestal sink, but it was very obvious and very much NOT a professionally done job.
Gutted kitchen (with the cement slab). Also the new plywood subfloor. We tore out the hardwood floors and are putting in tile. As much as we would have liked to keep wood, we have one finish in the dining room and another finish in the family room, and didn't think we would be able to match either one and we didn't think three different types of wood next to each other would look good.
Other side of gutted kitchen. Interesting when we pulled the walls off to see what was underneath. Looks like a framed door area above behind where the cabinets were.
Gutted bathroom. This was really interesting. Once again found what appeared to be a door frame that was covered up by what looked like an old tabletop or something like that. And a window-shaped area over where the sink was. But since the stairs go along that wall to the left and turn and continue up the wall you can't see, I have no idea what a door there would have led to. I'd love to get my hands on blueprints of earlier incarnations of our house.
Here's our temporary kitchen. Microwave and toaster oven from friends. Coffee pot behind. Lack of counter space (and water on the first floor) is killing me.
Our temporary pantry. Yep, right near the TV.
Enough pics for today. Tomorrow I can show off some of our drywall and tile work.
