Saturday, September 24, 2016

Cabinets and Chair

Well I bit the bullet and started to build the cabinets for the kitchen.  I'm still not sure about the uppers but I've got the lowers built. 

I actually borrowed an idea from Babettesmom over at Cramped Quarters.  When she did the Undersized Urbanite contest she had a huge problem making her kitchen cabinets.  I loved her solution and thought the look was perfect for my house.  You can go read her post here, it's really funny especially as I'm a huge Kitchen Nightmares fan myself.

I haven't stained them yet or added the hardware or the countertops, but here's what I have so far.


The small one will go between the stove and the fridge, the large one on the opposite side of the stove.

For the uppers I was thinking of using some of the House of Miniatures kits I have.  I've got a couple like this:



Maybe altering the glass fronts to some thin wood.  Not sure yet.  I don't know that I want the uppers to be that tall.  Have to think a bit about it.

I've got the counters glued together, just wood with two edges sanded to a gentle curve.  And the contact paper I ordered arrived Friday.  It's not quite as pretty as what I originally hoped to use but it's nice and light and looks like granite.  See?



See? I added a ruler for scale.  Kind of important.

It has the cream and tan and some darker browns so while it isn't as dramatic I think it'll work nicely.  And it's to scale.  Plus I got a whole roll for ten bucks. Which is a nice bargain. 

I don't want to put everything together until after I've stained the cabinets.  But I'm pleased with the day's progress considering I've never made from scratch cabinets before.  (Much more difficult than making cake from scratch. Not as tasty either.)

The other bit of progress I made was the chair for the bedroom.  I decided to use the same green as I did for the curtain cornices.  It's subtle and will look nice in the corner.



It has a soft, semi worn look to it that I like.  A nice little cushion stuffed in the corner and it's a cozy place to read.

The other bit of news is that while I was looking for my Chrynsbon bathroom accessories I found my kitty cat cushions from Brae!  I was so excited!  I also found the bed pillows I'd ordered at the same time.  So I might take a break from the counters, since I have to wait for the glue to dry, and play with the bolster bed and bedding for it.

That could be a fun use of the evening.



8 comments:

  1. I like your lower cabinet solution and the counter material, too! I think they are going to look really nice together! Maybe on the uppers you could leave the doors off. With the exposed brick, it will have a modern loft kind of vibe so the open cupboards would be a nice compliment. Plus, you could buy some special minis to display there!

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  2. I'm actually planning on open shelves over the sink and cabinet on the other wall. I've got some pretty little brackets that I'm going to paint metallic black and stain some boards so I have two open shelves there.

    I thought about having glass fronted cabinets but that's a lot of open shelving and I want some of the kitchen to have closed cabinets for food. I tend to keep pots and pans in my lower cabinets and food and dishes in the uppers. So I figured dishes on the open shelves. I've got some pretty Fiestaware type dishes.

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  3. Your chair looks great! I like the kits for the uppers. It makes me think of old kitchens from the 1930's. I totally agree that cake from scratch would taste better. Or at least I would assume it does. I've never eaten lower cabinets before 😂

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  4. Thanks! I was really pleased with how it turned out. Took me half the week but better to take my time and get it right than do it fast and have it look awful.

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  5. The cabinets look great Sheila. I agree with you having just a few shelves open to display the odd kitchen stuff..too many open shelves in a real life kitchen look contemporary but are also huge dust collectors. Nice chair too :0)

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  6. Thank you! I'm going to stain them today and hopefully figure out the uppers. I'm going to be measuring my own kitchen trying to determine how high off the counters they should go.

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  7. The cabinets look great, nice job. I like the contact paper, I think it will be a good fit.

    In older houses uppers were hung 18" above the counter, now it's 21".

    Nice job on the chair, too.

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  8. Thank you! I was thrilled with the paper when it arrived. I've got pictures of the assembled cabinets I'm going to post in a bit. As soon as my back gives out and I can't deal with anymore mini-ing.

    My house was built in the sixties so I measured my uppers from the countertops. 15 inches! Can you believe it? No wonder my mixer won't fit under the cabinets. I'm going with 18 because it just seemed to look better. Nice to know my instincts were on target!

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