Well hey there! It’s only been…. almost a year since I last posted. I can’t believe I’ve taken such a long break, and I can’t say I hated it! But I’m feeling ready to start sharing more both on here and on instagram; all things home, style (maternity-friendly items for the next few months!) and more. So settle in… this is gonna be a long one.
For those who missed it, we are pregnant with baby number two! Baby BOY will be making his debut in June, and we couldn’t be more excited. This pregnancy has been way different than my pregnancy with Lila, in the fact that I have been much sicker! It took me up until 16-17 weeks this time to start feeling semi-normal again. (Some of you may remember that we had multiple miscarriages before Lila. If you are trying to get pregnant or are experiencing loss, please know that I have been there before and don’t take pregnancy lightly. I am always here to talk! Please DM me on instagram or reach out here.)
Let’s get down to business! So many of you reached out during our kitchen remodel asking for sources, information, etc. and I am finally getting around to doing a full blog post on that. I’m sure at this point none of you care anymore (you probably completed your projects long ago!), but for those that do, here goes. (disclaimer - these photos were taken in the fall, so if you see a pumpkin here and there - that’s why). I’ll share some before / progress photos here but you can always go to my “KITCHEN” highlight on instagram to see the actual progress videos!
When we moved into our house, we were coming from a one bedroom duplex in Virginia Highlands that didn’t even have a dishwasher. When I walked into our tiny galley kitchen, I thought “This is the most amazing kitchen ever! It’s so big!” Ha - I quickly grew to hate it as Harrison and I bumped into each other every time we were cooking, there was no place for friends and family to gather while entertaining, and the final nail in the coffin was not being able to see / keep tabs on Lila while I was in the kitchen.
SO, after much deliberation and planning, we finally decided to pull the trigger this summer. Here’s an outline of what we did:
+ Removed wall that lined the living room and hallway coming from our front door
+Removed the wall between our living and kitchen (where the old stove, refrigerator and oven were)
+Added island in the spot where the wall used to be
+Moved our kitchen entry door to be between the new living and kitchen (there was a window here before, so we closed up the old doorway and added one to the window space)
+Removed old brick floors and continued hardwoods throughout
+All new cabinets, countertops, lighting, backsplash, etc.
+Added recessed lighting
+Removed old wood paneling in living room
Here’s a view of our kitchen before:
DEMO: Our entire renovation, from demo to move-in, took about 7-8 weeks. We were fortunate enough to be able to live in my parent’s house here in Roswell while they were in Florida. As many of you know, Harrison is incredibly handy and has done tons of remodeling projects at our house, the house we flipped, and for many others when we had our company Mimosa Design Co. He did all of the demo himself and with the help of awesome friends and family. We rented our dumpster through Bin There Dump That.
BEAMS: After demo, we had beams installed in the ceilings where the walls were. Harrison has an incredible framer that we have used in the past. If you’re local and want his info, let me know! We didn’t know if we were going to have to put a column in the island because of the load-bearing wall, and we did end up having to. But, I actually love how it turned out; we stained it the same color as our mantel so it kind of ties things together.
CABINETS: We decided the layout ourselves, drew it out, and shopped around at a couple of cabinet companies. For our project, we knew we didn’t need anything super high-end. We live in a small home and this project is going to allow us to be comfortable here for a couple more years. We went to Home Depot (whoa, pricey!), Lily Anne cabinets in Kennesaw (great prices, longer lead time than we wanted) and Builder’s Surplus where we had gotten the cabinets for our flip a few years ago. We chose Builder’s Surplus because the pricing for the quality, plus the lead time, was by far the best. We are super happy with how our cabinets turned out. Here’s the layout that Harrison did on an app called
DETAILS: I really wanted to tie in some black accents in the kitchen, so I went with a black island (I didn’t choose a specific black, just asked for true black paint. I found the blacks that we tried ended up pulling blue, purple, etc. and I just wanted a very BLACK paint.) Harrison fought me so hard on doing a black island but I LOVE how it turned out and love the contrast! Our perimeter cabinets are the standard white shaker cabinets from Builder’s Surplus. We had to have the island painted ourselves because they didn’t offer that cabinet color option.
I also tied in some black with these swing arm sconces over the sink and coffee bar. One of the things we had to think about with island pendant lighting was our ceiling height. We don’t have vaulted or high ceilings, so I wanted the lights to make a statement without being too big or in your line of sight. So, I opted for a “"see-through” option meaning you can look through the lanterns and see the other side of the kitchen. I love these lanterns because they’re big, classic, and the bulbs add a touch of modern.
I knew I wanted gold hardware, but really didn’t want it to look cheap, modern or trendy. I actually ordered several and ended up going with these from Home Depot. LOVE them!
Many of you have asked about our faucet. I actually had this in our old kitchen and love it. It’s linked here. We had a shallow area where our old bar used to be, so I wanted to make use of that space with floor to ceiling pantry cabinets and a coffee bar.
I knew I wanted quartz countertops. We had marble in our old kitchen and they were AWFUL. Never again will I put marble in a kitchen or bathroom. Every lemon squirt, every cup that got set down, you saw etching and rings. SO, I wanted something totally indestructible. I know all quartzes are named differently at different suppliers, but this was called Calcatta Palazzo. I LOVE the veining. We used Granite & Marble Solutions in Alpharetta as our fabricator, and found our stone at one of their suppliers.
Backsplash! This was such a tough choice for me. Half of me wanted to do something fun and different with color, but I know myself well enough to know that I would tire of that and want to change it pretty quickly. So, I chose this marble picket tile even though it was pretty pricey and have loved it. We did white grout.
OTHER MISCELLANEOUS THINGS: Of course this kitchen renovation turned into a full first-floor renovation for me. We added wallpaper to the dining room - this eggplant grasscloth has always been a favorite of mine and it looks so great behind my Alison Duncan painting. We added a new chandelier, sconces and chairs in our dining room to tie in the black accents throughout the first floor. We also added a stair runner to the stairs (I actually bought these antelope runners and The Carpet Lady installed them). It turned out fab, and I actually had a leftover runner that I used in the kitchen. I love this antelope print so much that I bought these pillows for the living room as well. Harrison re-did our mantel. He bumped it down a bit so that the TV wouldn’t sit so high, did shiplap and built a new mantel that we stained the same gray-natural wash as the column in the island. I scored our bar stools at the Ballard Outlet!
Art - I had been wanting a Meredith Mejerle piece for SO long, and I love how this turned out in our new space! I gave her my colors & dimensions, and she created this beautiful piece for the living room. She is so talented.
I get tons of questions about our sofas, coffee table, pillows, etc. all the time. Our sofas are custom from Bernhardt (the Albion sofa), and I am able to order these sofas through the manufacturer - so if you’re seriously interested, please reach out and I can provide pricing. My coffee table is discontinued, but I found it here. Our rug (which we have since changed… typical!) is linked here.
Am I missing anything? Feel free to ask in the comment section if you need something specific! See below for ALL the products from the post in one spot:
