This 1804 Farmhouse Family Kitchen Gets a Transformation with Double the Storage (and Appliances!)
ABOUT THIS BEFORE & AFTER
HOME TYPE: Historic Home
PROJECT TYPE: Kitchen
STYLE: Cottage, Farmhouse, Traditional
SKILL LEVEL: Professional
RENTAL FRIENDLY: No
If there’s one piece of advice homeowners provide time and time again for major kitchen renovations, it’s to plan for extra: extra time, extra materials, and, of course, extra budget needed to finish the project.
That rang true in Rebecca Reece’s (@reecesreno) kitchen transformation. When she and her family were planning their kitchen reno, they had only seen photos of the space and didn’t realize exactly how much work it would take to give the kitchen a new lease on life. “Have a very big buffer pot!” Rebecca advises. But she also says “the after is [her] dream space,” so in the end, the time and major dollar signs were worth it.
The kitchen required a total gut reno.
Rebecca and her husband and three children’s home is a farmhouse built in 1804, and Rebecca says it had seen years of botched DIY jobs. “It was damp, cold, and structurally unsound,” Rebecca says. It needed extensive professional work to make sure it was safe to use. “The kitchen started with being completely stripped back to brick and sand floor,” Rebecca explains.
The vision was to extend the kitchen to the right and make one large living, kitchen, and dining area, including a playroom. Almost the entire back of the house had to be demolished and rebuilt, “as it was so structurally unsound,” Rebecca says.
But the kitchen remains mostly in the same corner as before — and the old cabinets are now used in a utility room.
The kitchen has a new green and gray color scheme.
The new kitchen features a large green (Little Greene’s Obsidian Green) island, tan-gray (Farrow & Ball’s Cornforth White) cabinets, dramatic marble, and double the appliances. One of Rebecca’s favorite parts of the kitchen is that they now have two fridges: a food fridge and a drinks fridge.
She also loves the large island, but in hindsight says she might’ve left a wood finish — and she would’ve added legs underneath it so she can see the new flooring.
And speaking of new flooring, that’s another one of Rebecca’s favorite pieces of the puzzle. “I did a lot of research and comparison into flooring to get the best deal,” she says.
The large, open concept is great for hosting.
Rebecca calls the renovated kitchen “the perfect social space,” and says it’s seen lots of holiday hosting since its completion. She especially loves that it connects to the garden out back.
“The space allows for fun [and] entertaining — for us to live as a family in one functional space,” she says. “It is warm and cozy, but large and spacious.”
Inspired? Submit your own project here.
Further Reading
I Just Discovered the Smartest Way to Store Paper Towels in Your Kitchen (It’s a Game-Changer!)
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