I recently had a major flood in my kitchen.

I loved my kitchen.

Everything had to be pulled out of the room. The cabinetry was not salvagable. The floor and even the subfloor were destroyed. The threat of mold and the level of dust forced us to move out of our apartment.

But there is a silver lining here: I get to design a new kitchen.

Time to think about the space in a fresh way. I didn’t want to recreate what I had because I’m not the same person I was when I first designed the kitchen seventeen years ago. And being a designer, I have the need to make things as beautiful as I can and there are always new ways to do that.

Here is my plan. I am changing all the surfaces to lighter colors. I’m opening up the space by replacing all upper cabinets with two floating shelves. LED lighting is replacing halogen. I am moving from stainless steel countertops and backsplashes to glacier white corian tops and white marble back splashes that go to the ceiling. The half of my kitchen that was stainles will be brushed aluminum, which has a lighter, airier feel. The other half of the kitchen was an anegre veneer, which will be replaced by a chestnut veneer that is pickled to read warm, light grey in tone. The floating shelves will be of the same veneer.

I think the new kitchen will feel uplifting to be in. I can’t wait to cook my first meal there.

Look out for updates and more photos in the coming weeks!

SK