Progress on kitchen cabinetry

Recently installed upper cabinet doors.  Next step is to order glass and install.


Putting the finishing touches on the construction of the upper cabinet that goes over the refrigerator.

Kitchen coat and shoe built-in

The space between our laundry room door (stained) and the backdoor (painted red temporarily) is to become a set of shoe storage shelves, a bank of drawers for coat and glove storage, and an open coat cubby with hooks to hang coats, sweaters, etc. We've constantly got coats all over the house and piles of shoes by each door. This built-in should serve a much needed purpose. In addition, the lower shoe shelf will also feature a small opening larger enough for the cats to access their litter box in the laundry room. This project is one on a long list necessary to finish our kitchen remodel.

To construct the cabinet, we used mostly vertical grain fir that's was salvaged from an old school cabinet (minus the drawers which are face grain. We're using drawers salvaged from another piece of furniture. The cabinet is made up of two pieces - the first being the base with the shoe selves and drawers, and second is the upper coat storage cubby.

All of the salvaged lumber has been sanded of it's original finish and cut to size. Next up so to start staining so that the cabinet can be put together.

Check back here for updated photos as the projects progresses.

Kitchen 2.0

I've been whining about this "kitchen" since we moved in.



After a year of planning and collecting I finally took the week of Xmas off and started to really tear into it.



There were major setbacks, a foot of snow, electrical decisions, my (well deserved) fear of drywall, a sudden need to re-lay 60 squares of the kitchen floor, another project wherein I drunkenly offered to build a wheelchair ramp for a friend (in the foot of snow), and some appliance mysteries to boot. But the first bank of new cabinets with a cooktop and built in oven are in place.



Soon I will install the face of the cabinets which I have already assembled and then put in cement board on the upper wall for tile. Then on to installing the prep sink and the copper vent hood, the oak butcher block counter and the grand finale, an in-counter grill.



Ill get into the specifics on further steps later, but just a few notes on this section. The oak raised panel cabinets were salvaged from a Seattle home remodel as were the cooktop, the built in oven, the faucet, the garbage disposal unit, and the copper vent hood. The prep sink was bought new to match the large farm sink that will go on the other side of the kitchen. It took 6 months to collect all the parts, and there were several changes to the plan based on availability of better material. The copper vent hood just voted the stainless hood off the island last week. Keeping my plan loose and taking my time to prepare has led me to a remodel at substantially less cost with little impact on the environment.

As for the environmental impact, I try every way possible to mitigate my consumptive nature. While pulling down the lath and plaster I separated the lath so it can be recycled as clean wood. My previous set of cabinets were donated to the salvage store so they can hopefully end up in someones garage or retro kitchen. There are three parts to the logo "Reduce, Re-use, Re-cycle" we've got to remember that re-cycle is the last of them.