Yellow, Gray, and Turquoise Kitchen

Our kitchen is by far my most favorite room in our home.  When we began the building process of our home a little over three years ago, I started to research kitchens. We built two homes before this one and I was unhappy with both of the kitchens we previously lived in.  The choices I had made left me feeling trapped and unable to decorate and use the colors that I wanted to.  This time, I was determined to do things differently.

  My scientific research included hot chocolate and stacks of kitchen and home magazines at the Barnes and Noble cafe.  My husband and I spent a few hours pouring over beatiful images of kitchens and making notes of what we wanted.  I didn't read lifestyle/home decor blogs back then.  Heck, I didn't really even know they existed.  It wasn't until I started to do more research for lights, flooring, hardware, and doors that I stumbled across home blogs.  I was immediately hooked and they all helped tremendously during the process.

I have lived in many homes growing up, and all of them had always had cabinets that were dark rich wood.  It was just the norm for my immediate and extended family. As a matter of fact, I think it may be a regional thing for where I live.  Very traditional, very tuscan influenced. As beautiful as dark wood kitchens can be, I craved a change. As I flipped through the magazines I began to see a pattern.  There were hardly any dark wooded kitchens.  Most of the kitchens in the magazines and most of the ones I was drawn to were white and light kitchens.  As silly as it sounds, I hadn't even considered this for our new home.  It was uncharted and unfamiliar territory for me and way outside of my comfort zone. 

 

 

After many sleepless nights and way too much overthinking, I decided to say goodbye to dark kitchens.  I met with our builder's interior designer and the cabinet company and they created a custom creamy white color for us.  The samples they had in the showroom were either too stark white or way to yellowish.  The designer I worked with was thrilled that I was going to do white cabinets.  Like I mentioned earlier, dark wood cabinets are the norm for the area and our designer was excited that I was breaking away from the norm.  Months after making our choices for the kitchen, it finally all came together.  I think that is one of the hardest parts of building a home.  It takes a long time to see your ideas and choices come to fruition so that means lots of time to overthink and drive yourself absolutely crazy with self doubt.  I'm happy to say, that I couldn't be more pleased with how it all turned out!  With the exception that I didn't go with a subway tile backsplash, but that's a story for another day!  Let me show you around a bit...

 

 

This is the dining area, we are lucky that it is a large space so we have room for a table that seats 8-10 and room for a small settee for additional seating. We opted to choose a floor plan that did not have a formal dining room.  It just seemed like a waste of space for our young family and lifestyle. My dining table and chairs are from World Market.  They are fantastic in quality for the price that we paid.  I searched high and low for a good quality set that would last us for years, and three years later I'm confident to say I found it.

My settee is from Overstock, and I don't currently see it on their site, but they have a great selection of settees in some really unique fabrics and colors.  This is my third set of curtains.  They are from Crate and Barrel and I just love them.  Since purchasing them, I have seen some great knockoffs on Etsy for half the price, so don't forget to check that out if you like them.  It took three tries to get the curtains right, but isn't that how it always goes for the elementary designer?  I've actually had about six pairs of curtains up there at some point, but three of them I was able to return.  The others I lived with for a year at a time and decided that they just weren't working for the space.

 

I found my rug for a steal at the Pottery Barn outlet.  It's actually from West Elm and still available.  You can find it here.  I've had it for about a year and so far it has served it's purpose to bring a bit of color into the space and it's wearing well.  Thankfully there haven't been any major spills on it. 

I love having a pot filler even though I don't always remember to use it.  We got ours at a great price on Overstock. 

My island bar stools are also from World Market.  They were being discontinued so we picked up the pair for a little over 100 dollars.  Holla!  I've since painted them using Annie Sloan's chalk paint.  The jury is still out on that one, I'm thinking it's mostly operator error on my part and inexperience with painting furniture.  Let's just say it didn't go as smoothly has I had hoped and had been promised by the hundred's of bloggers that went before me.  You can see our island cabinet and floors are a darker wood.  I think it gives the room warmth and is a nice balance to the white cabinets.

Our sink area has a nice little window ledge that is great for seasonal vignettes or growing herbs and houseplants.  I bought some  geometric patterned fabric from JoAnns to create some no sew curtain panels and also to line the backs of my glass cabinets seen below. 

The glass cabinets are my favorite part of the kitchen. When we built three years ago, I knew I wanted some glass cabinets to showcase some pieces. I didn't really have anything to showcase, but I wasn't going to let that stop me. I picked up some inexpensive dishes from IKEA and filled it with a couple of baskets I found on clearance at Pier One. I spent less than 50 dollars on everything.  To add color and interest, I cut a piece of cardboard the same dimensions of the cabinet and used spray adhesive to glue some fabric onto it. It lines the cabinet and it can easily be changed out if I decide to change colors or grow tired of it. So far I'm really enjoying the look of it and love how much more dimension it gives the cabinet.

 

This is the small hall where our pantry is located and on the adjacent wall I set up an area to display my twin boy's art work. Our fridge is not magnetic and I definitely wanted a place to showcase their masterpieces. There is an A and J on the wall for their initials and I purchased the bulletin board at the Pottery Barn outlet. It's difficult to tell because the hall is small and it's hard to get a good picture, but the bulletin board is quite large.
 

And just for fun, here is a look at our kitchen's past

 

 During the construction process.

 

 

 About 3 months after moving in.

 

 

Told you it took me a few tries to get it right!

 

Planning the details of our kitchen was by far the most stressful part of building our home. I had so much trepidation about having white cabinets after living in dark wood kitchens my entire life, but we absolutely love it.  Are you a painted white cabinet lover or a warm darker wood type person?  Both looks can be beautiful, but for now I consider myself a painted wood convert.